Measures of growth

The orchestra is ready to start giving concerts. We have had a great residency, full of chamber music concerts and dancing and rehearsals. The food is good, but I have never eaten so much meat at once in my life. Not sure how I feel about it.
I asked Alex Klein, the oboe coach (and former principal oboe of the Chicago Symphony) to give me a lesson. I was nervous about asking him, but he was like "let's go now." So we did. We talked a little about being a musician and being selfish. His opinion is that artists are selfish, and that it's a good thing. It's a necessary thing. You have to have an opinion about everything - both on music and in the world. And it must be an educated opinion and one that you can express with conviction. I feel that my playing has been very subservient and apologetic recently. So I got out of my little box. I played a movement of the Bach partita for him. I haven't felt this creatively challenged in at least a year, maybe more. I felt open enough to have crazy ideas, and then he helped me organize those crazy ideas into something that had flow, logic, and narrative. What a great teacher.
Tonight we will have an open dress rehearsal for donors and special guests here at the hotel. Then tomorrow we will play a concert in Villavicencio and then the next day on to Ibague.