Today I spent the better part of my afternoon in Barnes & Noble working on class schedules and trying to resolve scheduling quirks that have me teaching and sitting in a class simultaneously. While the similarity of the situation is comforting (it reminds me of those 4 years of school, music, and work), it also reminds me that the workload of a graduate student is about to come back.
I don’t think any of the eleven of us would say we’re ready for this.
As much as I knew going in that I was going to be busy this semester, I don’t think I was quite prepared for what was going to ensue. I’m still pretty much perpetually behind, but I’ve realized I need to make a concerted effort to keep up with things that are not strictly logical (read: writing, art) to balance out the logic or I’m going to go crazy.
I miss writing music like crazy, but I’m hoping things will all even out in the next few months.
I have so much to put up from camp this last week (it was really a great week), but the first thing I wanted to upload was our complete set list for camp. I put this list together initially for all the kids and youth leaders, but it’s a very interesting deal to see how the songs flowed together over the week – all 47 of them!
It’s also interesting to see how the “old songs that hopefully everyone knows” list changes (and did change) year-over-year. This year it was as if we were finally at a point where the well-known songs were more “Hosanna” and “All Because of Jesus” than “Sanctuary” and “Pharaoh, Pharaoh.” That made everything immensely easier and more productive; in general, we were teaching songs like “Spring of Life” and “Beautiful the Blood,” not “Hapy Day” or “Marvelous Light.” All in all, I thought the whole endeavour was immensely successful and I know we all came away lifted a bit.
The List…
Great camp… good fun. Lot’s more coming later, but I am exhausted.
UPDATE: Some more interesting-but-possibly-meaningless statistics. We played 25 individual songs which break down as follows: 7 songs were played 3x, 8 songs were played 2x, and we threw another 10 in as one-offs. I find statistics interesting, but I don’t really know that these mean anything.
Martha and I just got our diplomas back all framed & nice — crazy. It’s still a little surreal that I’ve graduated, but on to the next thing — we’re getting married in 4 days!
I picked up our wedding bands from Diamonds Direct today — it’s a bit of a story, but it was going to be a big deal if they were ready for the wedding in two weeks. The fact that they were ready today (yesterday, actually) is unbelievable.
Both Martha and myself are going to be at camp this week with Port City Church, so hopefully it will make the week go by quickly. After that, we only have one week to go!
I’m almost ashamed to describe what I’m working on right now — I’m trying very hard to sound like the ever-popular & much-maligned T-Pain. Somehow the fact that I’m working on this for a church camp only slightly mitigates the guilt… the crime I am committing against music is so severe.
Music-as-a-whole: I apologize (click below for sound byte).
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