First, let me apologize once again for taking so long to write in my blog. School has been all-consuming these past weeks and things are finally starting to wind down. A lot has happened recently, so here is a brief update:
I have managed to stay on top of school this semester by spending a fair amount of time practicing and researching in the library. I just finished the first draft to a huge term paper which is due in two weeks. It required a lot of reading and research, but I am thrilled that it is almost finished. I have two final exams on May 6th and then I will have completed my first year of graduate school. It has been a great learning experience for me, but I am glad that I am almost halfway done with my Master's degree! Time really is flying by very quickly. I have been practicing saxophone as much as possible and I have been fortunate enough to play for church services on several occasions. I was also asked to participate in the premiering of a new work for saxophone quartet, which was very exciting.
I have four part-time jobs that serve to keep me very busy when I am not doing school-related work. I teach private music lessons for Takelessons. Through this company, I teach two trumpet students, one trombone/guitar student, one flute student, and one guitar student. I am really putting my Music Education degree to good use! I am still working for the USC School of Music Outreach Program by teaching music lessons to local music students and accompanying a children's choir once a week. In addition to all of this, I have been teaching saxophone/guitar lessons as a private teacher out of my own studio.
I have continued to work with Grayson Palmer on several projects and I am really excited about what the future has in store. We worked on the theme music for ASST, which is a great web-series that can be viewed on-line. We are also working on some other film scores. He has been helping me work on my own material, which has taken longer than I would have liked, but we have been getting some great tracks laid down lately and I am excited to finally share them with you. The plan is to have an acoustic EP available sometime in May.
Here is a link to ASST:
http://www.asstseries.com/
I will be moving back to Texas at the beginning of May (which is really soon) and I cannot wait to be home. I miss my family, church family, Julie, and my friends very much. I have a lot of things already planned for the summer. I will be working with some summer band programs. I am going to be playing some small acoustic shows in order to get some exposure for my solo stuff. I am also going to be playing some gigs with my band, NOVA. We just released our debut album on iTunes and I am really excited for everyone to hear the songs. I believe that we will be recording another batch of freshly-written songs at the end of May.
My summer plans also include checking items off of the "Summer 2011 Bucket-List." You should read Julie's blog to see what I am on about (http://justjuliec.blogspot.com). I will also be spending a lot of time with friends and family.
Here are some links to check out NOVA's album, Love Revolution:
https://www.facebook.com/novatheband
http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/love-revolution/id427653476
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004T6V5EQ/ref=dm_sp_alb?ie=UTF8&qid=1302824599&sr=8-1
Thank you for reading my short update. I am really going to try hard to keep this blog up to date, but we will see how successful I am!
Take care and may God bless you.
