dobry den!

Hey what's up?

I am waiting for my friend to get out of class at the moment so she can help me do some educated backpack shopping. I am leaving on Friday early morning for Italy, I have all my hostels booked and everything double checked with the friends that I am staying with. I am super excited except for the fact that I have a pretty bad cold right now and I have four midterms tomorrow.....in a row. I guess you all know how good I will be feeling tomorrow at 3:00pm.

So...what have I been up to lately?

Leah and two of her friends came to visit me last weekend. It was my first time playing tour guide because Nicole ended up missing her flight from Milan to Prague two weekends ago because a bus never came or something like that. I felt really bad but I hope that she ended up having a nice time in Milan for the afternoon. She said she may try one more time to get over here. So I took Leah and her friends to the normal places...the Prague Castle (Prazske Hrad), the Charles Bridge (Cecuv most), Old Town Square (staromestska). We saw a wonderful concert at the Rudolfinum that turned out to be a jazz trio that I saw on Thursday night at U stare pani (my favorite jazz club here) only at the Rudolfinum they played with a filhormonie behind them as well as a guest saxophone player who bordered on cheesy and also the most amazing violin player I have ever heard in my life (second to Aunt Amy of course). He looked to be in his 20s and he must have been a child prodigy...he had BRIGHT red looong hair and he was wearing black converse sneakers on the stage that everyone else was wearing tuxes and dress clothing. It was a LOT of fun. I think they enjoyed themselves, it was really nice to see a face from home. It was also really funny because they were from Florence and BOTH my roommates had friends visiting from Florence. In our room for the weekend we had three NYU in Prague girls and three NYU in Florence people. And as it turned out, none of the NYU in Florence people knew each other. It is a MUCH bigger program than in Prague.

The weekend before that a lot of people were visiting but like usual I wasn't feeling completely healthy. I tried to stay low key and do my work so that I would have an easy week and be ready for Leah to come. I think I saw a couple of jazz shows and hung around getting work done.

For all of you who want to come to Prague (haha)...the date to come is December 7th. That is the date of my concert. I am playing a monteverdi opera excerpt with my friends....the instrumentation is Alto saxophone, Harp and Dobro (for those of you who don't know what a Dobro is you should definitely look it up!) I am also playing Pacabelle's canon, with sax, trumpet, harp and violin. It sounds pretty awesome and funky. Not the most common group of instruments to put together. I think I am also going to be playing the Creston Sonata with my friend accompanying me on Piano because they told us that we were welcome to play any solo pieces that we wanted. I have my work cut out for me because I am going to be away all this week, but I am up for the challenge.

I think I failed to mention this but a couple of weeks I went to a horn festival, also at the Rudolfinum. It was one of the most amazing shows I have ever seen in my life. It started out with a french horn octatet playing some standards and then intermission. After intermission this man came out with his french horn and also an alpine horn. He started out playing his french horn. He played what sounded like a bassline then we realized that he was recording himself with a foot pedal. So the next second he was playing back what he had just recorded and jamming with it! He did that for about five horn lines and it sounded sooo cool. Then he put his horn away and took out the alpine horn, and I was in the first row for this...I could almost touch the bell of the horn. He was playing and beat boxing into the horn. It was like nothing I have ever heard. He could also circle breathe so he took a couple moments to show off and hold the note for like 5 minutes. It was very entertaining. Then he got the other horn players out and they played a couple of his compositions.

So I am all cleared to register for next semester. It is a little strange to think about now, but my registration date is in the middle of my journey. I think I will be in Florence, but Leah has wireless internet in her room so as long as I plan ahead I don't think I will end up running into any issues.

Jessica's class let out so it is time to find me a cheap backpack that I can carry and fit my life into for 10 days. I hope everything is going well with everyone at home. I miss you all!

Emma