February 6, 2014

• From a Former Teacher

  Dear Connie:
  I was thrilled to receive your postcard from Tokyo!! Thank you so much for remembering me! I am wondering where you ran into my current address and my married name (Sydow). I kept the Stackhouse part even though’ my first marriage ended about 3 decades ago. I am married now to Larry—best guy in the world and we live here in Erie!

  I also remember teaching at Niskayuna HS—that was a long time ago!

  I am so glad you are keeping up with the flute and your second hand collection has some really nice brands in it. Keep it up!

  I retired from the Erie Chamber Orchestra several years ago (I was a founding member of that orchestra and principal for over 35 years) and I am now devoting my time to volunteer work even though I am still a member of the musicians union. I love playing at various churches in this area and I also volunteer as a teacher at the Neighborhood Art House—run by the Benedictine Nuns—free lessons in music, art, sculpture and dance for children from our inner city! It is very rewarding and just the way I had hoped to end my career.

  Thanks so much for keeping in touch. I will look forward to hearing from you.
  Love, Holly

  hn_lr.sydow_erie@neo.rr.com

  Long winded answer:

  Dear Holly (is it all right to call you that?),

  I was very happy to receive your email! I often remember people from my past and wonder how they are, and hope that they are doing well. I also look back at myself and feel that I need to thank the people who I now realize were important to shaping my future.

  I found you on the Internet. Someone has made a page on Facebook about you and your address was listed there along with your current name. If you want it taken down the address to the page is https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Stackhouse-Sydow-Holly/164040086955627 You might need a Facebook account to do this. Besides me, there are seven other people who "Liked" your pags. I can give you their names if you want.

  As I said, I was probably not one of your better students, and I thank you for your patience. I had no understanding of the Altes exercises, and probably did not have enough eye-hand coordination (excuses, excuses) to be able to get through them smoothly. I kept the book but threw it out a couple of years ago, to my great relief! BUT, I have a sister in law who is a professional flutist (Alycia Hugo http://www.liberty.edu/academics/music/musicandperformingarts/?PID=15092 - plays in the Roanoke Symphony) and when I told her that I had thrown Altes out she immediately sent me a new book and told me to give it another try, and I am working on it again. Alycia is also the one who suggested that it was time for me to upgrade my flute, since I had been using the same Artley model since high school.

  Altes was necessary to develop technical ability, but I liked the classical pieces better - Faure, Bach, Mozart and so on. I had a parakeet at home who helped me practice by perching on my music books and adding notes to the pages. Sorry for bringing ikky books to my lessons. What else do I remember... Keep your shoulders down, open your throat, draw glasses on the hard parts... And thank you for helping me get used to an open hole flute.

  I remember one lesson that went particularly badly because I was too excited about an upcoming church youth group trip to New York City to be able to concentrate on anything. The Rotary Club sponsored exchange student from Japan was going along on the trip and I was "stalking" him. We ended up getting married, which is why I am in Tokyo. We still have parakeets, but they are not very interested in my practicing.

  We have two grown children. My daughter did not do well with music, but she loves to write and draw. She plays the radio quite well, though. My son took up trumpet in high school when he entered the Brass Band Club. It seems quite common that the older students mentor the younger students on their instruments in these school clubs. Nobody really takes lessons and they all pressure each other to practice. It seems a bit crazy, but that is what they do. The band at the school where I "teach" is the same. I have offered my help to the flute section, but they have never asked me for any. Anyway, my son's club is a very tightly knit family group, and they even get together often after everyone has graduated. He met his wife there. She was a percussionist in the same band club.

  After I graduated from Niskayuna, I went to Houghton College in Western New York. The first semester I took a band course, and then only lessons for one credit hour as my arts requirement. My teacher was a very kind (also patient) elderly man, John M. Andrews, who I think was better at violin than flute. I never heard Dr. Andrews play anything, but he gave me interesting assignments. He had a bad leg and got around with a crutch, probably from having suffered from polio. One lesson he almost fell over and caught himself on the piano with a dissonant chord. He did say that he had studied with Leonardo De Lorenzo at Eastman, but I knew nothing about DeLorenzo at the time.

  I have recently discovered that LDL was quite an interesting fellow, and regret that I was not more inquisitive. DeLorenzo wrote a book about the history of the flute that I found very informative. Jean Pierre Rampal is mentioned VERY briefly because he was probably very young when De Lorenzo's book was written. I saw Rampal perform twice, once in New Haven and once in Tokyo. I attended a master class and then attended his concert, but was a bit disappointed. I had looked forward to hearing him for months, but he only played a Mozart Concerto that he could have played in his sleep (actually quite an accomplishment) and then he walked off the stage never to return. The Yale Orchestra then completed the program with some horrid Schoenberg piece. I also saw Rampal in Tokyo for his farewell concert. He had one of his apprentices playing with him and doing the more difficult parts, which was fine. It was nice just to have a chance to see this piece of history again. It turned out that it actually was Rampal's last concert in Japan, so I am glad that I went. I still have the flyer from the concert.

  I have seen James Galway twice, one at Houghton and once in Tokyo, and I must say that he has a totally charming way with the audience, so different from Rampal. I just finished reading his "Man with the Golden Flute." He has also started a series of online lessons for beginners, but I joined anyway to be able to absorb anything he has to say.

  Have I talked your ear off enough yet? Since my sister in law convinced me to treat myself to an upgrade I have been trying to practice every day. I have worked through a couple of the Altes exercises and have been interested in the works of Astor Piazzolla and recently De Lorenzo.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MH-ZSIYP-4U This is an interesting piece of music called Kassouga (Spring Day) by Makoto Shinohara. Dr. Andrews decided that I had to take part in some recital and I played this, but in retrospect I see that I didn't realize what the first part of the piece was all about. (Let me know if you are getting bored!) It is a skylark circling above open fields on a spring day. The area where we now live has open fields, and the skylarks do sing like that. They play a "loop tape" for about five cycles and then switch to a different loop. As spring matures their song changes to just a "chip chip chip" as they continue to circle over what is probably a nest. Unfortunately, the area where we live is developing rapidly and the fields are being covered with buildings, so I don't know how much longer that we can enjoy the skylarks's songs. In a way this piece reminds me of Vaughn Williams' Lark Rising.

  Well, you probably heard that we have had a snowstorm in Tokyo. It is nothing like the snow in the Northeastern US, but people here are just not prepared to deal with snow, so it is a big deal. It is melting today, but it is still a good idea to get the grocery shopping done before it freezes up again. The supermarkets are close by, so we can walk or go by bicycle. We don't even own a car because public transportation is so good. I hope that you have not been bored, and I would be delighted to hear from you again.

  I got a Yamaha EC headjoint on eBay (for half of what it would have cost me at Yamaha on the Ginza) that arrived yesterday. Alycia said that I might enjoy that, so I will blame it on her. Hubby now also has another reason to nag me to practice since I have made the financial investment. (^-^)

  Thank you again for your email!!
  

  • 18:26
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