UT Austin

Ok, so last week I made the long drive down to University of Texas at Austin for my last audition (I think it was last weekend....no, it was 2 weekends sorry). It was crazy!! Well not really. But you know how UT has one of the biggest "party school" reputations and is really liberal? Yeah, the atmosphere was permeated with it. It was Saturday at the school of music and it still felt that way...and the kids that play classical music are probably the most right wing of the liberals that you would find there.

So anyway I got there, found the PERFECT place to park...right outside on the street so I didn't have to hike a mile with my harp. I was rushing because the rain clouds that followed me all the way to Austin finally started leaking while I was unloading...not too bad though thankfully. I checked in, unloaded my harp, and went up to the 5th level. Yup, the 5th, and that is not even the top floor of the music building, it has 6 floors at least. I have also finally figured out a way to carry ALL my harp stuff at the same time: harp, stool, harp bag, and music bag. So yay one trip! I went to the top floor and found a practice room. I was really hot from carrying all the stuff and turned on the air in the room...until I was not so warm and starting to get chilly. Unfortunately, once I turned off the air again I didn't' warm back up, and I realized just how airconditioned the building was. So I practiced before my audition time with freezing fingers that I could never quite get warm. Thankfully, when I went in to audition, the room was warm, so no cold fingers!!

I played very well. I had already told myself that no matter how good or bad I played, it was ok because I was well prepared and there was nothing else I could have done. But, thankfully I did play very good. I played my Pizzoli Etude no 29, Hanel concerto, and Scintillation. Except, I still didn't get to play all of it!! I was actually secretly upset that they stopped me after 6 pages becuase I had prepared it so well and really wanted to perform the whole thing. But oh well.

After my audition, I packed up everything and loaded the harp wagon back up. Thank goodness it wasn't raining this time.

I found Panda Express on the way home and ate lunch there. Yum! Then back to Dallas...and no more auditions!!! Now I get to play the waiting game. All of the schools have pretty much told me they would accept me, so I'm not worried about getting in somewhere. I just have to wait now to see how much money they will give me, because that is ultimately what it is going to come down to. We'll see in the next month or so.