Journey of No End

Latter-Day Voices 2008-2009
What is there to say other than I loved this year and I love these people? Some of my favorite moments:

**Disclaimer: There are going to be some Mormon things in this post, if you don't understand, we'll talk later.

1. We're in rehearsal one day learning an arrangement of "If You Could Hie To Kolob" and we get to the part where we all sing, "...there is no end to race." Bro. Salmond stops us, asks me to come up in front of the choir and asks me "Linda, How would you feel if you had to be white(racially) to get into the Celestial Kingdom?" He was dead serious. Was that a trick question...? And he still hasn't lived that one down yet.

2. Every girl Jason Chesney has ever kissed is in this choir. Yes, I am one of them.

3. Choir Tour. I loved everything about it. The week went as follows:

Sunday May 3rd- Fireside at Morgan Utah

Monday May 4th- Devil's Slide, Oakley (with Carli!), and Aspen Grove (near Sundance) to play. It was mine and Brady's Swiss Getaway (more on that later).


Tuesday May 5th-Show in Moab, Utah. We took care of some firewood for the widow's so when winter rolls around they will be warm.

Wednesday May 6th-Arches National Park. Thank you Emily Sorensen for instilling in us a love and respect for all things rock. Later, show in Grand Junction. Rebecca Tanner and I stayed with the funniest and creepiest host family ever. They didn't give us dinner until after our show which was 10:15 PM so we had to make do with peanut butter and Teddy Grahams. And let's talk about how we came back after the show to find my bra in their front room. No, I didn't leave my bra in that room. In fact, it was in my suitcase, in the room we were staying in and the door was closed. Needless to say, we locked our door that night. I am forever grateful that it was Rebecca Tanner that shared that experience with me. Bless her heart.
Thursday May 7th-Rawlins, Wyoming
This was an interesting place. We spent almost the entire day on the bus. I had been in a weird mood. We get to Rawlins and their stage space is non-existant. So we improvised. Turned out to be our best show.

Friday May 8th-Martin's Cove and Green River, Wyoming.
The last day of tour was so great. We went to Martin's Cove which is where the pioneers came through as they were crossing the plains and many of them died there. I have ancestors that came through there and died near there as well. It was an incredible experience. That night we had a show in Green River. Everyone was pretty emotional, especially the people who will not be coming back next year. It was a pretty rough show for me because I was so emotional as well.

Freude, schöner Götterfunken...

The opening words for the chorus to the fourth movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. I was so glad to be a part of this. It truly is a masterpiece. Even if you are not a classical musical lover, I suggest you listen to it... you will understand what I mean. I think singing in it made me appreciate it even more. For being deaf for most of his life, he certainly knew how to make it happen. Beethoven, I salute you.

A Felicidade

This past semester I have been practicing a few times a week with a group that asked me to sing for their Bossa Nova group. For those of you who don't know what Bossa Nova is, it's pretty much Brazilian Jazz music and it's fabulous. Thanks to my friend Jordan Riley, I was hooked up with Mike Christiansen, Eric Nelson, Christopher Neale, Lars, Jed, and Don and we put on an incredible show on the 25th of April. You had to pay to come and a lot of people actually came! It wasn't even free for student's and they still came. That says a lot.

This is Christopher and I going over some words during a dress rehearsal in the Performance Hall.

This is the setup on the Night of the show! (L to R: Christopher, Mike, Lars, Jed, Eric, Don, ME!)

So my mom showed up to surprise me. How nice of her. She pretty much sat right in front of me so I saw her right at the beginning of the show, and then she was upset when she came on stage and I told her I had already noticed she was there. Mothers.

All in all, a great experience. It was incredible to hear my voice coming off the walls in the Performance Hall, it was awesome that I had the opportunity to sing classic Brazilian jazz and bossa nova in Portuguese, and it meant a lot to me that my grandparents came to support me (and they LOVED it!). The only downside was that I had to miss the first night of my Latter-Day Voices Spring Show. I sang a ton of Tom Jobim's stuff: Girl From Ipanema, Corcovado, Felicidade, Agua De Beber, Dindi, Berimbau, Desafinado, Aguas De Marco, and many others. Rehearsals were pretty funny with these old guys. At times Mike would have to tell me, "Linda, forget everything you've been trained to do as far as singing goes. The less technique you have, the better." That was probably the most challenging concept for me! Ha! We'll be doing some more collaborating in the future, so look for us!

A Fine Frenzy

Not only is this the name of a pretty great artist and album but it very well describes the past month and a half of my life. A month that was chock full of awesome times and absolute and utter exhaustion. Therefore, there will be a bunch of mini-posts. Enjoy.