Template : update: prac and storeroom cleanup!
Friday, November 7, 2008 ? 0 Atashinchi ?
Haha finally updating after being dead for so long. Shall not comment on what happened in this lapse of time since so many stuff happened. Still recovering from my illness though.Yay today we got the score for the new SYF set piece 蝉歌 Song of Cicada. Quite easy but cos the back part 颂歌 (颂 what, the 蝉 ah?) is quite fast (120-132) so could be quite difficult to master the semiquavers well. But then when I 合 for tanbo right it was so difficult. Cos i had no 总谱 (which wenyun says apparently lu ls was supposed to give each section one copy today, but he didn't even come) then tanbo got split into 2 parts playing the same stuff only at alternate bars. Very confusing to look at all 4 copies of 谱 at the same time to try to figure out what each instrument is playing, where they differ, interweave, or whatever and stuff to take note (i had one 谱 on each lap, 2 in my left hand, and my right hand was tapping the speed).Then before they played the second part i had to ask them to stop to let me use my tapping hand to flip the score for each instrument on my lap/hand.
But we were quite accomplished today! We managed to go through the song once through without stopping) except for me to turn my scores. Even though there were quite some mistakes they were mainly due to individuals coming in at wrong places/playing wrong notes and despite the frequent 赶拍ing (esp at the liuqin long string of semiquavers part) we managed to get through without major mistakes. Good enough for a first attempt, i supposed, even though we played the second part which was supposed to be speed 120-132 at speed 60 (but later gradually increased the speed to i dunno what due to 赶拍ing). But they always cannot get the bar 98 空 前十六 part for some unknown reason. At first was cos zhongruan did all 弹 instead of 弹挑弹 so it sounded like 三连音 instead of 前十六, and after i told them to change that they couldn't get the one beat rest right. In the end it managed to sound something like that so i let them off but when we played the whole song through it was still super-messy. But whatever cant be bothered already let zhang ls sort out.
Ah and the scores ah. I was having such a headache sorting out. Cos must keep one set for zhang ls, one set of myself (to use when zhang ls isnt here or when she didnt bring her scores - like for 火把), plus must remember which instrument need how many more sets. And then almost all of pipa left their scores with me (even those who came - only nicole brought her scores back) cos they never bring file dont want to crumple the scores in their bags. -_- And now i am busy photocopying scores at the same time as i am typing this. Oh yeah and did i mention i spent some time during prac today going to almost all the sections and spying (i mean asking the SL) what their section is playing for the song and apparently all the sections have very boring stuff. So erm is the final effect going to turn out like 漠楼???
And the highlight of the day is ----- STOREROOM CLEANUP! How fun! Haha! We removed all the cello/bass and tanbo instruments and put them in the open to air a bit. Then we sweep the VERY DIRTY AND DUSTY AND FULL OF INSECT CARCASSES storeroom and attempted to tidy/clean it up a bit. Then we realised that many of the tanbo instruments/cases are rotting so we brought all the cello/bass instrus back into the storeroom and sorted the tanbo instrus into condemned/needs-repairs/ok-working-and-clean-can-keep. And for the dirty ones we had to clean them. And we were supposed to sun the cases before we kept them but 太阳公公太早下山了 ok more like the sun went to hide behind clouds so we had to keep all the stuff back in.
Now let me describe the pathetic conditions of the instrus. Many of them right, once we open the case there are insects that fly out. And many have spider webs and insect-related stuff inside/outside. 2 pipas had a lot of cockroach faeces on the 面板 (condemned), about 5 or 6 zhongruan cases had a lot of the remains of insect pupae in the cases (condemned), about 2 of the zhongruans had zips that were only attached to the case along half of the zips' length (condemned - unless someone knows how to sew it back), some other qins were too ancient to save so also condemned (unless someone wants it - like maybe tienli). Other stuff like ancient but save-able qins and cases with torn-but-not-so-badly-torn zips were pardoned. Even then the substantial number of condemned stuff (plus some cellos with parts that are totally disattached from the instru) filled up the entire stairway (that is when we stacked all of the up into 2 layers). Only about one third of the instrus were actually normal and working, but even many of these required cleaning cos of the presence of insect faeces/unknown suspicious-looking substances/insect eggs/spider webs/live insects and whatever stuff. Poor kexin, michellin, clare, zhiqi and er...cant remember had to manually clean these with the wet and dry tissues and even paintbrushes.
Then so many of the qins have missing parts, most commonly frets. There's one zhongruan with only 4 frets left. -_- Some of the spoilt instrus we managed to fix on our own, such as one pipa which cannot be tuned cos the thingy cannot turn (except for delia the macho, but can only turn one direction). We took the oil for fixing mechanical stuff (provided by huang ls, who also provided the wet tissue and liquid soap, the dry tissue was provided by the school toilets) and erm cos at first we couldnt get it out so in the end i poured it on my hand and wiped it onto the zhou of the pipa. It actually worked. Just that it took some time and effort to remove the oil on my hand afterwards.
In the end half the instrus were either condemned or needs repair. And at first we only put in the working ones. So the shelves looked so empty. But after the repaired ones come back i think should have no space again. Cello/bass are worse off than us. Cos they need about twice the amount of space that they have now. We only finished the cleanup at almost 7 o'clock (not counting the resting time, but we never rest for very long can). Koh and yixin finished chuiguan like super-early and they went home way earlier than us too. And yifei and leevoon never come so their hus have not been touched. Tanbo are the worst off cos the insects love the wood on tanbo instrus. Actually many of the problems have been identified long ago (i remember even when i first entered co some of the problems already existed) but then we couldnt do anything about them so the condition kind of worsened. And the worst part is the humidity in the almost enclosed storeroom with poor ventilation. Huang ls told us to buy 干燥剂 and mothballs (which we have done before with no significant effects, but i suppose we need more of them if we want it to work) and we also plan on buying pesticide. Then one day maybe during jixun we can remove the instrus to air and sun the cases then spray the pesticide to kill all the disgusting insects that keep on pestering our poor qins! But we are unable to have a long-term solution (unless school very nice can sponsor us - which is quite improbable).
Ok so ends a very tiring day. I was feeling itchy all over can. We battled all kinds of dirt/insects/insect-stuff and whatever not. It is a very GROSS feeling. And i was bossing everyone around, telling them to do this do that put this here put this there, haha sorry! :) But anyway really really thanks to kexin, zhiqi, wanjing, michellin, jiahui, delia, clare, koh and yixin. Grrr i cant imagine we have to do this again!
update: prac and storeroom cleanup!