June 7 - 8

June 7, 2011

Megan Lotz (fellow flutist & RA) and I took off for Tanglewood tonight from Boston after enjoying two days of a Trevor Wye Flute Masterclass at Boston University! We had a scare early-on with Megan's '92 stick-shift car rolling down a hill, but by a miracle the car was unscathed. After picking up my belongings, we hit the road and arrived to the BUTI campus in little over two hours. We made great time, despite our uncertainty about the car! I never realized how close Tanglewood was to Boston until I travelled there by car.
After arriving around 9:30pm, Megan and I quickly unpacked our belongings and found the other RAs hanging out at a bonfire on campus. We introduced ourselves to dark faces around a campfire we could barely see in the woods. Fortunately we would have many more opportunities to meet our fellow staff in the daylight of the next day. Tired from a long day, all of the staff soon returned to our housing facility for a good night's rest.

June 8, 2011

I am back in Tanglewood and it feels awesome! It has been great seeing the staff members that I first met last summer for the flute workshop. There are 10 RAs in the BUTI Staff, from a wide variety of schools and hometowns in the United States. They are all wonderful people, devoted to mentoring young musicians as well as their own musical craft. The day started at 8am with all of the RAs going to Dunkin Donuts for Breakfast. We traveled from Lenox, MA to the nearby town of Lee, MA in our BUTI vans. Fortunately, we also enjoyed some sightseeing along the way. Lisa Nass, the Director Operations & Student Life, took care of the bill! Hurray! After arriving back to campus, we began our first day of RA training. For the morning portion of the day, we focused on ice breakers, respect, and understanding how others think, feel, and act in a variety of ways. Lunch followed soon after and consisted of sandwiches, provided by a local deli in town called Loeb's.
We all ate together basking in the sunshine of a great day. Unfortunately this great weather would not last. More to come...

After Lunch, Lisa Naas explained the general hierarchy and duties of everyone on the BUTI staff. Even though we have just recently been freed from the studies and exams of school, the 10 new RAs have to be aware of Midterm and Final Evaluations that will be filled out by their respective floor students in the next couple of weeks. Next, the senior RAs assigned the 10 of us to BUTI committees in charge of exploration/recreation, publications, and event planning. Even though I was not successful in making it onto my first choice committee of exploration/recreation, I landed a spot in the publications committee and will be able to help create a weekly newsletter called "West Street Story" along with a Summer Book, similar to a high school yearbook. My goal is take many insightful, informative, and intriguing photos of what life is like on BUTI for everyone involved, both staff and students. After the committee meeting, I had an amazing two hours of free time to practice my flute. Today I thought up the good idea of creating a practice log that helps me monitor the warm-up, exercises, etudes, excerpts, and repertoire that I work through day to day.
I wish I thought of doing this soon and encourage any young musician to start NOW! Dinner was served in the BUTI cafeteria and was just as delicious as I remember it from last year with a plethora of options and good quality. The dining staff were very friendly and helpful. Hopefully, as the year progresses, the students will appreciate these wonderful people who cook our food. Don't bite the hand that feeds you...

After dinner, we played a group game in the library and were having a great time. However, in the middle of our game the weather turned bad, very bad. Thunderstorms and high winds raged through the BUTI campus and the greater Lenox area. A great deal of trees were knocked down all around campus and one tree even fell on the back left wing of the main facility. It came through the roof and absolutely destroyed the room of a new RA on the top floor. Thank God no one was hurt!

After waiting out the storm for a few hours and watching it die down, people relexed a little bit and began watching a movie on the floor below the accident. However, the night was not over just yet...
Soon after the weather scare, the power went out in BUTI as well as in the town of Lenox, MA up the road.
Thankfully the back-up generators provided some light for a limited time.
Due to a lack of working flashlights and the late hour, everybody decided to head to bed. We will assess the full damage of nature's display tomorrow morning. The weather is also not looking good for tomorrow either.

Until then, good night & good music!