In the air between Frankfurt and Oslo
I am SO sorry for my lack of blog writing the last months! I really don’t have a particularly good explanation or reason, I promise you it will never happen again!
Anyway, a LOT of things have happened since April (!), and for the few of you who have also checked out my Norwegian blog you probably know some of it. (I actually wrote until May in the other blog… sorry…) So, here follows a short summary of what I have been up to:
• End of April: Great days in London with the Razumovsky (check out video blog at YouTube!). Some small concerts in Norway.
• May: Had a very
good week with the Oslo Philharmonic and Saraste, doing the Shostakovich concerto with Håvard Gimse on the piano. It was also a DVD production ☺ TenThing week! Always having a good time with the other girls (check 
out video blog on YouTube!). Celebrated Norway’s National Day. Lovely weather, really hot in my “bunad” (Norwegian National dress…) I went to some concerts (you can actually see me in the audience sometimes as well! …hehe ☺) Bergen International Festival and Hardanger musikkfest. Lovely week, if not a bit full of concerts and rehearsals, rehearsals and concerts, but that’s work, isn’t it? Hardanger must be one of the most beautiful places on earth! Look at the pictures!• June: Three exams at school, in one day! Pedagogic first, then Norwegian music history and last my final trumpet exam. Everything went really well, and the concert (final exam) in the evening was a great experience. I had it at a café actually. A concept called “Café de Concert”, really nice, will tell you more about this concept later. That was the final exams of my Bachelor degree. Bachelor, finito, Master Diploma, here I come… ☺ I went to Berlin and played a concert in the Berlin Philharmonie with a chamber orchestra. A lot of meetings and office work this month… And then, recording! I can’t tell you exactly what it was yet, but I can assure you it was the most amazing week! Soon you will know what this mysterious project is…The end of the month I spent in Risør, at the Risør Chamber music festival. I may use the word “amazing” a lot, but this week was extremely amazing. It started with a boat ride with a small ship from Kristiansand to Risør, some of us musicians played concerts aboard. I have never played while the ground is moving before, everything has a first I guess. The week was especially nice because my mother and little sister, Amalie, had rented a house and stayed there with me. The weather was as good as it could get, and the summer feeling was complete. I met many nice people and great musicians and lovely audience. Very special atmosphere. Went home for one day before next trip…
• July: … to Bad Kissingen, and the Kissinger Sommer Festival. Third year in a row I am there, and it is always so nice to be there. Two concerts, both went really well. Already looking forward to next year, then we go there with tenThing. Home for a couple of days, editing my mysterious CD project, then Germany again. I’m going to be in Germany so much this summer I am suspecting to both think and speak fluent German by the end of August… I wish! Last weekend I went to Stuttgart, two concerts with Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra at the Mercedes Center. Playing Haydn among all the amazing cars! (look at the picture, I fell in love with this one...) I really enjoyed it ☺ Then my mother and I had a very loooooong train ride from Stuttgart to Potsdam (I think it was over 7 hours…). Potsdam was such a beautiful little city situated around 25 min (by train) outside of Berlin. We stayed there for rehearsals with Kammerakademie Potsdam and Michael Sanderling. So nice people to work with. Yesterday we went to Wiesbaden (another, not so long this time, train ride) and concert at the Rheingau Festival in the evening. It was outside at a very beautiful place called Kloster Eberbach, and we could not have been luckier with the weather. Lovely surroundings, musicians, conductor, music, audience (even bird singing!), it doesn’t get much better than that.
That was my last months and days in a short (hopefully) summary. Right now I am sitting on the plane from Frankfurt to Oslo, on my way home. I am staying there for some days before I’m back on the road. Italy is my next stop.
As this blog is my blabbing about small funny things that happens, I could tell you about the insect invasion at our hotel room in Stuttgart, the crazy shouting taxi-driver, hearing a bunch of kids singing “Fairytale” at the train from Potsdam to Wiesbaden, Hunting for the mosquitoes lookalike creatures at hour hotel room in Potsdam, walking and walking and walking in Berlin because we choose the wrong station…. There is a lot. But it would be a novel, so I will leave it up to your imagination ☺
Until next time (which will definitely not be this long!), remember to enjoy yourself, things doesn’t get better than you make them…
Tine
