Die Krähe

Now that I have had time to adjust to the new year, I feel I am up to making some promises. So here comes :

1. I will dump the use of ugly ‘mä’ and ’sä’ (short for the 1st and 2nd person personal pronouns ‘minä’ = I and ’sinä’ = you). Finnish is such a beautiful language, it deserves to be pronounced well. And while at it, I might also stop swearing. Except for a selected bunch of powerful words that really work on the rare occation when I drop a hammer on my toe. But the fill-out type that go into your speech without any significance, they are out. Not many of them left, since ten-or-so years ago, but I notice when I get angry, the few that are left still bounce off my lips like popcorn in a kettle.

2. I will think less about myself and more about others. This has absolutely nothing to do with altruism, it’s just for selfish feel-good. You know, when you think about others, you worry less about yourself…

3. Damn right, I’ll exercise more! But I’ll add this disclaimer and say it is not for weight loss. Nope, the reason is that I noticed last fall that a lack of exercise will leave me depressed and/or grumpy, so I think I need to watch that more. Especially since exercise often is the first thing I drop off my list when I get busy. Not anymore!

4. I will start learning Spanish. This has everything to do with my blossoming romance with flamenco. Dance classes like a lover, whom I sneak out to meet every sunday evening. Oh!

5. I will write more and become a better blogger. Now I often start out writing a post, then erase it, then rewrite it and finally I leave it as a draft and never publish it. A couple of months later I’ll forget the point of the thing and delete the draft. So in the future, I will think less and write more. Some may say that it’s better never to publish crap in the first place, but where’s the fun in that?

So, three draft versions later, the list is done! Pressing the p-word -> 

My supposed-to-be-today song performance is sadly not taking place, as a nasty winter flu came and took away my voice. This is actually the first time I have ever lost my voice completely and I must say it has been quite an interesting experience. Nevertheless, after two days of mimics and clapping my hands, I was happy to wake up and notice that today I already have some voice back. I sound much like Tom Waits, but that is actually kind of cool. The doctor I visited yesterday however strictly forbade any talking let alone singing for the next few days, so I’ll just continue using my hands and expressions for a while.

The good news is that the flamenco is doing wonders with my neck. Since twisting it nastily in December (department christmas party, dancing, Doris - saynomore, nudge-nudge wink-wink), I have done all kinds of stretching and exercising and paid cartloads of money to various physiotherapists for them to make everything ok again. And now it seems that I have found my remedy. I am so happy that wawing my hands and making dramatic postures is so healthy, considering how fun it is!

After some browsing, I found a more comprehensive list of Lotte Lehmann’s recordings. There are some selected opera arias, a nice list of lieder and, delightfully, 25 of her very first recordings dating all the way back to 1914.

Will be singing Strauss’ Allerseelen on Wednesday 24.1. at Pirkanmaa Music Institute. Today I was searching for the song on the Internet (I purposely avoid listening to other interpretations of a song while I am rehearsing until I have at least some idea of what I am going to do with it) and stumbled on a gold mine via The Lotte Lehmann Foundation. The song, interpreted by Lehmann with several links below for recordings by other artists.