Fall semester is done half of it, time flies faster than I can catch it. But, I'm totally satisfied with my attitude and work progress.
It's the final year of my degree, but I feel that my learning process JUST started.
I went to improv soiree at York just now, it's one of the musicians-must-go monthly events in Toronto, I swear. Through soirees I attended starting last year, I met so many awesome musicians and heard a lot of good musical ideas. I found my good good music friends there; sometimes we play together, everything is just so beautiful and wonderful. Of course, I need to mention the awesome person holding this monthly event - Professor Casey Sokol who is teaching improvisation at York. His classes totally changed my thoughts and attitude towards music and life, in an extremely good way.
I do believe my 4th year in university is a turning point in my life. This is a time when I have mastered certain level of knowledge and started to question things critically. Maybe some people do it earlier, this is just my pace of my life. Goodness knows when I first came to Canada and York, I didn't know what jazz is. Not at all.
In 2008 September, I was very clueless in this new country and new style of life. I have a weird accent although I can write English pretty well. I spent so much time studying and practicing and sometimes crying in practice rooms, because I wasn't confident with my musical skills at all. But no matter what happens, people I met, especially Canadians or musicians, are always nice to me.
Life is so beautiful when you look back and feel so good with those moments. Some moments can be heartbreaking, but they are indeed memorable.
Stories are beautiful too, I mean other people's life stories. Although I always question critically about cultures and social norms, I do believe that happiness comes from people around you. Commercials like to use "happiness" to sell their products, and most people find connection through their favorite brands; but in the end, if you love someone, you can lose everything in the world but not that person.
I lack of "stories" in Canada. My stories back in Malaysia are mostly heart-wrenching, and only recently I started to be able to face the past with a positive attitude. I don't have family in Canada, I spend time with music almost 24/7, and I start to question myself...I need to have a life if I want to make good music.
That's how I thought of the subtitle of this blog - music, art, and life should come together. But in fact, I would love to add one more - words. I used to do Chinese writing semi-professionally from 2004 to 2007. I think it's a good time for me to do it and speak my own accent of Mandarin and English proudly again. This is like a turning point in my life, I figured so many positive changes are going to happen.
Very personally, I also realized some changes. I like how I spent my last summer, and I like how my Fall term goes. I question more, but I'm going to love more too.
