ITEC 2010

Hi gang--it's been a LONG while since I've done this--thought about it many times, but just never made myself do it.  Gonna try again........

Every other year, the International Tuba Euphonium Association holds an international conference, or ITEC.  This year, we're in Tucson, AZ.  The competitions start up today, and I'm chairing the Young Artist Tuba Competition this year--we have 9 semifinalists to listen to this morning, and will whittle that down to 3-4 for tomorrow (probably 3, I expect).  I have the privilege of judging with John Cradler (USMC Band) and JAy Hunsberger (prof at USF and tubist of Sarasota Orchestra) this morning, and two friends from Great Britain tomorrow--Les Neish and James Gourlay. 

Getting out here yesterday saw me leaving the house @ 4 am ish.  Plane trips can be quite interesting if you allow them to be--with all the cost cutting the airlines are doing, I won't say it's at all pleasurable (even when privileged to go business or 1st class)  but it can be interesting.  On the first leg, I sat in front of a family from somewhere in central NC.  Mom, Dad, daughter.  Daughter was likely about 11-12 years old.  The mom caused all conversation between the three of them, and referred to the dad as Daddy all the time--she would ask him a question, and start with " Daddy, would you..." or something like that.  Every time she spoke to the girl, she started the sentence with "Daughter, isn't this.." or something similar.  No names of any of them ever used.  quite interesting to listen to, but not see.    Second flight, wound up sitting next to a husband/wife (I was in window seat) and their child was directly behind me.  I offered to switch, but they declined.  I had seen a young woman come on to the plane with quite a few body piercings and full-arm tattoos (she was wearing a tank top) but didn't pay attention to where she sat down--we'll come back to this.  As the flight began, the couple was bickering a bit over bottles of water, candy, etc. handing back & forth to the child behind us--the way the conversation went and the huskiness of the voice of the child led me to believe it was a somewhat surly 14-15 year old male. (lots of 'yeah' whatever' 'sure'  responses)  we arrive in Tucson, and turns out the child was this 20-ish young woman with all the tattoos.  at the very least it kept me entertained between catnaps.

Upon arriving I talked with our conference host, got some lunch, napped a bit, and then wandered back over to the School of Music for a judges meeting--ran into Richard Murrow, the teacher at TCU, and he asked me to come listen to the quartet from TCU in the competition--I did, for about 45 min, and then we along with Roger Lewis went out to find some hot dog joint that Matt Walter's from Dillon Music had told Roger about. 
Good, but not great...........actually was a Mexican joint (surprised to find one of those in Tucson, not!)

soo, off to the races today........