Zieht uns hinan!!

I sing with the Larimer Chorale here in Northern Colorado. It's an audition, non-professional, community choir. Wherever we've lived, I've always found a choir like this: Buffalo, San Jose, Syracuse, Salt Lake City. It's a great outlet for me, and even if the quality of the group isn't very high, singing the great choral masterworks (Brahms Requiem, Beethoven's 9th Symphony, etc.) is still so enriching. It's like getting to see Michaelangelo's "David". Really. It's been such a privilege all these years to sing in community choirs. Sooo, back to the Larimer Chorale. It happens to be an incredible group. Mostly, it's incredible because of the conductor we have right now. He's so skilled. Every rehearsal seems like part private voice lesson, part musicology lecture, and part stand-up comedy routine. It's so great.


So, this past week we got the once-in-a-life-time chance to perform Mahler's Symphony #8. It's sometimes referred to as "The Symphony of a Thousand". It has two full choirs, a children's choir, an extra brass choir, a huge, beefed-up orchestra, and NINE soloists. For it's premier performance, there were over 1,000 people on the stage; hence, the nickname: "Symphony of a Thousand". That's why it was a "once-in-a-life-time" chance to sing it. It costs so much to produce, and it can be such a logistical nightmare to prepare and perform that it's not done that often.


It was such a thrill. When we were in California over Thanksgiving, the San Francisco Symphony performed it under Michael Tilson Thomas. My parents, Catherine, and I went up to see it. We were totally blown away. As the conductor of this weekend's performance wrote in the program, "Mahler's 8th is not just a symphony. It's an event. It really is the original surround sound." He was right, too.


The Symphony has two parts. The first part is a setting of an old chant text, "Veni Creator Spiritus". The second part is a setting of the final scene of Goethe's "Faust", a sort of meta-physical look at man's attempt to overcome his own self and weak tendencies. The last words are my absolute favorite: zieht uns hinan or lift us higher. Mahler's 2nd Symphony has a choral part, too. It's referred to as The Resurrection Symphony, and the last movement is about being lifted or resurrected. I love that one, too. But somewhere in my lowly, little soul, I think that the miracle of being able to overcome my own personal weaknesses through the Atonement of Jesus Christ will be a bigger and much more difficult miracle than the miracle of the Resurrection. Here are the words at the end of the symphony. I just love them.


Lift your eyes!
All that is earthly is only an outward symbol;
That which is inadequate, here will be sufficient;
That which is inexpressible, here will be manifest;
The Eternal Feminine (the Virgin Mary, or as I like to interpret it, the grace of the Savior)
Leads us higher!


If you ever get the chance to see this piece, really you should go see it. It's only about 80 minutes long, but it's magnificent in its message and its emotional force. What an awesome week...which leads me to talk about how this week was possible.


We had 3 hour rehearsals Thurs night and Fri night down in Bolder which is about an hour away. Then, there were the two performances: one on Saturday night and one on Sunday afternoon. Tim had some training in Bend, Oregon, so I needed to find some child care. If you count up those hours, you find a pretty hefty babysitting bill at the end of it all. So, I called up my lovely mother a couple of months ago to see she if she was up to the task. She said she'd come out and have my Dad join her. They could babysit during the week and then go and see me perform it on the weekend. They love Mahler, too! So, Tim flew out Wed afternoon. Mom flew in Wed afternoon. Dad flew in Friday morning (We picked him up and went over to the Denver Zoo. Why, you ask yourself, would Caroline choose to go to the zoo after a 3 hour standing only rehearsal the night before, knowing she had another that night? I should have known when I saw the 2 dozen busses in the parking lot that I was destined to not enjoy our trip to the zoo. Why don't I see these things coming? Anyway, to say the least, I was a cranky mommy at the zoo, so no one enjoyed themselves. sigh...). They watched the kids. Tim got home Sat afternoon. We got some babysitters and headed down for an evening of Mahler in Bolder. It was such a great night. We had a nice dinner at this Italian place on Pearl Street, and I still made it on-time for my 6:30pm call. Phew!


So, I'm still recovering from all the excitement. Little phrases of the music keep floating through my brain. It was so wonderful. But now, back to reality: I spent all day cleaning. (My ulterior motive: if I get the house totally clean, then I can justify putting time and energy into my flower garden idea. Why do I always need incentive to clean?)


Blicket auf! Zeiht uns hinan!! Lift your eyes. His Love/Atonement lifts us higher!!

And....here are some random pictures from the week. I think I even got some at the zoo before we all fell apart. Poor Grandma and Grandpa...

I got to chaperone Miles' class field trip to the Water Treatment Plant, another perk of Grandma visiting. I don't get to do this kind of stuff enough. It was fascinating. I just kept on imagining a James Bond movie or something. You could really see how someone could do some serious damage to our infrastructure if they wanted to. Do you all have drums of clean water in your food storage? Eeeks. We only have one. I'd better get more.


That same day Lindsay had her 5th Grade Exhibition. It's a project that they've worked on since January. The central theme was "Human health is affected by changes in ourselves and in the world around us", and yes, my child chose HIV/AIDS to study. Nice, an STD. She really focused more on the microbiology/immunology of it all, though. It was fun.

Julia, looking at the elephants.

Miles and Samuel with the elephants

feeding the Lorikeets

No visit from Grandpa Call is complete without a trip to The Dollar Store or Chuck E. Cheese. The kids lucked out this time and got both. Here's from your favorite place and mine (especially on a Saturday afternoon....): CHUCK E. CHEESE. Julia's not too sure about this ride.

Miles is in heaven.

Wesley hammin' it up, and yes, it looks as though the girl behind him is picking her nose. Nice.

Lately, Wesley loves to steal my camera and take random pictures. Here, he has caught his little sister in one of her favorite past-times: taking apart Mommy's wallet. Is it scary that she already loves shoes, credit cards, chocolate, and jewelry? What a woman!!

WESLEY, self-portrait, circa 2009