First Semester
I had a unique perspective of the performance of Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony in the Duke Family Performance Hall. For my work study occupation, I take photos and videos of music performances at Davidson. I was managing the livestream of this concert and it allowed me to observe the concert from several angles. We had shots that were up close and personal I got to see the amount of effort each musician was putting in to make the greater noise of the symphony sound that much better. The musician’s concentration over such a long period of time through movements of the symphony was stunning. I also got to hear the horn solo weeks prior to the concert for an advertisement the music department was publishing and finally hearing it in concert was really cool because I could hear the improvement that was made.
My roommate is nationally ranked for the Horn and also plays in the orchestra at Davidson. He explained how intensive the Horn solo is and the amount of concentration involved and it’s truly impressive. The Horn is one of the hardest instruments to hold a note on and the solo in Tchaikovsky’s symphony poses an extreme challenge because the duration of some of the notes.
Second Semester
I had the privilege of attending Bryan Stevenson’s lecture in the Baker sports complex. Having read his book Just Mercy prior to hearing his lecture, a lot of the material he presented was a little redundant, but hearing the first person account of those experiences was incredible. His ability to intertwine narrative and facts to create a cohesive, impactful argument was something that I admired as an aspiring lawyer. My main takeaway from the lecture was the theme he began and concluded with: proximity. Stevenson argued that in order to solve a problem, one must become closely involved with the people and the community that the problem affects. In his career, this meant moving down to Alabama after graduating from Harvard Law to fight racial prejudices in the legal system. After having the opportunity to see EJI’s museum and monuments, it was especially interesting to hear from the man who began both projects.
