Day6: Old and new friends, no friend...

The first Saturday--kind of a gray day to start so I practiced. I'm preparing for Tuesday's presentation and Subharmonics are quite healthy :) I should not break a string so that I don't have to change it! The age of the string has a lot to do with it, and usually hard to produce them when they are new. But often I do have to put new strings. And I do have a trick and a solution :) More later on that...

Struggled a bit with "Max for LIVE with gesture follower" example, as I'm using my husband's computer and things got shifted around, but finally I solved it. Husband went to help his brother and manning his two nephews both 6 yrs old just like ours, then went back to Picardie to our kids who are with the grandparents. On Skype Mamine (grandmother) was quite upset that our kids were fighting. I am thinking that my worries are coming true. It will be a long and hard summer for the parents, and I might have to find a different solution.... maybe sending one back to NYC with husband in July... I hope not.

Not a big gastronomic day except I enjoyed a tarte au pomme my husband got, and we shared it for snack. I decided for the first time I will give my talk properly using Keynotes application. This is rather a formal occasion and I cannot just babble along like I usually do to college kids. I'm slow in doing this, and I will have to go back and forth between a few different software during the talk, but it does look nicer and organized... Time to grow up finally, I guess.

In the evening I went to a concert given by an old friend, percussionist Lê Quan Ninh, with a Japanese dancer named Moeno Wakamatsu, at Tenri Cultural Association French-Japanese. The dance was entitled "Crossing the Senzu River". Just her dancing very slowly almost like Noh, and Ninh playing one drum. He made so much variety of sound worlds that any electronic music I've heard using multi-million $ equipment makes them sound so simple and dull. What a guy. "Senzu River" is the Japanese or Buddhist version of River Styx. The performance started in pitch dark, in this small cave-like venue. It was very, very spooky and at times I felt like I was seeing my future crossing that river myself!!! Yikes!

I met Moeno after the performance and found that she just had a baby 1+1/2 months ago. I did perform in Sevilla/Granada in Spain when my daughter was 2 months old, but didn't contort my body folding it in two nor holding my body horizontally up for extended amount of time, which I cannot do it anyway, with or without having a baby. She is crazy! But very very well done. I also met Ninh's friends from other countries in the audience. Paris resembles NYC; people come from everywhere to be here, to be in art. I feel very at home. The photo below, is a sad and strange one. There is a man who sits just below my window all day long. He comes in the morning, and he leaves around 6PM, just like going to work. He eats there, but not reading nor doing anything else but just sits. Future Sartre? Or one of those poor men who cannot tell his family that he lost a job and spends all day elsewhere? I'm afraid I won't be his friend though.... It's the guy with blue shoes.

Day5: At home, Sake and family

I'm getting into a routine: I get up in the morning, have a sizable breakfast, do what I have to do then head to IRCAM and meet people or do what I have to do. Today I ran my pieces for the Tuesday's upcoming demo/talk; all is working. Thanks to Bruno who worked with me on the day of my arrival all my older pieces using the gesture follower seems to work fine. Whew! Now I have to make sure I will not break anything until Tuesday! :)

My computer broke last week, less than a week before I came to Paris. They had fixed it (logic board failure) and sent it FedEx, and we now know it is sitting at the customs. We were warned that French "Douane" customs will try to make us pay the taxes, 1/3 of the price of the computer (the store has to insure it). My brave and able husband had already took on the task to wrestle with the French bureaucracy for me, which I am so grateful for... I would have just given up and pay the hefty fee... He was told to write a letter explaining the situation (in French of course) and bring all the documents which I had prepared including the proof of purchase in 2008 from Apple etc. He is rolling up his sleeves ready to fight. The store (Tekserve) said at the most we shouldn't have to pay more than the 1/3 of the service fee $390, but husband thinks even that is not right.

Anyway this is our first weekend in Paris and we prepared ourselves a small lunch, Terrine de Lièvre à l'Armagnac (rabbit paté) with Cidre left over. Then I went to IRCAM and sheepishly went back to Laurant, the formidable computer scientist of IRCAM's IT system. "I'm sooorryyyy.... I forgot my password..." I must have looked so sheepish that he took pity on me saying, "Don't be afraid!" I got my password back. Then I mailed my first package out from IRCAM to Radio France, several CDs as requested for my upcoming interview there in a few weeks.

After that with some recommendation and information on the Japanese Consulate online, we went to a Japanese store called Jujiya where I found basic everything that's Japanese food. We bought some bottles of Sake for the reception I'm planning after my talk on Tuesday. We took a bottle also for the evening at my brother-in-laws' where we met with two of his brothers and their wives. After a glass of beer, celebratory Champagne, then Sake, it was amazing I still followed their conversation thanks to Berlitz intensive classes. But maybe because the subjects were awfully familiar; we are all working parents and issues are universal. Husband carefully made canapé with fish roe, smoke salmon etc. and arranged it geometrically. As a geometer he would expect nothing less of himself, and it was delicious :) The table looked like this before we started to eat.

Day4: wrestling with French bureaucracy

Well, today was rainy and I spent the morning preparing for the talk I will give on Tuesday. Then went online to check some Japanese store to get some Sake; I'm giving a little reception after the talk, in the spirit of "cultural exchange". I was told it is very unusual and I should absolutely do it. Then it occurred to me IRCAM is a government building and thought I could get in trouble serving alcohol (!?), and asked if it's OK. I got a "ROTFL" response (rolling-on-the-floor-laughing). When they stopped rolling they said, "Welcome to France!" I think I will go Sake shopping this weekend.

Husband came back from Picardie leaving the kids with his parents; kids are absolutely in the greatest hands and I am so grateful to the parents making my kids' stay wonderful, and letting me stay in Paris and work. We went to La Poste, the national post office combined with a bank where one of my husband's account has been. It's our European account so it's better for our IRCAM account settling here. Then we were met with this gigantic wall of bureaucracy taking a form of one chubby French bureaucrat in a purple shirt. Nothing against him or the shirt, but here is the verdict. Husband cannot ask for a credit card to his own account, because he doesn't live here. I cannot have my name listed although his name is on my Japanese passport, we have our marriage license (we got married in France), and we have the same home address in New York. We cannot close the account in Paris because it was opened near Nice where we lived 12 years ago. However there was no rule to DEPOSIT; I could deposit, but I cannot take it out! Only solution is for my husband to get a Debit card, AND for him to personally go to Nice and close the checking account (or do that by mail I guess).

Anyway, after that we went to IRCAM continuing setting myself up, today I attacked my IRCAM email/computer account. The formidable and very very nice computer scientist Laurant worked with me to come up with an iron-clad password; he said IRCAM system is directly connected to the highest level of security of the country, and has to be very good. After 5th or 6th rejection of my password Laurant finally approved, but didn't allow me to write it down. I confidently said "I have a photographic memory" and was OK. Then on the way out, of course I forgot. Oh well.

Before all this, we had a fantastic, my first Couscous meal in Paris this time. 18euro for all this, starting with a complementary Kir with a hot "amuse-bouche", followed by two courses then a desert with Thé à la Menthe. Heavenly....


Oh and yes I did make my usual stop to San Marina shoes store in Les Halles, while husband hit the Fnac and sipped his coffee. This is a church, so please skip this picture if you don't belong :) I can't help it myself!

Day3: Improvisation, turns into a structure

I spoke too early. Husband didn't just 'give' me the BHV card. He had connected that to our account in La Poste, where I will be paid from IRCAM! Ha! So I cannot spend more that I earn. He wasn't resigned to the fact his Japanese wife can't help herself living near a department store. He has put a break to it saving our bank accounts! See I didn't marry this man for nothing.

Today I spent the morning in my studio practicing a bit, then went to IRCAM. I was just going to receive my 'magic' IRCAM card and my key, then basically see some faces and come right back. At IRCAM, all offices have clear window/door; there is little privacy. So when I found Nobert Schnell, one of my main hosts at IRCAM and started to chat, Nicolas Rasamimanana, a bright violinist/researcher, a former PhD student joined, then probably hearing my loud English Frédéric Bevilacqua, another main researcher joined. We were then hanging around talking casually, then we started to speak of when to have a planning meeting.

Then I realized this is dangerously close to what I have experienced in Japan; some people would schedule a meeting just to schedule the next meeting! We were all there, minus Bruno whom I saw, spoke to and worked with on the first day. I said to myself, "Well the team is HERE, aren't they" And this impromptu chatting became quite a serious strategy meeting on the spot, coming up with the immediate goals what has to be done and the timeline for the next week or two. People at IRCAM are so busy and one must grab any moment and person to get things done; I have been learning this in the matter of two days :) So this improvised meeting became a structural and organizational meeting on the spot.

I had forgotten to eat lunch so I grabbed a sandwich then passed by my first Paris Farmer's market in a nearby square. I just had to buy those little juicy French strawberries. Here they are, with a huge French breakfast coffee bowl I got, 2 for 7 euros (in this photo I put Kusmi Earl Gray tea). My hand was doing a relay between these strawberries and my mouth, a lot faster than Michael Phelps could swim!

In the evening I joined Norbert to go to one of the Agora festival concert, entitled "Emergence, Young Artists" at an enormous new art complex called Centquatre (you can click on the cool 3D map!) way up north in 10e arr. They say it was a centralized municipal funeral center since the 19c until the 70s! At the concert, there were two young composers whose work used ear-piece (click track?), then older piece by Scelsi "Pranam II" and a surprising Tristan Murail's electric guitar piece called "Vampyr!" performed by a very attractive electric guitarist named
Christelle Séry (I couldn't find one in English). This iPhone photo doesn't do her justice, but I think she is just about the only female electric guitarist I've seen who can do contemporary new music. And I enjoyed the piece enormously, AND her fashion as well as her playing; a true slick Parisienne. She was just "Trop Cool!" as my son would say :)

Day2: Cités International des Arts and the 'magic' cards

This is a very busy week for IRCAM, as they are organizing Agora festival in Paris. I knew about this long ago and planned to use this week as a 'set up' week for myself and the family, which seems to be working well. After Bruno set me up with the new version of the Augmented Violin software, I came back to my studio apartment at Cités International des Arts and was able to run some of my demos for next week; I will be giving a lecture for the IRCAM community (though open for public, so please let me know if any of you want to come, I have to put your names on the list). It is on Tuesday, June 15th at 12h-13h at Salle Stravinsky, IRCAM (1, Place Igor-Stravinsky in front of the 'Miro' foundtain). BTW my husband said "C'est completement MIRO" in French means "it's crazy".

I am realizing that I now am being thrown back into the memories of my student era, where I lived carefree without commitment. I have a studio to myself,

only 390EURO/months in this wonderful location at Cités International des Arts, where typically foreign (French too) art/music students stay. However, I am not in the big concrete bar building, but in "Annexe" where it is a lot quieter. I hardly see anyone and hear anything, except occasional harp and jazz piano. The building looks as if this was an old Hôtel Particulier with a courtyard.

This is the staircase just in front of my room. I love the old wood beams with white plaster. And this is the wall and the ceiling of my room. The computer seems like an odd contrast! I think this is Europe--old and new live together. Here I am under the old wooden beams, running wireless remote control with Ethernet receiver, waiving my 3-dimentional sensor on my bow arm.

Husband is back in Picardie for the 1st day of school for the kids; they are attending a local French public school for almost a month. This is the "sink or swim" total immersion for them, which I know is hard but was done to me when I was 4 yrs old in English. I still remember coming home to my mom in Ottawa asking in Japanese, "They are all coming at me saying 'Whacha name'. What does that mean!?". Well husband tells me my 9 yr old daughter already made a friend with a girl named Silvie, and when I spoke to my 6 yr old son on Skype this evening, he started, "Bonjour, Maman!". Oh well. They are ahead of me.

The Cités gave me a photo ID today that opens the doors of more than 40 museums in Paris, for FREE. I don't see Louvre on the list, but D'orsay, D'Art Moderne, Picasso, etc. It's fantastic and this promises to be so valuable. I am also getting the IRCAM card, which also opens a lot of doors in Paris it seems. France is so centralized to Paris, as Tokyo is so in Japan, and not like USA. Now I am armed with two magic cards. And the BHV card.

My violin sounds very nice in this room of plaster and wood. I am starting to work very hard on the 'mystery' new Subharmonic interval which went away (I lost it... couldn't produce anymore since a few weeks ago). It usually comes back, then goes away, and this back and forth - gaining and losing - gets shorter and shorter. This is how I learned to play Subharmonic octave and the 3rd.

Late bloomer: Life in Paris Summer 2010

I started my summer in Paris yesterday, so I decided to blog about my work at IRCAM as a Composer in Residence in musical research. It will also help me to chronicle my progress to keep myself in check, I hope! Of course, I don't know how you can be in Paris without talking about food/culture, so this is my first meal in Paris yesterday, at a Crêperie in front of IRCAM. And of course with Cidre.

June 5th: I didn't even say goodbye to kids, who were whisked away to the grandparents directly from the CDG airport which I knew to be the right thing to do (avoiding ’Wagnerian’ prolonged tragic moments). 　On this first day in Paris for the summer, I'm giving myself a generous 'A': my son peacefully slept throughout the flight on my lap: thus I couldn't sleep well. Despite the lack of sleep, I met and greeted many people at IRCAM, and even worked a little with fabulous Bruno Zimborlin, a PhD student at IRCAM who has been helping me with the Augmented Violin system 'transatlantic' for the past year. There is a new version of the IRCAM software, which I was not able to fix on my own. Within about 20 minutes, everything was up and running! This residency is SO worth it!!

We were quite tired from jetlag, but still my husband and I even saw his former colleague and his wife from INRIA Sophia Antipolis for dinner, who now is a professor at Univ of Athens. This is Salade Landaise with Magret de Canard and fois gras, one of the best ones I've had in a while. Or maybe I was just very, very hungry. It is a restaurant near Faidherbe Chaligny metro station at 11e arrondissement, where his wife works as a doctor.

Husband gets A+ as he got cell phones+internet working after only a few hours of our arrival, and he even showed true love by setting me up with BHV card! Or rather, he is a husband who realizes that he is married to a Japanese woman, who can't help herself in an environment like BHV which is dangerously close to where she lives, so he has taken the initiative to minimize the damage as quickly as possible. (this card got some discounts that comes with it) Aside from all this, I spent time looking up at beautiful architecture, and looking down more intensively at shoes Parisienne are wearing.

I am truly grateful for this late-blooming "live in Paris" experience which I probably should have done two decades ago. But I'm feeling happier about where the stage of both my personal and professional life is, and being at IRCAM in this particular capacity as a Composer in Residence. Also I am far from being completely fluent, but my French is a lot better; at least now I speak "I am married to a Frenchman" French. I don't even call anymore a convertible car: "Voiture Décapitable" ("guillotined" car, husband still laughs at me for it) which should be "décapotable" (hats-off).

Food intermission: Buceo 95

I am finally, finally almost done with mastering my new solo CD coming out from Mutable Music Label. It has been going on for a few years, on and off, and I had to go away from thinking about it and now I can listen to the pieces again. I spent the past few weeks working really hard; when I work on mastering my CD I spend a lot of time listening to it, almost feel like performing over and over again while doing so. I'm exhausted. So, I had a rare dinner out 'sans' kids with violist friend Liuh-Wen Ting and her husband Marshall at Buceo 95 Spanish Tapas. Great calamari, pulpo, but the best was pork belly. And the very interesting Spanish Rosé called Tondonia, which was VERY much approved by my French husband :) Liuh-Wen is the person who introduced me to him; he is also a [very good!] amateur viola player. Tomorrow, I'll go back to reading, guess what, Moskowski duo (!) which I'm playing with Muneko Otani, the 1st violinist of the Cassatt Quartet next Sunday at our kids' piano recital!