Reliving Memories in 2021
Hello again to another December blog! If you have already read the blogs for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of this week, you know by now that I am reminiscing about the past four years of Christmas while I was in college. This blog is going to be about my memories from last year, 2021. I suggest you read Monday’s blog and Wednesday’s blog before reading this blog if you don’t want spoilers because I’ll be referencing them a couple times. In fact, I had some experiences last year that were quite similar to the Christmas seasons before it.
First of all, I was once again singing in The Messiah! In 2018 I had sung How Beautiful Are the Feet for the second time. In 2019 I was too busy with school to go to the practices, even though they were only on Sundays. And as I mentioned before yesterday, in 2020 I got Covid and couldn’t sing. Of course, it was so crazy in 2020 that our community choir wasn’t going to perform The Messiah anyway. So by the fall of 2021, it had been 3 years since I last sang these songs with this choir. When I sang a solo in 2018, it was a month before I was going to switch to a vocal music major. So when I decided to try out for a solo last year, it was the first time that I had done so after taking voice lessons. I was honestly surprised that this additional factor changed this experience that I had done many times before.
I really like How Beautiful Are the Feet, and I wanted to audition for it a third time. While I was singing it, a woman with a strong Soprano voice and who was staying after our practice time to listen to the auditions suggested that I should sing Come Unto Him. So the pianist and I turned the pages in our books to that solo and I focused on what I had learned in my Sight Reading and Ear Training classes as I sang and read this song for the first time. As I did my best to look ahead while singing, I heard my voice ring loudly through the chapel. I was so used to hearing myself in the school Concert Hall, but this was the first time I heard myself sing this way in a chapel. I ended up singing this song at the official performance. I had to find the right balance of singing this Aria into the mic that was provided, but overall it was a wonderful experience to sing it. After hearing me sing a few phrases, one of my relatives in the audience started filming me and later sent me the video of my solo.
Speaking of videos, after I had sung in The Messiah and just a week and a half before Christmas, I officially decided to start making YouTube videos. By December 20th I had uploaded my first video, “Away In a Manger, A Chinese Christmas Cover”. I’ve already written and posted blogs about how I originally decided to do this video and how I was able to create and upload the video. So you can click the links for more details on that story.
And then, yet another amazing thing happened two days after I had uploaded my first YouTube video. I was hanging out with a friend at Walmart doing some last minute Christmas shopping when her mother called her and said that she had two extra tickets to a concert that night. Guess who was performing in that concert? NATHAN PACHECO!!!!
I couldn’t believe it. Three years after I had performed with and talked to Nathan Pacheco, he was back again- and performing in the exact same building on the college campus!! Lucky for me, this friend of mine is awesome and let me take the second extra ticket. Seriously though… if I hadn’t asked her if she wanted to go to Walmart and if some of her family members hadn’t canceled just before the concert, I wouldn’t have had a second experience of seeing Nathan Pacheco perform.
Technically, I was also once again performing with him. There were moments that he asked the audience to sing along with him and that brought back the memories of when I softly sang along with him while playing my Cello. I also got excited when he started talking to us about the talk by Elder Holland, the same one I heard him share 3 years before! But this time the story of his own life relating to this talk was a little different. He talked about how he fell in love with a woman. Though he was living his dream and singing all over the place, he would look forward to his evening calls with her. He told us that he eventually realized that he had another dream, the dream of having a family. I loved hearing that. He helped me see that not only are dreams possible, but they can change and grow as time goes by. It was the perfect thing for me to hear. Three years before, I was just starting school and only had a vague idea of what I could do with my talents. Hearing Nathan Pacheco tell me to keep on dreaming was encouraging, but I had no idea that three years later I would upload my first YouTube video and then attend yet another concert with Pacheco performing in it two days later. In a way, it felt like this was an opportunity to be held accountable for what I had done during those years. In another way, it was encouragement to have the faith to let my dreams change. Who knows what I'll be doing three or four years from now? Even last year I didn't realize that I would start this website this summer.
At the end of the concert I asked my friend if we could stay longer so that I might get a chance to talk to him again. The foyer wasn't crowded with people desiring to get autographs this time, but I kind of liked that. It gave me the chance to have a longer, one on one conversation with him like I had at the end of that dress rehearsal. When I walked over to him to have a conversation I said, "Hi, you probably don't remember me-"
"I recognize you," he said kindly. "I just don't know where we've met."
No. Way. He recognized me! Trying not to get too excited, I reminded him of our conversations three years ago and proudly told him that I had just gotten my first YouTube video out. "You told me to keep dreaming, and I've been doing a lot of dreaming since then!"
It was so awesome to see him a second time and tell him about the progress I've made. This time, I made sure to get a picture with him!
This year in November, I went to a concert in this same auditorium at the university I’ve just graduated from. It was a symphony band concert with the choir singing along. I thought of last year when I was in this auditorium watching Pacheco’s performance. I was reminded of my first YouTube video I uploaded last year as I heard the choir sing “Away In a Manger”. As the choir sang “O Magnum”, I was reminded yet again of when I sang another version of that song last year while I was still a part of the school choir. I love all these memories that I’ve made over the years, and I especially love the ones I’ve made during this special season. At the end of the concert, I was able to give hugs to my friends who had performed and who I hadn’t seen since April. As I did so, another bucket load of memories came back to me.
I hope you enjoyed reading these memories in this blog, as well as the previous three blogs. Comment below on one of your favorite holiday memories or traditions! Please also remember to watch my YouTube videos, consider buying the sheet music for my original songs, and/or donate to this website. Tomorrow, my blog will be about how I put together my November video. This month, my video is actually going to be a behind the scenes/blooper reel for this past year of doing YouTube videos. Can you believe it? By next Tuesday it will be a full year since I started doing this! My, has the time flown by!
I hope you enjoy your Christmas celebrations. Keep on dreaming.
