What is Jan doing?

So, there's always a little consternation over what we're doing in Israel from people at home and people we meet here.

First, an academic sabbatical is not a vacation. It's a time to focus on research (translation: producing new knowledge and learning new stuff that lets you produce that knowledge). Research is a job requirement and I will submit a report of my activities when I return in February. This kind of work often requires a lot of brain space that is complicated to carve out while teaching and doing service at a college, not to mention juggling family responsibilities.

As for why Israel, there's lots and lots of reasons why (some of which I list at the end of this post), but for the purposes of my research, the general thing I wanted to benefit from was not being at home. A mentor had suggested this idea to me for one of my previous sabbaticals, but it just wasn't the right time for me or the family (or for me to leave the family for a while).

Case in point: I just completed a significant goal, and I accomplished almost half of that progress in the last 17 days. The rest of it took a good year of unprecedented success in balancing research with service and teaching. The goal was to analyze, form diagram, and input to a spreadsheet all thematic returns in every last movement of Haydn's Symphonies--108 movements. I sit here on a red couch with earphones in, listening to Haydn and representing it graphically. It takes anywhere from 25-65 minutes per movement. (I love my Haydn Symphony YouTube playlist!)

This is a tiny screen shot of part of a movement's form diagram

another tiny screen shot of the spreadsheet... 1054 lines and 18 columns so far

I think I've been able to work so effectively because (1) It's "perfect quiet." Helen is at school, the little girls are on their devices with earphones most of the day (le sigh) until school starts in less than 48 hours, and there's the white noise of cars and people in Ra'anana, (2) There's peer pressure. Josh never has problems focusing and working, and he's sitting about 8 feet from me in our little apartment. (3) There's accountability. I'm back on my timer regiment to keep myself honest. (4) There's a lack of other things to do. I have none of the creature comforts of my home, and it's horridly hot outside. (5) There's more boundaries. I'm far from Oberlin, so it's easier to stay detached from institutional concerns and day-to-day minutiae.

My project is to rigorously tease out how thematic returns in Haydn impact his forms. I'm more convinced than ever that current theories of sonata form lead to mishaps and misunderstandings for Haydn's music and style. I'm reading a lot of stuff published in the last 20 years, which is bringing up more ideas and questions. There are lots of ways to go at these questions, but I ended up in a big data project. At the midpoint of this project, my excel spreadsheet had gotten really slow (and crashy) from the formulas, so part of my daily routine here in Israel is working through the Python 3 course on codecademy. Why Python 3? because that's what almost all other music theorists doing this type of work are using. I'll also be re-learning some useful statistics and playing with some other recommended computer programs that will produce cluster analyses and other graphics that are good for communicating some of what I'm exploring. This kind of learning is really fun for me and I'm delighted my research has taken me towards mathy stuff.

my Python course

At the beginning of July, I was invited to a workshop in Tel Aviv that fits this project really well. This timing was great for my research because it exposed me to many new ideas, revealed flaws in my own work, and allowed me to develop professional relationships with people who are helpful and know a lot more than me about the technical side of things. This was also super well-timed because not only did I get to go to Israel for the first time by myself, but I could go a day early to check out our apartment. I also met a dozen Israeli music theorists interested in work similar to what I am doing. I've already had the pleasure of spending a morning with one who teaches here in Ra'anana and have been corresponding with a few others. It's possible that I might get some sort of institutional affiliation with TAU (Tel Aviv University), which could be beneficial for library privileges.

In addition to the research and learning (I aim for 4.5-5 clocked & focused hours a day), I'm working on my Hebrew through Duolingo 30-60 minutes a day, doing mom stuff (so much dust/sand to sweep up in the apartment, must get girls to the park when the temp drops below 30 celcius, daily grocery store because food spoils quickly), doing a lot more cooking than usual because Josh often needs to be engaging with colleagues in America during dinner time, and playing my old favorite game: Civ V. There's a bridge club near us, so I'm hopeful that we can play bridge at least once while we're here, but other than that we're homebodies--everything is so expensive that eating out (unless it's fast food like falafel) is something we're avoiding when we have the time and means to cook at home. We're not even buying wine. If you know us well, you know that's a big lifestyle change.

Duolingo progress. 14 units done. can't wait until I can unlock saying stuff in the past tense...

So why Israel? I really didn't need to be exactly here for my research, but being away is going to have a significant positive impact on the research aspect of my professional career.

And then there's all the other benefits such as an immersive international experience for all of us, stepping away from our normal patterns, nuancing our Jewish identities with first-hand experience in Israel, trying to better understand the global politics of the area, and making some incredible family memories. I feel very blessed that all of this is possible.