Song and Dance

It has been busy lately!  The good news is, lots of great things are getting done.  The less good news is that it has meant less blogging.  However, today I hope to remedy that.

Yesterday was especially jam-packed on account of I was due for a haircut, it was a workout day, AND the in-town orchestra group started rehearsals again.  We're planning a patriotic concert on July 1st.  It should be a fun program.  My fellow viola player and I are not especially fond of the two Sousa marches--not because the marches themselves aren't stirring and wonderfully composed, because they are--but because we violas are relegated to playing offbeats almost the whole time.  For those without musical experience, offbeats are the "two" part of the traditional march rhythm, which goes one, two, one, two--like tramping feet.  So we don't get any of the nice melody, we're just sitting there keeping the rhythm, which is very important but also very boring.  Oh, well.  We can't all be stars.

Other than that, though, we do get some good parts, which cheered us up immensely.  The biggest challenge in this program is going to be the fact that a number of our pieces are "medleys", which consist of a bunch of songs linked together.  Individually, they are easy enough, but each one has a different rhythm, and goes at a different speed, and is in a different key, and having to switch on the fly can be quite a feat of mental agility.  They also tend to have a lot of pauses and held notes which are probably the most challenging thing of all for amateur musicians, because you have to really pay attention so that everybody pauses, holds and releases together, or the effect is ruined.  This is doubly true if, like our local group, the conductor is also relatively inexperienced.  Our director is actually very good, all things considered, and she is just about the world's nicest person, which makes rehearsals quite pleasant, but by profession she is a trumpet player, so she spends most of her time on the other end of the conductor's baton.  Therefore, holds and pauses have always been a bit tricky for us.  To date, however, we have always managed to make them work right in time for the concert.

To honor this little quirk of ours--and all in a spirit of good fun--I'll leave us with a little video.  The piece being performed in this video is "The Dance of the Comedians" by Bedřich Smetana.  Our local orchestra group has actually performed this piece, and it was delightful to play, but this video is not of us.  It is, rather, an actual, professional group directed by the great Viktor Borge.  I think you will enjoy it.

And on that note (har har)--adieu.

In the Name of Art

 I am a bit tired today because we wound up running late at Orchestra rehearsal last night.  "We" being myself, and two other locals who make a weekly trek over to the next state to participate in a community orchestra there.  The person who originally snagged me into joining this orchestra hasn't gone in a while, being particularly busy lately with personal commitments, but there are still a couple of folks from my neck of the woods that continue to participate.  It was rainy for the drive back, but not too bad, fortunately.

Now, lest one think that "classical" music (that performed by a modern Symphony Orchestra or a group modeled on same) is stuffy and just for snobs who are connected to it professionally in some way, this particular group happens to be made of of amateur musicians, either retired or professionals in a non-musical career who simply like to play, and gather for the fun of it.  We've played a variety of venues and types of concerts, ranging from seasonal (Christmas or Patriotic themes) to "pops" (not strictly classical, but employing similar forms and instruments) to more high-minded concerts with proper Classical music. 

I happen to generally like the proper classical stuff the best.  In fact, I'm all for making sure to get a little dose of Culture in your day, so with that in mind, I thought I'd share a little video below.  There is not, unfortunately, a recording of our particular group performing this piece, though we have performed it on one very memorable occasion.  However, as this piece holds a very important  place in the Classical repertoire, I scoured YouTube and, happily, managed to locate a video of an excellent performance.  So, for our mutual enrichment, I present Concerto Gross, composed by Robert Hirsch: