I filled ya in last week about all that was going on. In case you didn't read it, I had an orchestra concert last weekend, where the Saratoga Orchestra of Whidbey Island combined with our conductor's other group, the Seattle Collaborative Orchestra. We put on one hell of a program, performing it once at Roosevelt High School in Seattle on Friday, and one at South Whidbey High School on Saturday. Our program included the 1st movement of Scheherazade, a world premiere of "1001" by Leanna Primiani (which is also about the story of Scheherazade told from her perspective), Hindemith's Symphonic Metamorphosis, a seldom-performed work for piano & orchestra called "The Miracle Concerto" by Seattle-based Walt Wagner, and...the world premiere of my very own piece called "High Flight". So much to talk about!
Oh man, where to begin? Well, let me tell you about the music on the program from the other composers. So, playing anything from Scheherazade is always a real treat, because I just love that piece today, but playing the 1st movement is still kind scary. The little 3-note horn solos make me very nervous, but lucky I didn't mess them up in either performance, after really embarrassing myself (I felt, anyways) in rehearsals. Aside from that, it's always fun to play and to listen to. The piece after it, "1001", referring to the 1001 nights Scheherazade took to tell stories to her king and save her life, was actually really cool. It was quite eeire, but made a ton of musical sense and had a lot of beauty to it. I am always skeptical of new orchestral works from other composers because there's so much "noise" out there, and I've played a lot of this "noise" (which is a topic for another blog). But this had a lot of harmony to it and was a lot of times very melody driven, but also at times very textural. I really enjoyed listening to it as a played. My part was really pretty easy, so it wasn't stressful.
And then, Symphonic Metamorphoses...Man, I heard this for the first time in high school when the Seattle Youth Symphony played it at one of their concerts. I've always loved it, and I got to play it at CWU on 2nd horn back in 2006, which was awesome. And, playing this time was just as exhilarating, particularly because our orchestra really nailed it. I was quite fun to be a part of.
And then we had this other piece that I had never heard of before, but it definitely wasn't a premiere. It was a piece by Walt Wagner, a Seattle-based pianist (and a good one, at that) who is still quite active. The story behind this piece is that it was committed by Peter Morton, longtime Boeing HR Vice President and masterful engineer, to celebrate the launch of the Boeing 777 airplane. It is an absolutely amazing piece of work, really well orchestrated and colorful, with lots of musical challenge. It sounds very cinematic, which I love. I'm really surprised this piece isn't played more, because it's brilliant, and I'm sure audiences around the world would absolutely love it. It also has a sacred sound to it, which was the composer's intend, because he wanted to portray his faith and what it's like for underprivileged youth go through to discover faith. It's been recorded, though, by the Seattle Symphony, about 20 years ago. It's an absolutely fantasic recording, which you can find here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkWJF3RrrL4
This link is just for the 1st movements, but you have got to check out the others, because it gets better. It was sure quite a lot of fun to play, and I only hope I get to do it again.
And then, there's my piece. The orchestra commissioned me to write it to thank Peter Morton for doing so much to sponsor and arrange our concert. So our conductor asked if I could incorporate the poem High Flight, which every aviator seems to know, into a piece. It was quite a challenge for me, but in the end, I'm quite happy with the result. Our performance, with narration of the poem by 98.1 Classical King FM's own Dave Beck, is here:
But playing the music wasn't the only great thing about this weekend. I also got to meet a lot of new people and see some old friends. I got a chance to talk with both Walt Wagner and Leanna Primiani, who were at both performances, and they both really liked my composition. I also got to talk at length with Peter Morton, who was very touched by the piece and offered to take me up in one of his small airplanes, which is really exciting. Here is all of us together with the amazing piano soloist, Mark Salman, and Anna Edwards in the middle, our conductor:
Talking with Danielle, I also picked her brain a bit, and asked her what she practiced, given that she is such a busy performer. She told me all she practices is fundamentals, with hardly any work on her ensemble music. She's not the only full-time player that has told me that: Greg (my grad school teacher) told me that, the Milwaukee Symphony guys told me that, I've heard it in masterclasses at symposia...And it got me thinking. The pros work their fundamentals so much that they can trust themselves with handle anything with perfection. In addition, they have done research and study, so there is really no need for them to practice much in the way of ensemble music or solo music. They can just count on themselves to play it all well. Greg always told me that he did that, and I have practiced a fair amount of fundamentals in my career, which is why I can do what I can do without having as much practice time in the last several years. But I just haven't done it enough. I struggle with consistency in my playing, and still worry about hard passages in my orchestra music and solo music. Also, when I do recording I have to redo a lot of stuff, and sometimes I'm just not satisfied enough. If I worked fundamentals for a good 2 hours each day, I bet I could really alleviate myself of my worries, plus I'll sound a lot more consistent.
And I also thought about how I can apply this to my students. I have been good about having them practice fundaments, but I haven't been doing it enough, and stressing that they balance more of it into their practice, maybe like 50/50 with fundamentals and everything else...because when I sit down and think about it, a lot of issues my older players have revolve around a lack of solid fundamentals...
And what are these fundamentals? Long tones, lip slur & flexibility, scales, articulation exercises...basically stuff that isn't melodic or song-like, and stuff that isn't an ensemble part. However, I would consider throwing certain etudes into this category...well, most etudes, because a lot of them are designed with fundamental aspects in mind. But non-melodic stuff is the best because it is low-pressure, with no goals to ever consider it for performance.
So thanks for reading all of this, and sorry for the long post. But I am excited and inspired for the future, for myself and for my students. I have learned a lot this weekend and am read to roar.
Take care and value music.