It also got me thinking about myself playing with other groups. I really miss playing with professional ensembles right now. I got to play with the Saratoga Orchestra brass in August, but that's really been it in the last couple of years. Oh, there was that Ewazen recording project, too. But I miss playing with large ensembles at a high level. I feel like I really need to be playing with other players who are as good as I am or better than me. I sometimes play with recordings, and that's fun, but it just makes me miss it more. Sitting with my student ensembles and playing is fun and rewarding when I get the chance, but I still find myself wanting a little more. Is that a bad thing?
Oh, well...it's just what my life calls for now. My purpose is to take care of my family and my students right now, and as you know from reading previous blogs of mine, I cherish getting to do those.
And speaking of, my youth brass ensembles had their winter concert on Monday. It was really great, and a lot of fun. The middle-school group, the Harbor Brass, played out of my Christmas quartets book (and I played with them instead of conducted). The high-school group, the Penn Cove Brass, played a very challenging program including Rimsky-Korsakov's Dance of the Tumblers, Prokofiev's "Troika" from Lieutenant Kije, and Sleigh Ride. The Penn Cove Brass performed admirably, not just because they played their music well, but they dealt with adversity in a couple moments where sometime went wrong. Heh, performance is a fickle thing. Things can go wrong for the first time in a performance, but it's up to the players' intuition, instincts and calmness to get through it. These guys are really well-trained and experienced, so I'm confident in them. And I'm very excited to start working towards Solo & Ensemble in January!
This Saturday we will once again be playing Christmas music in front of the Oak Harbor Safeway! We did this in 2018 and 2019, but couldn't last year. So I'm very excited to get rolling on that. What excites me most, though, is how excited everyone else is for it. My students and friends playing, the store employees...And we're going to ship the kids to grandma's for the weekend so that my wife can come play, too! Hopefully someone will take some video so I can show you.
Take care and value music.