First of all, my group, the Penn Cove Brass, played a pretty decent performance. They played the Toreador Song from Carmen, which was a perfect piece for this kind of thing and a great challenge. They played it pretty well, although there were some issues with hearing the melody all the time, and some other little bumps and bruises that you wish weren't there. As a result, they got an average score and a lot of really great and helpful comments from the 3 judges, and a really great experience. And 5 of the six players in the group are freshmen. I was very proud of them, because they likely were collectively the youngest group there, and they just went on stage and did their thing. I'm really excited for the future of this group, because kids can really improve quite substantially in high school with the right help.
But I was always this bubbly. After I got the results from the judges of their performance, I got kinda down, and it stuck with me for a couple days. I guess I just felt like I let them down, because I didn't rehearse them right or enough, maybe. I was also upset for the legitimate flub of giving them their music only 3 weeks before...that's not going to happen again. I have to make sure I pick a piece in like November, and have them play the same piece at Regional that they do at State...because they played 2 different pieces for that. Kudos to them for handling it. But anyways, because I felt like I let them down, I was worried that I may have not allowed them the best experience, or that they would want to quit the ensemble, or something.
But, I snapped out of it today, thought about it some more. And had a nice talk with them at rehearsal today. I told them I was excited for the future, because we've got all these great ideas and all this time to make them better. Just you wait--the Penn Cove Brass is gonna be a very entertaining ensemble. They are already getting there.
So other than that stuff, the rest of the trip was really great, too. I saw some old faces at the competition, including several folks that were students when I was there. I got to chat a bit with Jeff Snedeker, who actually had an interesting topic to discuss with me, of which I will share with you in an upcoming blog. And I saw my former student, Allison, who was nice enough to baby my little boy while my wife and I heard the Penn Cove Brass. She's having a pretty amazing time as a music student at CWU, which isn't a surprise. It's such a great music school...in case you didn't know.
My wife, youngest son & I had a very nice time. It was good to get away and spend some time together. And we spent the time in the place where we met, got to know each other, and fell in love. And we did some shopping and visiting...it was great.
So that's over and done, and I now once again look ahead. Both of my brass ensembles play a concert in 2 weeks, which is going to be very exciting: it's going to feature commonly-known Classical music that has been heard in movies. I also want to get some new works published and posted on here, which is basically some arrangements I've just no finalized yet. And I've got a program for the Brass Camp to put together...I was to get an earlier start this year than I did last year.
Take care and value music.