!!!MEMORY LANE ALERT!!!
NBYO was in town this weekend. Geez, I miss being in it. I miss being a string player for all sorts of reasons, but having the chance to be part of an orchestra is definitely highest on that list.
I spent two years with NBYO. During the first I was halfway back in the second violin section with a whole bunch of other newbies, hero-worshipping the first violins who were so incredible. The second year, as one of the firsts, I realized that they weren't so spectacular after all; they just played higher than than everyone else and had learned the tricks to faking their way through wrong notes. But it was still so much fun: getting together for weekends to practice, getting dressed up for the Sunday concerts (the guys always behaved so much better once the tuxes were on), and going through the concert routine just as a professional orchestra would. And, well... I've never experienced anything quite as moving as sitting in the middle of an enthusiastic 80-member orchestra playing its heart out.
I spent way too long this afternoon looking through pictures from the trip we took to Italy at the end of my second year. We played in this awesome auditorium (a converted sugar refinery) that had glass walls at either end, and some of my best memories of the trip are of sitting on the stage during rehearsals and looking out at the trees behind us. We'd start O mio babbino caro and it'd hit me... it was a beautiful summer day and we were in Italy. Then, of course, Dr. Mark would flick his baton in that way that told us the next words out his mouth would be, "Take it from the top." Again.
Anyway... a few snippets from my trip down memory lane: this is the CD we made in Italy. It was nice to listen to the short snippets of some of our pieces. I'm in there somewhere. (In the menacing stringy parts that start after the brass blow themselves out.)
And here is the Paganini Auditorium itself. I had zero photography skills back then.
I spent two years with NBYO. During the first I was halfway back in the second violin section with a whole bunch of other newbies, hero-worshipping the first violins who were so incredible. The second year, as one of the firsts, I realized that they weren't so spectacular after all; they just played higher than than everyone else and had learned the tricks to faking their way through wrong notes. But it was still so much fun: getting together for weekends to practice, getting dressed up for the Sunday concerts (the guys always behaved so much better once the tuxes were on), and going through the concert routine just as a professional orchestra would. And, well... I've never experienced anything quite as moving as sitting in the middle of an enthusiastic 80-member orchestra playing its heart out.
I spent way too long this afternoon looking through pictures from the trip we took to Italy at the end of my second year. We played in this awesome auditorium (a converted sugar refinery) that had glass walls at either end, and some of my best memories of the trip are of sitting on the stage during rehearsals and looking out at the trees behind us. We'd start O mio babbino caro and it'd hit me... it was a beautiful summer day and we were in Italy. Then, of course, Dr. Mark would flick his baton in that way that told us the next words out his mouth would be, "Take it from the top." Again.
Anyway... a few snippets from my trip down memory lane: this is the CD we made in Italy. It was nice to listen to the short snippets of some of our pieces. I'm in there somewhere. (In the menacing stringy parts that start after the brass blow themselves out.)
And here is the Paganini Auditorium itself. I had zero photography skills back then.