Regular Band: Hoarding for fun and profit
Monday was pretty chilly. I wore long underwear under my pants, plus a good sweater on top over my shirt. Given that there's still something blowing cold air in the building, I was not uncomfortable or hot in rehearsal.
ADB came up to me before we started and handed me a sheet. He wanted specific articulation in the piccolo duet piece, which is fine, but 1) the articulation is not preprinted in the music, and 2) it's exactly the opposite from what AD2 had us do in that piece last year. When we eventually got to it in rehearsal, he stopped us the first time and I had to go, yeah, I'm having to override the muscle memory I built up on this piece. He seemed okay with that and did ask us to write in his notes prior to our next rehearsal, which is fine. He also came up to the piccolo player and me after rehearsal and went, send up a flare, a red flag, something, but we need to have you two tune before we play this at the concert! Yes, agreed. I will be coming in cold and given that the song just prior is a flute-only song, so will she. And, again, it's freezing outside and it's not as warm as would be ideal in here. That affected the tuning Monday night. ADB said he'd let the emcee stall before this piece, and even if the emcee stops talking, he'd let us take our time to get in tune. Good. I like hearing that.
Before all that, though, I get into rehearsal and the sax quintet is practicing; I think they're the opening act before the full-on concert. They sound really good. However, they were practicing in my row, which disrupted the chairs a bit, so the Eb clarinet player sat next to me and we talked for a bit, which was nice. By the time the picc player arrived the sax quartet had finished and the row was getting reset, but the picc player had an issue--her folder was missing. There was a whole thing about how the picc player was going out of town and wouldn't practice during our break, and the Eb player was going to put the picc player's folder in her slot, but it wasn't there and they were trying to remember what happened two weeks earlier. Ultimately, I gave her as much music as I had, since when I've had custody of her folder, I've made copies of her music, so I had appropriate parts for all but the three new pieces from this year; she just shared off mine in those cases. I was joking that my hoarding had come in handy for once; she was appreciative of it. I always keep all copies of the songs with me just in case I have to cover them. It was pretty easy to whip them out of their sleeves in my binder for her to play. She did email several of us after band to let us know her folder had been on her dining room table, likely flipped over by the cleaning lady, and was mistaken for one from another of her groups; I think she's in four of them. I was just relieved to hear she'd found it.
I think I mentioned this after our last rehearsal, but we're kind of in summer mode. We easily could spend more time, many weeks, on a few of the pieces, but we have one more rehearsal to go. We haven't even touched a couple of the songs yet, but as they're ones we've played in the past, we at least have an idea of how they should go. The only drawback to that is that we have high school students sitting in with us for the first time since covid and those kids haven't played these pieces before, so it would be nice for them to get the music under their fingers.
There was also a revisiting of jury duty. While the Eb player and I were chatting, trumpet A appeared at my side. Somehow I wondered if she'd talk to me about it. She was asking about getting paid. Yes; I got an email earlier that day saying my debit card was activated. This is curious since we were all handed generic cards. I'd tried to request a paper check over the weekend and couldn't get very far with it, because the website would say my name wasn't attached to the card. It was weird and frustrating and the Kane County website said we'd get mailed a check in 14 business days, so I just figured I'd wait for that. It looks like I'll have to go back to the website and figure that out again. A actually needs a physical check, because she can trade that in to get her full pay from her school district for the day. That seems fair.
After rehearsal, I found myself talking with Mr. AD2 and trumpet J, discussing this weekend's Fancy Band concert. Sounds like Mr. AD2 will be attending, and J was telling him how Stars & Stripes Forever will be our opener, which is totally incongruous to how I've ever played it, but that's how it goes. J also mentioned having looked at the submitted veterans slide show that Dr. K put together--we were asked to preview it and check names and things--and joked that he knew who my submissions were, since they share my rather distinct last name. Yes, well, I'd had to send along corrections since both my grandfathers have suffixes to their names that weren't included (one is a Sr, one is a I), and one of my uncles (who is II to my grandfather's I) was omitted. I let J know that I had eight people in the slideshow, heh. J has two. Some of the vets seem really interesting and I'd love to know their backstories. I'm hoping more will be shared about them at our concert, but that's a whole different band.
ADB came up to me before we started and handed me a sheet. He wanted specific articulation in the piccolo duet piece, which is fine, but 1) the articulation is not preprinted in the music, and 2) it's exactly the opposite from what AD2 had us do in that piece last year. When we eventually got to it in rehearsal, he stopped us the first time and I had to go, yeah, I'm having to override the muscle memory I built up on this piece. He seemed okay with that and did ask us to write in his notes prior to our next rehearsal, which is fine. He also came up to the piccolo player and me after rehearsal and went, send up a flare, a red flag, something, but we need to have you two tune before we play this at the concert! Yes, agreed. I will be coming in cold and given that the song just prior is a flute-only song, so will she. And, again, it's freezing outside and it's not as warm as would be ideal in here. That affected the tuning Monday night. ADB said he'd let the emcee stall before this piece, and even if the emcee stops talking, he'd let us take our time to get in tune. Good. I like hearing that.
Before all that, though, I get into rehearsal and the sax quintet is practicing; I think they're the opening act before the full-on concert. They sound really good. However, they were practicing in my row, which disrupted the chairs a bit, so the Eb clarinet player sat next to me and we talked for a bit, which was nice. By the time the picc player arrived the sax quartet had finished and the row was getting reset, but the picc player had an issue--her folder was missing. There was a whole thing about how the picc player was going out of town and wouldn't practice during our break, and the Eb player was going to put the picc player's folder in her slot, but it wasn't there and they were trying to remember what happened two weeks earlier. Ultimately, I gave her as much music as I had, since when I've had custody of her folder, I've made copies of her music, so I had appropriate parts for all but the three new pieces from this year; she just shared off mine in those cases. I was joking that my hoarding had come in handy for once; she was appreciative of it. I always keep all copies of the songs with me just in case I have to cover them. It was pretty easy to whip them out of their sleeves in my binder for her to play. She did email several of us after band to let us know her folder had been on her dining room table, likely flipped over by the cleaning lady, and was mistaken for one from another of her groups; I think she's in four of them. I was just relieved to hear she'd found it.
I think I mentioned this after our last rehearsal, but we're kind of in summer mode. We easily could spend more time, many weeks, on a few of the pieces, but we have one more rehearsal to go. We haven't even touched a couple of the songs yet, but as they're ones we've played in the past, we at least have an idea of how they should go. The only drawback to that is that we have high school students sitting in with us for the first time since covid and those kids haven't played these pieces before, so it would be nice for them to get the music under their fingers.
There was also a revisiting of jury duty. While the Eb player and I were chatting, trumpet A appeared at my side. Somehow I wondered if she'd talk to me about it. She was asking about getting paid. Yes; I got an email earlier that day saying my debit card was activated. This is curious since we were all handed generic cards. I'd tried to request a paper check over the weekend and couldn't get very far with it, because the website would say my name wasn't attached to the card. It was weird and frustrating and the Kane County website said we'd get mailed a check in 14 business days, so I just figured I'd wait for that. It looks like I'll have to go back to the website and figure that out again. A actually needs a physical check, because she can trade that in to get her full pay from her school district for the day. That seems fair.
After rehearsal, I found myself talking with Mr. AD2 and trumpet J, discussing this weekend's Fancy Band concert. Sounds like Mr. AD2 will be attending, and J was telling him how Stars & Stripes Forever will be our opener, which is totally incongruous to how I've ever played it, but that's how it goes. J also mentioned having looked at the submitted veterans slide show that Dr. K put together--we were asked to preview it and check names and things--and joked that he knew who my submissions were, since they share my rather distinct last name. Yes, well, I'd had to send along corrections since both my grandfathers have suffixes to their names that weren't included (one is a Sr, one is a I), and one of my uncles (who is II to my grandfather's I) was omitted. I let J know that I had eight people in the slideshow, heh. J has two. Some of the vets seem really interesting and I'd love to know their backstories. I'm hoping more will be shared about them at our concert, but that's a whole different band.