Those Wacky Russions

This week was the first rehearsal of the UW orchestra for the fall term which is the open rehearsal at which the newbies get to check things out and decide if they want to join or not. (It also seems to be traditional for me to mention it in my blog.)

We basically sight read two pieces at the rehearsal. One was an overture from some Verdi opera, the name of which escapes me at the moment. We've played this piece before during one of the summer terms. It's an easier piece and was used as a warm up (it's not one of the actual pieces we're playing this term).

The second piece, and one of the pieces we are playing for read were the 2nd and 3rd movements of a symphony by Shastakovitch (if I'm spelling that right). He's one of those crazy Russian composers. We've played a shorter piece by him in a previous term.

I'm not quite sure what I think of the Shastakovitch symphony just yet. It sounded... strange. Now, part of that is probably due to the fact that everyone was sight reading and I'm not at all familiar with it yet or how it's supposed to sound. Even so, it sounded fairly different from most of the other stuff we've played. If I had to try to describe it, I'd compare it to more atmospheric music or perhaps movie sound track-ish, perhaps even more "modern" (whatever that means) than other stuff we've played. Well, we'll see how it goes.

There were 9 cellos at the open rehearsal this term (down from our high of a whopping 13 over the summer) so it seems like a decent amount and, assuming everyone who came out decides to join, everyone will probably get it. If I recall correctly, we had 8 cellos during the most recent winter term. The most we've had during a non-summer term was 11. (Yes, the cellos went to 11 one term.)

On a related note, I am current doing some wrangling for some of the string auditions and have my trusty lap top to entertain me (hence this post).

That's all for now, so until next time,
Freak Out.
-TFitC

Musical Convocation

The UW orchestra played at convocation this term (which was today). To prepare, we had our regularly scheduled rehearsal time on Thursday night, then dress rehearsal for convocation last night and finally played for both the morning and afternoon convocations today. As a result, I'm a little orchestra'd out, so I think the cello will be neglected a bit for the next couple of days.

Not much to say about the convocations themselves. The chancellor's speech was the same at both of them, as far as I could tell, at least. I also noticed that one of the PhDs in the afternoon convocation (which was the math, CS, engineer, science types) had a Star Trek tie that looked exactly like one I've got, though I've not worn it in years and years, seeing as I generally try to avoid wearing ties whenever possible.

That is all, Freak Out,
-TFitC

Classical Cacophony

With the start of the new term, the UW orchestra is starting up once again with the open rehearsal last night. So, I dusted off the cello (much neglected over the summer) and off I went! It's looking like there'll be 9-10 cellos in the section this term, which is pretty similar to the past few terms. There were 11 signed up on the list, 10 showed up to the rehearsal and 1 left part way through proceedings. If I'm remembering correctly, the largest cello section we've had was a whopping total of 12, so I'd imagine that all the cellos that decide they want to stick with it will get in.

This term, we're playing Borodine's 2nd symphony (we played the 3rd movement two summers ago, and it's one of the easier movements so it won't take long to polish that one off, the rest of the symphony, who knows?), a flute concerto from Mozart, I think, and other things. In addition to our regular end-of-term concert, we're playing at convocation this term, and one of the things we're playing there is a medly from South Pacific, which I gather is a Rogers and Hammerstein musical, though I'm not familiar with it. The medly actually seems more in line with my actual skill level than our normal fare, but I couldn't help thinking that it was more boring than the harder stuff.

Of course, I use the term "boring" relatively in this case, as it's always fun to be playing (and easier means less practicing for me).

Freak Out,
-TFitC