tonight was the durham symphony's first rehearsal of the 2004-2005 season.
once again (for the 4th season, i think) i'm working as their music librarian and stage manager, but this year i'm also their 4th horn player. what this means is that i'm working twice as hard but getting the same paycheck. i don't mind, though. it's been such a long time since i've had my own seat in an orchestra (versus just sitting in as an occasional, last-minute sub)... it feels good to be making music again.
one of the best things about the rehearsals is the conductor, alan nielson. he's a total hoot. his humor is usually unintentional, which makes it even funnier. i've been archiving some of my favorite nielsonisms over the last year or so... here's another from tonight's rehearsal:
we're playing a relatively unknown symphony by a relatively unknown composer, nikolay myaskovsky. it's got quite a bit of dissonance, and though it's not all that difficult to listen to it's pretty tricky to play. a lot of us were more than a bit confused during our first run-through. alan, trying to make the work seem more friendly, said:
"This was really a well-known piece of music at one time. Then something happened... they sent it to me."
more exciting than this nugget of humor was the fact my horn broke in the middle of the rehearsal. broke!! the thumb valve just totally fell off. this is not good. the horn is playable, but seeing as i was missing a bunch of notes already i really didn't need the additional challenge.
i've got the name of a good repairman, though, and i'll call him in the morning. i have a feeling it's not going to be an expensive repair (probably just some solder) but the whole instrument could also use a good tune-up... it's been 10 years since i've played it regularly, and it's clearly suffering from neglect. (it is falling apart, after all.) worse, though, i imagine there are 10 years' worth of little critters living happily inside all those tubes.
yum.