Sweating Summer
One of the questions musicians get asked most frequently, usually by someone who works a standard 9-to-5 type job, is: so what does your typical work week look like, anyway? It's a complicated question to answer, since we don't really have "typical" weeks very often, and a lot of our most intensive work is done in our own private practice rooms at home, before we even start rehearsing a concert as an orchestra. During our regular season (which runs mid-September through mid-June,) we might spend three or four weeks playing nothing but our regular classical concerts, followed by a week in which we whip through 8 or 10 young people's concerts, plus two Inside the Classics concerts and a weekend pops gig for good measure. The week after that, we might not play any concerts, but spend the entire week recording a CD.
And then, there's the summer schedule. Summer is supposed to be a relaxing time, but for musicians, it's anything but. (This is actually pretty obvious, when you think about it. Since we're professional entertainers, it stands to reason that our busiests times of year should be when "normal" people have the most time to kill and interest in getting out of the house.) During the five weeks that make up our summer season, we'll play around 15 or 16 concerts, not including chamber music performances, and with the exception of the outdoor shows we play around the 4th of July, each of the programs we rehearse will be performed only once. (During our regular season, we might play four classical concerts in a single week, but all four will be the same show. In other words, it takes about four months of the regular season to cover as much music as we play in a single month at Sommerfest.)
As you might imagine, this makes the Sommerfest rehearsal schedule fairly chaotic. At the moment, we're in rehearsals for three completely different concerts, all of which will be performed this weekend. Here's what's on the schedule, concert-wise:
Friday, 8pm - a light but jam-packed concert featuring two waltzes, a few polkas, a bunch of brassy favorites like Bugler's Holiday, a hilarious concerto for two bassoons, and an almost totally unknown piano concerto by the dude who wrote Sleigh Ride.
Saturday, 8pm - An arm-buster of a program. A Verdi overture, Grieg's piano concerto, and Tchaikovsky's massive 4th symphony.
Sunday, 4pm - This concert is way the heck down in Winona, Minnesota, where we'll be helping wrap up their annual Beethoven Festival with a concert featuring Osmo conducting the 1st and 6th symphonies.
So, with that kind of repertoire stacking up on the docket, you can imagine how confusing the rehearsal schedule can get. Here's how it looked for us this week:
Wednesday - A double rehearsal day with Osmo conducting the two Beethoven symphonies. We know these pieces very well, having recorded them just last year, but this is the only shot we have to get them back under our fingers. We won't play either symphony again until the Sunday concert.
Thursday - Another double rehearsal day, with Sommerfest director Andrew Litton on the podium. In an unusual move, the morning rehearsal actually includes repertoire from both the Friday and Saturday shows. We start with the Verdi, move on to Tchaikovsky's 4th, then whip through some of the shorter pieces from the Friday concert. In the afternoon, we cover more of the Friday music, including the Bassoonapalooza and the Anderson concerto, and finish up by quickly touching the polkas and waltzes.
Friday - We'll have a single 2-1/2 hour rehearsal at 2pm, covering only the music for the Friday night concert. History suggests that Andrew will focus heavily on getting us to style the waltzes and polkas exactly the way he likes them.
Saturday - I never get used to our summer Saturday morning rehearsals. During the regular season, we rarely rehearse on Saturdays or Sundays, and never in the morning. Musicians tend to be night owls, so dragging yourself in for a 10am rehearsal the morning after a concert that ended only 12 hours earlier is no fun. But there we'll be, again with Andrew on the podium, to tighten up the Verdi and Tchaikovsky for the Saturday night concert, and rehearse the Grieg concerto for the first and only time.
What about Sunday? Well, with 3-1/2 hour bus rides on either end of the Beethoven concert in Winona, there won't be time for a rehearsal. We'll just have to snap to without getting a chance to test out the unfamiliar hall. Par for the course - the summer course, at least...
And then, there's the summer schedule. Summer is supposed to be a relaxing time, but for musicians, it's anything but. (This is actually pretty obvious, when you think about it. Since we're professional entertainers, it stands to reason that our busiests times of year should be when "normal" people have the most time to kill and interest in getting out of the house.) During the five weeks that make up our summer season, we'll play around 15 or 16 concerts, not including chamber music performances, and with the exception of the outdoor shows we play around the 4th of July, each of the programs we rehearse will be performed only once. (During our regular season, we might play four classical concerts in a single week, but all four will be the same show. In other words, it takes about four months of the regular season to cover as much music as we play in a single month at Sommerfest.)
As you might imagine, this makes the Sommerfest rehearsal schedule fairly chaotic. At the moment, we're in rehearsals for three completely different concerts, all of which will be performed this weekend. Here's what's on the schedule, concert-wise:
Friday, 8pm - a light but jam-packed concert featuring two waltzes, a few polkas, a bunch of brassy favorites like Bugler's Holiday, a hilarious concerto for two bassoons, and an almost totally unknown piano concerto by the dude who wrote Sleigh Ride.
Saturday, 8pm - An arm-buster of a program. A Verdi overture, Grieg's piano concerto, and Tchaikovsky's massive 4th symphony.
Sunday, 4pm - This concert is way the heck down in Winona, Minnesota, where we'll be helping wrap up their annual Beethoven Festival with a concert featuring Osmo conducting the 1st and 6th symphonies.
So, with that kind of repertoire stacking up on the docket, you can imagine how confusing the rehearsal schedule can get. Here's how it looked for us this week:
Wednesday - A double rehearsal day with Osmo conducting the two Beethoven symphonies. We know these pieces very well, having recorded them just last year, but this is the only shot we have to get them back under our fingers. We won't play either symphony again until the Sunday concert.
Thursday - Another double rehearsal day, with Sommerfest director Andrew Litton on the podium. In an unusual move, the morning rehearsal actually includes repertoire from both the Friday and Saturday shows. We start with the Verdi, move on to Tchaikovsky's 4th, then whip through some of the shorter pieces from the Friday concert. In the afternoon, we cover more of the Friday music, including the Bassoonapalooza and the Anderson concerto, and finish up by quickly touching the polkas and waltzes.
Friday - We'll have a single 2-1/2 hour rehearsal at 2pm, covering only the music for the Friday night concert. History suggests that Andrew will focus heavily on getting us to style the waltzes and polkas exactly the way he likes them.
Saturday - I never get used to our summer Saturday morning rehearsals. During the regular season, we rarely rehearse on Saturdays or Sundays, and never in the morning. Musicians tend to be night owls, so dragging yourself in for a 10am rehearsal the morning after a concert that ended only 12 hours earlier is no fun. But there we'll be, again with Andrew on the podium, to tighten up the Verdi and Tchaikovsky for the Saturday night concert, and rehearse the Grieg concerto for the first and only time.
What about Sunday? Well, with 3-1/2 hour bus rides on either end of the Beethoven concert in Winona, there won't be time for a rehearsal. We'll just have to snap to without getting a chance to test out the unfamiliar hall. Par for the course - the summer course, at least...
posted by Sam at
5:15 PM
2 Comments:
Sam, a quick question - you mention home practice time. How does this go over with the neighbors (assuming apartment living)?
It really depends on the thickness of your walls, the tolerance of your neighbors, and the instrument you play. As a violist, I don't have to be too choosy about living space, since I play one of the softest instruments in the orchestra. But wind and brass players and percussionists almost can't afford to chance living in an apartment setting, lest a neighbor object to the noise.
Even string players face some challenges - I once played in a quartet which rehearsed in the upper unit of an up-and-down duplex in the tony Kenwood neighborhood of Minneapolis. The four young women who lived in the lower unit HATED our rehearsing, and some heated discussions were known to break out, particularly if we rehearsed in the evening. They had a piano downstairs, as well, and eventually, one of the women began pounding out annoying tunes as loudly as she could whenever we started to rehearse...
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