oboeinsight

I’ve been busy. Les Mis takes a good amount of time and energy. Teaching takes that too, although the one thing missing from the mix there is that I don’t get nervous! Yes, even after 36 shows I get nervous for the “sewer solo”. Now isn’t that silly? I think so! It’s not that I haven’t played well, either; the shows are going quite well. I guess nervousness is just part of the “Les Mis Mix”. :-)

Today is the “Band Dinner” … the touring musicians and us local folk will meet between shows for a nice dinner and fun times. We like to do this once a run. The touring folk don’t often get together with us; they like to go “home” between shows since, obviously, going out to lunch and dinner every day can get old (and isn’t the healthiest or cheapest way to live). So fun times for today, I hope!

37 played. 18 remaining.

Oh … and Dan and Jameson (along with a friend of Jameson’s and the friend’s mother) came to the show on Tuesday. Sounded as if Jameson loved the show! Somehow no one thought it was all about the oboe. Go figure. (I really think the show should be renamed … something about Les Hautbois … if that’s the correct way of saying that!)

And one other short, but important, note: I haven’t blogged about the London horror here or elsewhere. Words just don’t come. I was relieved to read news from the music bloggers I “know” saying you were okay. But to those bloggers I visit, and to all from the area, I send my prayers.
—–

Brian Sacawa blogged about his wonder reed and I can only scream … so here goes …
You are using a reed that you used back in February?! NOT FAIR!

Oboe reeds simply don’t last that long, although I must confess that I pamper my reeds and make them last longer than most of my fellow oboists (who are much better at making reeds, I willingly admit) would, I’m guessing, would allow.

And Brian (I usually type Brain first (Hey! And did you know that if you put the word Brain between quotations you get this:

What fun!) … but I’ll bet you’ve heard that before), you mention boxes of reeds. Ouch. We don’t get boxes. Reeds cost between $20 and $35 each, and most of them don’t work for me anyway. Could we maybe take your saxophone reeds, fold ‘em in half, and magically make them double reeds? Ya think?

Sigh. The life of an oboe player. (And people wonder why we are neurotic.)

But enough of my silliness. In some ways I find it somewhat refreshing to read of someone else’s reed struggles, despite feeling some compassion for Brian as well. 8-)
—–

# of shows played: 31
# of shows remaining: 24

I feel as if I’m finally in the swing of things with Les Mis. It could have gone on longer and I would have been fine with that. I’m sorry they decided to cancel the extension now.

Ah well. Too late to do anything about that, even though it appears to be selling very well.
—–

There’s an article about musicians and retirement. This particular article is dealing with British musicians, and the possibility that the retirement age there may be moved up to 70. I’m not really sure what the “normal” retirement age is here, but I’ve not even thought about how that affects me because we musicians don’t think in the same way as many with “regular” jobs. Some of us retire because we’ve had it with the stress. Some retire because of injuries. Some just get fed up with the income problem or dealing with other (often pretty darn nutty) musicians.

As the writer of the article concludes she writes:

If we do all end up having to work for longer, as the government threatens, we shall need to develop some kind of handicap system that acknowledges the fact that not all jobs are equally demanding. Of course, there are many which are very arduous in all kinds of ways – from heavy manual jobs to caring for the elderly – but classical musicians are in an unusual position. We’re expected to combine the precision of the proverbial brain surgeon with the stamina of the marathon runner. It’s difficult enough to maintain this up to normal retirement age, and most musicians I know couldn’t afford to retire early. Add to that the strain of working in an image-conscious profession where youth gets most of the publicity, and the prospect of ploughing on into old age seems cruel indeed.

What do I think? I can’t think today (Les Mis is hard on the brain!). But I do wonder, sometimes, when I’ll be through with this career of mine. Do I want to be doing this when I’m 65? I honestly don’t know. There are moments when the joy is so great I think dying while playing would be just fine. There are other times when I think I will die playing because the stress is so crazy that I think my heart will finally just give out or explode.

But those of us who aren’t in the major ensemble piece our work together and don’t have exactly the best retirement plans. Many assume they’ll teach after they finish performing. Some go into instrument repair. But many of us sure don’t have good retirement plans through our employers.

Me? I’m hoping some kind music lover out there will say “You’ve served us well. Here’s a retirement account. Please come over and play for me now and then but, otherwise, enjoy your free time … and, for Pete’s sake, do something about your horribly messy back yard!

;-)
—–

Doing a search on classical music snobs, I landed at Naxos.com and read this:

Coping with Snobs

There are snobs everywhere, in every field. Baseball snobs try to make you feel bad if you don’t know Ty Cobb’s lifetime batting average or Willie Mays’hat size. Computer snobs try to make you feel bad if you don’t know a ROM from a RAM.

Classical music snobs are some of the snobbiest snobs of all. They try to make you feel bad by showing off their knowledge and declaiming their opinions. Often their snobbery masquerades as helpfulness, but snobs have a way of making you ashamed of your ignorance.

Nobody should feel ashamed of ignorance. If a classical music snob tries to shame you at a concert, don’t take it personally. They’re just showing off, and may be unaware that they are making you feel small in order to make themselves feel big.

Classical music has a reputation for snobbery, but in fact the audience is full of wonderful people who aren’t snobs at all, people who come to enjoy the beauty of the music. These people know that what really matters is your willingness to open your mind and heart to the music.

I don’t know why, but “Nobody should feel ashamed of ignorance” bugs me. Maybe because we shouldn’t be ignorant about certain things – hunger and racism come to mind immediately. I wish they had put that differently. So there are times, I think maybe we should be ashamed of ignorance (and remedy the situation). It’s just that perhaps we ought not be ashamed of ignorance in classical music (although it’s not difficult to fix that). But anyway, I just thought I’d post this here for all to read since I’m guessing not everyone does a search on classical music snobs!
—–

The symphony orchestra’s future has been discussed, seemingly, forever now. So much of the time we are told that we seem distant or elitist. (I think that most things appear that way to people who don’t understand them. I’d say, in fact, that some of my friends who listen to only a certain kind of music, say, for instance, “indie rock”, seem like snobs to me because I haven’t a clue who or what they are talking about.)

But Toronto Symphony is doing something they think will appeal to a good number of new audience members. I just think what they are doing sounds like fun, and I can use fun!

Clutching a plastic doll of the golden droid he made famous, Daniels admitted to being “put off by opera houses, concert halls, by a certain snobbishness.”

“There is none of that in this concert,” said the British actor during a chat with reporters just prior to rehearsing the program. “People already belong to the music and the music already belongs to them.”

Well heck, if C3PO says this, it must be true, yes?! Read more here.

I like the whole idea of a Star Wars concert. (I wanna play, I wanna play!) I liked doing the Final Fantasy “Dear Friends” concert as well. I really like hearing how similar these works are to the music we often play in our snobby symphony and opera performances.

San Jose Symphony (RIP) played a concert many, many years ago that included music from Star Wars. R2D2 even visited. (And my son was chosen from the audience to meet the robot, and get a t-shirt from Skywalker Ranch. I’ll never forget how he looked when the conductor asked if there was a Brandon Mitchell in the audience!) The music to Star Wars isn’t all easy fluff. A lot of movie music, in fact, is challenging to play, and is wonderful stuff.
—–