oboeinsight

… mind you, not in a physical way … but if I wanted to get more hits here at this little site, I guess I should have blogged about Nathan Gunn last night. It sounds as if it worked for one blogger.

But then … of course I’d never check my stats and see how many hits I get. No sirree. Not I.

Actually I do figure I’ll blog more on The Magic Flute after I watch the whole thing. My initial response to the portion I watched was that Gunn steals the show, though. Maybe that’s just a Papageno thing. Maybe not.
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I’ve things to do here, so I’m not going to get up to San Francisco tonight, but Robert Gable’s blog entry took me to a group called Formerly Known as Classical, which took me to their program page. I’m impressed with their name, their youth (all teenagers), and the title of their upcoming concert, My Father Knew Olivier Messiaen. Clever!

Don’t know why the title is clever? Go here.
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… or I guess I should call it The Magic Flute, considering ….

I had forgotten that the Met broadcast would be on at 10:00 PM, and I tuned in about 8 minutes into it. Rats. I would have recorded it tonight, but too late now.

Still … I’m sorry to hear it in English. I miss the German. I like the sound of German. Is that silly? Maybe so. But there you go. (I do understand why it might be done in the language of “the people”, and we do speak English around here, but still I really miss the sounds of German. And who can understand all the words as they are sung anyway?)

Ahhh … hearing some lovely music; it’s one of my favorite little moments. (Gee, and there’s no oboe. How odd.)

Anyway, I’ve just set my DVD recorder for Sunday’s 12:00 PM broadcast.

Opera San José, as I mentioned earlier, will be doing this next year. Again. (We’ve done it a number of times, but who would ever grow weary of Mozart?) As I’m listening now I’m reminded of what fun it can be to play. It’s still not my favorite Mozart but, believe me, I’m quite happy to play it!
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Somehow I landed at an iTunes link that took me to a San Jose Symphony recording. I can’t get the link to work, but if you go to iTunes just search on San Jose Sympony and you’ll find it. Quite a while ago San Jose Symphony (RIP) recorded Henry Brant’s LItany of Tides, and I do own a copy of the record (yes, I mean record … as in “vinyl”), but I didn’t realize that recording was still for sale. Wish I could say I was involved, but there was no English horn. Ah well.

Now I find that it is also available on emusic.com, right here.

But I do wonder if any of the players involved managed to get anything from this recording. I’m doubting it.

So here I am reminiscing again (as I did Monday) about the things we did in that now defunct orchestra. Several premieres. Some commissioned works. And a whole lot of big names that came to play with our little orchestra. I was only 18 when I joined the group. By the time it died I’d been in it for, I think, 27 years. That’s a lot of history. (And not one program in my house. Sigh.)

Oh Rats and Double Rats! I just checked my calendar; I won’t be seeing our son, Jameson, as Prospero. The Tempest conficts directly with Camelot. With some shows I’m able to take an absence or two, but in this case it’s a one rehearsal show and two-week run, no absences allowed. This will be Jameson’s last straight theatre production in high school. At least I’ll get to see him in Fiddler on the Roof.

This is the down side of being in this biz. Just how many of my childrens’ performances have I missed, I wonder?

Or maybe I just don’t want to think about it.

Sigh.

Tonight I will be attending his vocal jazz concert. That should be fun.
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I landed at a blog because of the use of “English horn” and here’s what I read:

There’s a section toward the end of the second movement where the piano defers to the cor anglais (fancy for English horn) that, well, if you know of a passage more beautiful, please let me and my planet know.

No. Cor anglais is not fancy for English horn. It’s French. It’s also used in Britain. Consdiering that the piece the blogger was talking about was Ravel’s Piano Concerto cor anglais makes a bit ‘o sense. Ya know?

Here you go, in case you want to know more:
Italian: Corno inglese
German: Englischhorn
Spanish: Corno inglés

News you can probably won’t use.

As to what the person wrote about that part of the work … indeed! It is an incredibly beautiful movement from an incredibly wonderful work. I’d love to play it again—it’s been far too long since I played the work. I’ve only performed it twice, once with Jean-Philippe Collard and once with, if I’m remembering correctly, Alicia De La Rocha. I sure wish I’d saved all my programs.

Yes, you read that correctly: I’ve not saved the majority of programs. This means I can’t remember when it was that a number of big names performed with the San Jose Symphony (RIP). The list is long and rather amazing, when I think on it; some friends and I were going over the list a while back, and were simply amazed at the names that we managed to get in our little symphony. There was Isaac Stern, Rudolph Firkusny, Leon Fleisher, Sarah Vaughan, Bill Evans, Nathan Milstein, Jorge Bolet, Aaron Copland … I mean the list goes on and on. Simply amazing, as the San Jose Symphony (RIP) wasn’t exactly in the top 10.

Oh dear … now I’m regretting all the things I’ve tossed over the years.

Hindsight.

I just landed at a blog where the writer stated “I used to play … concert oboe.”

So what does that mean? Do I play concert oboe? Or do I play a different kind of oboe? Maybe I play opera oboe, or symphonic oboe or maybe just mediocre oboe?

Just wondering ….
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Jill plays oboe. Jill knits.

This person plays oboe. She also knits.

Another knitter who plays oboe, or oboe player who knits. Whatever.

And yet another.

Pam Hakl, my oboe colleague in Symphony Silicon Valley and Opera San José plays oboe. And she knits.

Am I missing something? I don’t knit. Hmmm.
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Yes, I’m home from the concert.

Yes, I got the notes again.

Yes, I had a coughing attack. (More than one.)

Yes, I’m ready to crawl under blankets once more.

(But yes, I have to do laundry first.)

And yes, my dear husband is making dinner!
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