Concert, round II

So, after blog-announcing my early retirement from orchestra after the concert in June, I negotiated with Nick and we decided I could keep going for another term. The only reason for any hesitation and discussion is that practices are on Friday nights, which cuts into our family movie and pizza night. It's workable though as I just slip out during the movie and am back by the time the boys go to bed. I've really enjoyed this term's pieces - all movie related and fabulous to play (except for a selection from Cats which just did not stick, except for the Memory section in which everyone came alive).  Harry Potter and The Hobbit were probably the favourites.  Caleb's Primary School Orchestra joined with our Youth Orchestra for tonight's combined concert, both under the excellent efforts of conductor Rosemary Miller, who seems to have no end of patience for our amateur groups!  Caleb and Aaron were at school camp this week and arrived home today pretty tired and in need of a sleep; I woke Caleb up in time for him to play through the pieces once before pizza arrived.  As a result he felt a little underpracticed (despite the year's lead-up to the event - you really need to be ready on the day) and didn't give it his best effort.  We thought they did very well though.

The younger orchestra stayed on when ours joined them, but perhaps we could have used a slightly larger corner - we ended up being a little squashed, and I got my violin in the way of a bow and was bumped out of tune right before the dreaded Cats selection...turns out Rosemary had cut out all the nasty bits and only kept the much-loved Memory though, so I ended up not being able to play that at all with a horribly pitched D-String.  Ah well.  Had a quick tune up before the next piece.  There's Justus in the front row, who was brought in to lead and/or supplement the firsts as we thought our section leader might be absent on the night due to a rather severe illness.  Since Justus hadn't been at any rehearsals and just got the music the week before, we had a hurried run-through at our house before the concert which may or may not have been helpful...it didn't help in getting us to the concert on time as my "just one more piece" made us run late; I hadn't put my music in order and didn't take in the order of events with me, so didn't know which pieces were coming up when...frantic whispers to the front row seconds before starting is not ideal! 

A flute quartet was surely the high-note of the programme - they were fabulous.

Definitely a fun evening though despite my mistakes and disorganization, and another great experience!