High School Musical (concert)

We had our first of two holiday concerts last night. It was in conjunction with the Riverside High School Band concert.

Overall, it was a pretty cool evening, and the concerts went well. The Riverside bands (yes, there was a concert band and a symphonic band) were fairly decent for the most part. I can tell that the program is in a rebuilding phase, and they do have some very decent players. And their music was ambitious to say the least, so kudos to them.

The high school bands did not play much holiday music in their programs-- i guess that was left up to us. And it was probably a good thing, as most of our concert was holiday music-- but different holiday music.

We played Sleigh Ride, of course. But also a couple cool medleys of christmas music, some of which was arranged in nontraditional ways. I love when familiar melodies are deconstructed and broken apart and reassembled into new ways, in new meters, etc... it can make for very exciting musical opportunites.

It can also lead to trainwrecks... one of which happened last night.

"Jubilant Holiday" in one such 'nontraditional arrangement' of "In Dulce Jubilo". This particular arrangement infuses a bit of the nutcracker's arabian dance in the middle (very hot!). But there were a lot of tempo changes to master. We didn't so much master one of them.

The conductor and the trumpets had VASTLY differing ideas about the new tempo in one segment of the piece. The trumpets get credit for listening to each other and holding it together. However with the conductor flailing about up front and not matching what the trumpets just fanfared, the rest of the band was at a bit of a loss as to when exactly to come in. Thank Allah it was only an 8 measure transition area-- because it very nearly ground the piece to a bloody halt.

Not pretty.

But the rest of the concert went very well. My favorite piece was called either Christmas Traditions or Holiday Celebration. The titles start blurring after awhile. The reason I liked it was because the ending was hugely loud. Very traditional bombastic end-- and I felt the need to 'represent' in the trombone section.

And I did.

I think I left part of my lungs on the stage after the last note. Fortissimo with a crescendo to the end. Brilliant! And it tune. And holy fucking LOUD.

Because as anyone who knows band geek personalities knows that trombone players and percussionists live to play loud. (So do trumpets, but they live to play HIGH and loud).

One last thing: there were some little cuties in the high school bands! How lecherous am I?? Seriously, there was one percussionist with a chin goatee, kinda thin, ears that stuck out, sandy blonde hair, but cute as anything! Still in that awkward, not fully developed phase, but getting there. And I was looking at it!!! He was probably 16 or 'maybe' 17 too.

God, I've turned into a chickenhawk!