This is possibly my favorite post concert comment ever, courtesy of Tom (thanks for dinner, Tom!!!!)

“You could hear everyone onstage and, you know, there wasn’t any weird shit going on” I loved that!

This came out of my mouth this morning in reference to a former colleague and made me smile as I was saying it….

“Really, I’m surprised he’s not still there. He was a perfect fit for that department, both incompetent and mendacious…”

Rarely have I felt I summarized someone’s professional life so succinctly and accurately!

From the “best laid plans” file. Sue and I figured out a few days ago I could simplify my travel today and tomorrow by going directly from Heathrow to Hereford, where I have a rehearsal tomorrow evening. I should get to Hereford at about 4, which allows me a decent nap before the rehearsal. We just realized the problem with this plan… My scores for the HSO concert are in Cardiff, not Hereford.

The orchestra has a set, but they’re with the rehearsal conductor, so now all is in motion to gather them, otherwise it’s straight to Cardiff, off the train, get the scores, on the train then in rehearsal. No nap. Very sad…..

The OES concert last night had the misfortune of competing with a few other events, and attendance was down a wee bit, which was the only bummer in an otherwise wonderful week. Given the situation, I did something I’ve never done before, which is to remind the audience members to tell their friend how wonderful the kids in the youth orchestra were and that they deserve just as much support as their peers on the football and basketball team. Small towns like to trumpet community spirit, but Pendleton has some fantastic young musicians and they deserve better from their neighbors. I expect I’ll probably get in trouble!

This is one of the dangers of being Ken- I do a good job of tip-toeing around feelings and never offending people for 11 months, then find out I’ve offended someone I was really trying to be nice to, so then I get fed up and speak my mind for a couple weeks, and then have to cover my tracks for the next several months.

Otherwise, I enjoyed the concert itself even more than usual… I thought the Dvorak Wind Serenade had some of the most polished and sophisticated playing the orchestra has managed. There were a few tiny blips which I’m sure the audience missed entirely that caused an inordinate amount of self-recrimination on the part of the players who made them. This is the curse of the musician- the better you play, the more your mistakes bother you, and often when you think it’s going poorly it actually sounds good because you’re so focused, which means you don’t get to enjoy your best work. When I listened to the recording of my recital the other day, I should have known it would be the movement I was most bummed out about after the concert that actually sounded the best….

And Beethoven 8… Yarrr!!!! There were a lot of comments afterwards about how tight the ensemble playing was, with which I concur. No mean feat, especially in the last movement.

It was an unusually lively post-concert party, which culminated in a 2AM argument over the greatest moments in the Transformers (the animated series and movie, not the new film).

Other quote of the week “the last time I got that drunk was also here.” That’s what I call orchestra  spirit. Anyway, onward and upward…  

UPDATE- I forgot to include one other treasured post-concert comment, this one from one of the young ladies in the youth orchestra

“You’ve shown me the path!” she said.

Of course, she’s found it for herself, but it’s really rewarding to be a part of a project that makes it possible for young musicians to find their paths. On thing I heard from all of the freelancers was a general degree of amazement at the amount of talent in the junior orchestra. We’ve always had talented kids in town, but never so many across all sections and age groups.  Maybe they’ve shown us the path?