Klarinet Archive - Posting 000012.txt from 1998/12

From: pjfnefro@-----.edu (Pat Flannery)
Subj: [kl] 1812 overture-please don't try this at home
Date: Tue, 1 Dec 1998 11:42:37 -0500

August, 1998, Montevideo, Uruguay --- Paolo Esperanza, bass-trombonist with the
Simphonica Mayor de Uruguay, in a misplaced moment of inspiration decided to
make his own contribution to the cannon shots fired as part of the orchestra's
performance of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture at an outdoor children's concert.
In complete seriousness he placed a large, ignited firecracker, which was
equivalent in strength to a quarter stick of dynamite, into his aluminum
straight mute and then stuck the mute into the bell of his quite new Yamaha
in-line double-valve bass trombone. Later, from his hospital bed he explained
to a reporter through bandages on his mouth, "I thought that the bell of my
trombone would shield me from the explosion and instead, would focus the
energy of the blast outward and away from me, propelling the mute high above
the orchestra, like a rocket."

However, Paolo was not up on his propulsion physics nor qualified to use high-
powered artillery and in his haste to get the horn up before the firecracker
went off, he failed to raise the bell of the horn high enough so as to give
the mute enough arc to clear the orchestra. What actually happened should
serve as a lesson to us all during those delirious moments of divine
inspiration. First, because he failed to sufficiently elevate the bell of his
horn, the blast propelled the mute between rows of players in the woodwind and
viola sections of the orchestra, missing the players and straight into the
stomach of the conductor, driving him off the podium and directly into the
front row of the audience. Fortunately, the audience were sitting in folding
chairs and thus they were protected from serious injury, for the chairs
collapsed under them passing the energy of the impact of the flying conductor
backwards into row of people sitting behind them, who in turn were driven back
into the people in the row behind and so on, like a row of dominos. The sound
of collapsing wooden chairs and grunts of people falling on their behinds
increased logarithmically, adding to the overall sound of brass cannons and
brass playing as constitutes the closing measures of the Overture.
Meanwhile, all of this unplanned choreography not withstanding, back on stage
Paolo's Waterloo was still unfolding. According to Paolo, "Just as I heard
the sound of the blast, time seemed to stand still. Everything moved in slow
motion. Just before I felt searing pain to my mouth, I could swear I heard a
voice with a Austrian accent say "Fur every akshon zer iz un eekvul un
opposeet reakshon!" Well, this should come as no surprise, for Paolo had set
himself up for a textbook demonstration of this fundamental law of physics.
Having failed to plug the lead pipe of his trombone, he allowed the energy of
the blast to send a super heated jet of gas backwards through the mouth pipe
of the trombone which exited the mouthpiece burning his lips and face. The
pyrotechnic ballet wasn't over yet. The force of the blast was so great it
split the bell of his shiny Yamaha right down the middle, turning it inside
out while at the same time propelling Paolo backwards off the riser. And for
the grand finale, as Paolo fell backwards he lost his grip on the slide of the
trombone allowing the pressure of the hot gases coursing through the horn to
propel the trombone's slide like a double golden spear into the head of the
3rd clarinetist, knocking him unconscious. The moral of the story? Beware the
next time you hear someone in the trombone section yell out "Hey, everyone,
watch this!"

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