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Re: summer camp for adults

Author: susieray
Date: 2006-03-04 01:23

Hi Michelle,

I attended the Midsummer Musical Retreat last summer, and I had a blast. I highly recommend it!

All wind players are automatically signed up for the concert band, which has daily rehearsals plus daily sectionals. You can also be in the orchestra if you want (they will draw names; no auditioning needed.) My name didn't get drawn for that, but it turned out to be a good thing because I had enough to do already! In addition to everything that was going on, I was staying with a friend who lives just a few blocks from the campus and we were up playing duets until like, midnight!

I had signed up to be in a small ensemble (their choice, unless you come with your own group and your own music) because I currently play in a woodwind quintet at home. They choose to put me in with four string players and told us we were going to play the Weber quintet. I had never played clarinet with strings so it was really great fun. Karen Iglitzin was our coach (you can Google her) and she was great to work with and we all learned a lot from her. We had three days to work on it before performing it, but thankfully we didn't need to rehearse the whole thing; each group has three minutes on stage since there are so many of us!

Most of the participants are from the Seattle area and have been attending for years. This is their big event of the summer. You can probably find someone to carpool with. BUT be warned that the weather in Walla Walla is a lot HOTTER than Seattle! It was over 100 degrees every day. I drove up from southern Oregon and our summers are very hot too, so it was no big shock for me. But if you are staying in the dorms you will want to bring a fan with you.

By the way, the Whitman College campus is gorgeous! I want to go again this year, but I also want to go to Atlanta for ClarinetFest so I am going to have to decide between them. [frown]