 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: DAVE
Date: 2007-11-13 20:33
Pretty common. I have seen people reading, doing crosswords, knitting, and even minor instrument repair.
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Author: Iacuras
Date: 2007-11-13 20:46
One amusing story told to me by one of my band directors is I believe of the Cleveland Symphony. One of the horn players was reading a magazine during a long rest and missed and entrance. When the conductor stopped to ask what happened the horn player said it was a mistake in the part. When the conductor found the truth, the horn player was promptly fired.
Steve
"If a pretty poster and a cute saying are all it takes to motivate you, you probably have a very easy job. The kind robots will be doing soon."
"If you can't learn to do something well, learn to enjoy doing it poorly."
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Author: Danny Boy
Date: 2007-11-13 20:48
Here's what no to do...count the seats in the concert hall.
I know someone who had been booked as the Eb player alongside two other players for Symphonie Fantastique, he decided to count the seats while waiting for the orchestra to reach the last movement.
He was on 4000 odd when he got a bang on the knee from the second clarinet, the orchestra were waiting to start the last movement and the conductor was issuing a traditional conductor death stare because of the fact that his Eb was still happily sitting on it's peg while said clarinettist was in a world of his own.
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Author: James Langdell
Date: 2007-11-13 20:58
Hector Berlioz wrote a book, known in English as "Evenings with the Orchestra". The narrator is often sitting in the first row of the audience for the opera, and recounts the conversations between orchestra members and the stories they tell. Each chapter is a different night's performance of an opera. A few chapters are very short, because the composition that night held the musicians' attention, so no chattering. Most of the stories and anecdotes involve music. The tale of the piano used for a piano competition gone terribly wrong is one of the funniest things I've ever read.
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Author: crnichols
Date: 2007-11-13 21:11
That's been pretty common for a long time now...
Blair Tindall talks about it in her book. Actually, she was able to read a magazine and play her part in a broadway show simultaneously. According to her, only 10 percent of musicians have this ability.
Christopher Nichols, D.M.A.
Assistant Professor of Clarinet
University of Delaware
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Author: samohan245
Date: 2007-11-14 01:26
yeah when i was doing a pit for the sound of music i was pretty busy.
but sometimes when i had nothing to do for 20 minutes i was bored out of my mind!
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Author: InTheBassment
Date: 2007-11-14 02:59
In pit orchestra I was using a nasty school instrument that was in desperate need of repair. Therefore my director didn't mind me eating candy and drinking Mt. Dew while tabling reebs during obscene amounts of rest. I know... terrible
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Author: tdinap
Date: 2007-11-14 04:38
I rarely have the opportunity to do anything interesting on rests, but I do remember a time during a particularly exhausting week in high school when I fell asleep during the first few bars of a long rest and woke up with just enough time to comfortably make my entrance.
And there's always the budget-constrained high school philosophy of playing other parts during your rests/tacets. I will never forget juggling the accordion book and the Reed 1 book for Cabaret, or playing both keyboard and a policeman in Pirates of Penzance.
Tom
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Author: James
Date: 2007-11-14 04:59
Heh, I'd almost forgotten about my high school pit until I say this thread. On any song we didn't play on we'd write our own lyrics to all of the songs and then compare during breaks in rehearsal. Unfortunately none of them were written down, but they should have been cause some of the stuff was hillairous.
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Author: Bassie
Date: 2007-11-14 08:41
Apparently (so the bassoonist tells me) my predecessor in the pit orchestra I'm in right now would finish a Times (London) cryptic crossword every night during the show...
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-11-14 10:03
This is what I always did while in high school during long rests- in this order...
pay attention to the conductor- be sure I know the amount of measures I am to rest- turn a page if needed- pay attention more- count the measures rested on my right hand in sets of 4- lose count when someone coughed- get back on track- get ready to play- oops! one measure too early.
:P
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Author: davyd
Date: 2007-11-14 14:10
"Guys & dolls" has some fairly lengthy dialog breaks. During a recent run, out came the Crackberries. Who cares about Nathan Detroit's dice game when there's email to be checked?
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Author: William
Date: 2007-11-14 15:36
Usually during a circus show, there isn't a lot of "down time" with cut, fanfare & immediant segue to the next piece the norm and bordom is not the problem. However, there are few rests and while playing a local Ringling Bros extravaganza, during one of those I was apparently glancing too intently at one of the acts. Immediantly and quite severly, I was admonished by the conductor (Meryl Evans I think) that, "IF YOU WANT TO WATCH THE SHOW, GO OUT AND BUY A TICKET". So I learned early on in my musical career to pay attention for cues and count accurately, even during the longest symphonic rests or actor diolog--no mags, gameboys, IPods, etc for me. I also learned to say "NO" to circus gigs........
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Author: Mike Clarinet
Date: 2007-11-15 08:06
There's the Hoffnung cartoon of the percussionists playing cards using a timp as a card table. The caption is "350 bars rest".
Translating into American: "350 measures rest"
Post Edited (2007-11-15 12:12)
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