 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-01-10 00:36
I was playing in a concert once (principal viola), community orchestra (I play clarinet, too--but not simultaneously) when my chair decided to break. It was a gradual process - the legs bent, slowly outwards and I was sinking with the chair - in the middle of a quiet passage (when else I ask you). The player sitting next to me (the co-principal) got the giggles and ended up having to walk out, guffawing from the wings. My shoulders, were rapidly going up and down and I laughed silently and tried to maintain my composure. It's really difficult to hold your self up with your legs on a dodgy chair, trying not to drop your viola.
This set off the whole orchestra (I noted that the woodwind section in particular laugh outrageously at me) and finally the conductor stopped, I got up - stuck my nose in the air, grabbed a new chair and returned to my spot. The audience were bemused at first - until they realised what was going on, and I remember a lady in the front row (in direct eye contact with me) had one of those really catchy, loud laughs - she laughed and set off most of the audience. This is my most embarrasing moment in my musical life. One my friends and colleagues constantly remind me of - shesh! I could have died that night.
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Author: Mindy
Date: 2002-01-10 02:13
ohhhh!! I feel so bad for you!! That is awful. lol but that was a great story
Mindy
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Author: Fred
Date: 2002-01-10 02:18
This is a story from another side of the platform. I was on tour once and our group was playing for a public school assembly. The behavior of the students was a bit rowdy. Our conductor cut us off in the middle of the first piece, addressed the student body, and carefully explained the following. They had two choices - they could sit there quietly and listen, or they could go back to class and we would be on our way. But no way was he going to ask his group of tired musicians to play to a rude audience. You could have heard a pin drop the rest of the performance.
I've often wondered how the school administration dealt with that issue after we left.
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Author: jbutler
Date: 2002-01-10 02:28
This didn't happen to me, but a friend of mine has told the story many times and doesn't change the event in anyway, so I tend to believe him. He is a great trombone player and former secretary of the musicians union her in Houston. At any rate he, Bob, tells of the time when a Russian ballet group came to town. They brought their music and conductor. He says the conductor couldn't speak English, the orchestra couldn't understand Russian, and all the music had the terms written in Russian. They had somewhat of an interpreter to help them out. That's not the story however:
Seems this conductor had a fascination with one of the dancers in the chorus. She evidently made her entrance at a particular time in the ballet and the conductor would just be mesmerized by her. Well, during a performance he was so intent in watching her that he let his body lean a tad bit too far while trying to follow her offstage and fell off the podium. Bob says that it was all that the orchestra could do to keep on playing, but they managed. However, during intermission everyone had a big chuckle about it after they reached lower level!
I've stated the story as related to me. If true, it would have been a riot to have seen it!
jbutler
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-01-10 02:42
Yes, it was one of those moments when I wished the earth would have opened up and I just would have fallen in! I seem to remember shoulders occassionally bobbing up and down from my co-principal (who, I might add managed to keep a "poker-face" for the rest of the concert). I'd love to have partnered her in Bridge!
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Author: Leanne
Date: 2002-01-10 02:56
Who ever said my disastor story would become one of my favorite war stories was right.
Anyway, the director forced me to play contra alto clarinet (for one lousy note, I might add) and bass clarinet. Some how, they got tangled together on stage. The other bass was doing great job of not laughing as she helped me untangle.
It was really great when the assistant director had to interrupt the count off with "Wait a moment! We have metamorphized!"
Extremely embarrassing, yes, but it was almost worth it.
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Author: clarinet713
Date: 2002-01-10 04:44
In the orchestra I play in now, we rotate chairs for pieces, and I didn't play in the first piece, so I came out on stage while the rest of the orchestra was already there and sat down. I have a thing about the position of my stand, and my stand needed to be raised, so I attempted to raise it, however, because the stand was an older one, it decided to fly off of the metal post that it is supposed to stay on, and the top part of the stand smacked me in the face, hit my clarinet, my music went flying and something made a loud bang. The whole orchestra turned and looked at me, but I quickly gained my composure and fixed the stand and the music, and did all I could to not laugh at myself. Keep in mind that this was in front of a live audience. That is what I will always think of when playing or hearing First Essay for Orchestra by Barber :-)
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Author: Michael Ringle
Date: 2002-01-10 05:02
Well, since we're relating disasters, I'll mention this. Last year just as I was getting set up on stage for a concert in my college's Symphonic Band. It seemed that we were missing stands to set our music on... No problem, one of my section mates in the alto sax section is on staff and he went to get it. Well, this would have been all fine if not for one problem, he tripped as he came to set the stand in front of me, the stand hitting me -and- my instrument. As I shook of the shock of getting pelted with a stand I tried my instrument almost immediately.. And to my horror my octave mechanism was busted on the neck of my alto. This wouldn't have been bad if I didn't have a solo in the very first song!!! So, I switched saxes with the guy who hit me with the stand for the first solo (From Chorale and Shaker Dance by Zdechlik) and my sax still wasn't fixed by then. (We have a guy in our section who repairs instruments) So, I kept playing on the other guy's sax for the other solo. I must say.. It must have been hilarious to see "musical saxes" being played, by faculty and anyone else who noticed!!
Suffice to say, the guy who dropped the stand on my instrument was extremely sorry and got it repaired for me.. Luckily no body or rod damage was done!! Hope everyone enjoys! I now laugh looking back on this story! It shows that -anything- can happen to make a concert go awry.
Mike
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Author: donald nicholls
Date: 2002-01-10 05:40
2nd clarinet got the hiccoughs (hiccups? i think the english and americans spell that one differently, but i'm getting them both wrong i think....)
.... in the middle of the Dance of the Hours- Ponchielli (i just can't spell anything this evening). y'know- the famous "hello muder, hello fader" bit- it was hysterical, the whole wind section couldn't play as they were trying hard not to laugh
"da da da da"
hic
"da da da da
hic
(only, not quite in time)
that was about 1985, i can't remember the 2nd clarinet players name
donald
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Author: Kate
Date: 2002-01-10 17:19
OOh everything goes wrong for me at concerts!!!!! Once I passed out when I was doing my first solo (i got really worked up) and keeled over onto the trumpet player, tho luckily the nearby cornet player managed to grab my leblanc symphony VII (phew) before it fell to the ground.......the most hysterical was probably when I had a concert a week ago and the conductor fell through the wooden platform he was standing on; no one noticed (shows how often players look at the conductor) until the end of the piece when we looked up and saw our conductor had absconded...........the poor man had gashes up his legs!!!!! But it was quite funny, not saying i'm a sadist but never mind. Ooh another highlight was when we did a concert on a farm (yes, high status performance!) and this evil goat escaped and ran over and started chomping on my music which I then had to restle out of it's mouth......urrghh....... I managed to fend it off with the trumpet section coming to the rescue...it must have looked so funny, ten blokes and me fending off a demented goat. Then the goat got upset and proceeded to charge into the flute section....arrghh nightmare!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love concerts, it wouldn't be interesting if nothing bad ever happened.
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Author: MsRoboto
Date: 2002-01-10 17:23
We play outside in the summer on the lawn in the town common. We were in the middle of a piece when a car went by and beeped. I found out later it was a friend of mine saying hi to me.
P.S.
The band doesn't know it was my "fault".
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Author: Jonathan Farquhar (Aus)
Date: 2002-01-10 23:10
A few months ago the orchestra that I was in at my con performed in a school auditorium down at the Gold Coast (about an hours drive from where the con is) and we were doing a concert based on A Night at the Proms. During the rehearsal before hand a kookaburra flew into the hall and did some low flying acrobatics around the orchestra. Eventually it settled up in the rafters of the building and we continued rehearsing. During the middle movement of the Stanford piece we were playing (a variation on Danny Boy) right in the middle of my solo the kookaburra joined in and was perfectly in tune with myself - which set off the whole orchestra and conductor!!! Somebody should arrange the piece to be a rival to the Pines of Rome. :-)
Thankfully it didn't happen during the concert.
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-01-10 23:33
Ah, now that's a lovely story. I adore Kookaburras - we've got a small flock of them living near us. They make the most horrifyingly loud song, but it's beautiful. Also, their beaks are tremendously strong, afterall they can break snakes backs with them - I found this out when rescuing an injured one on the road side. It bit me, I shreiked, it let go, then I put on my industrial strength gardening gloves.
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Author: clarinet713
Date: 2002-01-11 01:15
kate,
why were you playing a concert on a farm? i've never heard of that before
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Author: Laurie H.
Date: 2002-01-11 01:18
Another outdoor story. Our little community band was performing a short summer concert on the square. Just as the conductor went to give the downbeat a car alarm went off. Beep-beep-beep and on and on. Our first flute picked up the pitch and in seconds the entire band is playing along the the car horn. BTW, it was an A.
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Author: diz
Date: 2002-01-11 01:27
It was obviously apart of the curriculum, under the heading "pastoral care".
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Author: Emms
Date: 2002-01-11 11:39
I've played a couple of gigs on farms. These farms were places that are open to the public, who visit to learn about farm life. Both times were a sort of open day / garden party, so visitors had music to listen to as well as being able to feed the lambs and make a corn dolly. My life is so exciting.
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2002-01-11 16:36
Back to the chairs - my good [comm. band] cl-playing friend told me of his performance of the Adagio movement of the Mozart with the Ark. U band, where as he stood up to play, one of the "dangles" of his uniform caught in his chair, which rose with him, to much laughter and consternation. When the merriment ceased, he said that his nervousness was gone and he playit it very well!! Don
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Author: Kate
Date: 2002-01-11 19:21
I'm not entirely sure why I was playing on a farm...........
but I hope ppl enjoyed the moosic (geddit.....MOO......oh dear, I really should get out more; weeks of exams have taken away any interest in anything else but bad pun making, oh and clarinetting of course)
Yeah well I got paid for it anyway!!!!!!!!
Strangest venue for a gig ever was in a lift in the Central Library.......We got stuck and myself and a few other players started playing cos we were so bored waiting whilst the fire crew had to come and rescue us......Acoustics were good though.
Kate :-)
PS Apologies for strange "joke": I have been learning the periodic table and now anything seems hysterical due to the hours of inflicting boredom on myself.
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2002-01-12 20:57
Our Al "Whatshis name" claimed to have invented the internet.
Kate are you laying claim to the inventiion of "Elevator Music"?
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Author: Sandee
Date: 2002-01-13 02:15
When I started high school, marching band was optional. Next year, we had a new music director. Marching band was made a requirement, probably because in the final formation the season before, they put together an airplane. Unfortunately, one wing flew west, one flew east, and laughter abounded.
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Author: Kate
Date: 2002-01-13 11:46
hehehe.......elevator music......nice one Bob. :-)
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Author: Joel K.
Date: 2002-01-13 18:50
Back in Junior High School my brother played percussion with the school orchestra. My brother is very nearsighted and was playing cymbals on a piece. He had to do a big cymbal crash but instead of hitting just the cymbals he managed to also hit his eyeglasses which caused them to go flying. For the rest of the piece he had his face about one inch from the music trying to keep up with the orchestra. Needless to say, the whole audience saw what was going on and was pretty much in stitches for the rest of the piece.
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Author: David Pegel
Date: 2002-01-13 22:42
Reminds me of a cymbal story...
This was during a rehearsal, not a concert, thank goodness. We had just finished an agressive section of an overture and were moving on to a slow, droll movement. The cymbal player was just about to set down the cymbals for the part when the leather strap broke. The cymbal landed on the tile floor and practically broke in half, NTM made a loud noise.
The conductor immediately cut everyone off and fell over laughing. I never forgot that moment. (Partly because I was sitting next to the cymbal player and couldn't hear a thing for five minutes.)
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