Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Taking the musical plunge

Our band concert is next week, and the final rehearsal was last night.
It turns out we will be performing my piece after all. For the past two weeks, I'd seriously considered removing it from the program because I did not feel we were ready. I e-mailed our conductor (Bob) with these concerns, and Bob said he would let me be the one to decide.
Much to my surprise, the piece sounded much better last night. I went from being 99% sure we would NOT be performing it, to being 70% sure we can have it ready. That's quite a leap. I got a decent amount of positive feedback from fellow band members, so I took the plunge and told Bob to go ahead and put this piece in the lineup.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the piece I'm talking about, here are the basics.
It's called As I Once Imagined. It's 67 measures long and is scored for the following instruments:

Flute
Bb clarinet
Oboe
Alto sax
Tenor sax
Bari sax
Bass clarinet
Bassoon
Trumpet
French horn
Euphonium
Trombone
Tuba
Marimba
Bass drum
Glockenspiel
Cymbal
Chimes
Rain Stick

It's gone through a lot of revision in the past couple years, and it appears that next week it will finally be performed. Wish me luck.
We've performed a few other things I've written; last summer we played a composition called Waiting In Violet, then there was a brass fanfare called Fanfare For A Moment, then there have also been smaller ensemble pieces (solo, duet, trio, quintet, etc).
Our band is a community ensemble, comprised of people of all ages. Members are from Hillsdale County and other parts of southern Michigan too. I play french horn in this group.
Our concert is next Tuesday (Feb 27th). I'll let you all know how things go.

10 comments:

Schmoop said...

Is the conductor's last name Cobb? Good Luck Janna..

Christine Boles said...

Audios of these songs available for posting here?

Mo and The Purries said...

How cool that you have a glockenspiel, an euphonium, AND a rainstick in this piece!!!
Congrats (by the way, I know you'll be a much more hospitable guest when someone has YOU over for a composer's dinner...)
cheers,
mo
It’s A Blog Eat Blog World

Foofa said...

That is awesome. Good luck with the piece. I can't imagine thinking how to write for one instrument let alone a band. Too cool.

Steven said...

I'LL KEEP MY FINGERS CROSSED!

Steve~

No Mas said...

Good work! Sure wish i was nearby to attend the concert.

Anonymous said...

Can't WAIT for us to perform it!

Desert Songbird said...

I'm with Mo - great collection of instruments here. We definitely want audio of this one.

Best of luck! Great job!

Steven said...

This is awesome! Let us all know how it goes...I can't imagine what it must be like to hear your own composition performed.

Janna said...

Matt-man: His last name is Livingston!

Christine: Nope, I have no clue how to post them. Usually we do record our concerts on CD, so if all goes well I'll at least have a copy of that. But I have no idea how to turn that into a WAV file.

Morgen: You love to type the word "euphonium," don't you? :) Go on, admit it...

Natalie: Composing is fun; it's sort of like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle, only instead of puzzle-pieces there are instruments and notes and chords and rhythms!

Novak: That makes all the difference. :)

NoMas: Thanks! :)

Kyle: Here's hoping we do it right! (I have full confidence that YOU will do just fine. :)

Desert Songbird: Thanks! I don't know how to post audio of it, though!

Steven: Thanks! If only you were there to play sax with us, I would write a solo just for you!!