Skip to main content

IDRS 2014 Day Zero

I arrived in NYC yesterday after one of those ghastly get-up-at-3:45-to-drive-to-the-airport mornings, and the first thing that happened is...nothing. I successfully navigated transit to arrive at the NYU address given on the conference website, was sent to a different campus building to register, and learned that the accommodation I'd booked was another 6 or 8 blocks beyond that - so my memory of the pre-lunch period of my day is one of being hot and tired and dragging my roller suitcase, oboe, and tote-bag for MILES.

But things got so very much better.  Monday was technically pre-conference, so I was in town exclusively for rehearsals.  I found myself a delicious and healthy lunch, enjoyed people-watching in Washington Square Park, and reported for my rehearsal (not, unfortunately, in my recital venue, and not even in the venue I'd been told a few weeks earlier.)

I've written before about my poor success rate with first rehearsals with new pianists, and I was definitely a little anxious going in.  My program is hard.  I didn't know what the room would be like, and I knew going in that I had EXACTLY an hour to work through everything in my hour long recital, so there wasn't a lot of slush time to stress about reeds.

And I don't know how my performance will go today.  But the rehearsal yesterday was simply delightful.  Jon Klibonoff, my assigned pianist, was absolutely top-notch, and friendly and low-key to boot.  I loved working with him, and am looking forward to today.  (At 11am, in ED Bldg 303!  Hope to see some of you there!)

I also had rehearsal last night for a Large Double Reed Ensemble program.  I usually steer away from anything that smacks of Oboe Band - not interested in chop-busting, punishing arrangements that never sound well in tune - but in this case composer Daniel Baldwin had assembled a collection of world premieres by great people - Eric Ewazen!  Bill Douglas!  - and a group of legitimate professional oboists and bassoonists to play, and it turned out to be enormously fun.  The rehearsal began at 10pm, and started late even at that, and since I had been up since 3:45 I was planning to duck out quite early.  But the pieces kept getting better and better, and the group kept sounding better and better, and I stayed until 11:20 when the rehearsal broke up.  Hiked back to the dorm and fell asleep.

I have high hopes for the fun factor of this performance, which will be Wednesday afternoon at 2.

Final news:  I have my Mendelssohn arrangement complete and available for purchase on my website, HERE.  That project took a long time, but was well worth the effort.  I'm performing off my own bound copy today, and it's SO MUCH EASIER when the notes I see reflect exactly the notes I intend to play.  Less mental strain.  More fun.  Don't know why I didn't do this before. 

I'll try to keep everyone posted about the greatness I see today and tomorrow.  Wish I could stay in NY all week, but I'll fill my two days here like crazy!
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Zoe's Musical Beginnings

I've mentioned before that I started out on the piano by figuring out melodies.  Connecting notes and trying to learn how they worked.  I'm fascinated to observe that Zoe's initial approach to the instrument is totally different from mine. She sits at our new piano and plays random notes, and tells us what to feel.  If she is playing slowly then the music is sad, and we should cry. When we are "crying" she either gets up and hugs us so we feel better (so awesome!) or bangs faster, to indicate that the music is now happy and we should dance.  Her other piano game is accompanying herself - she plays "chords" in alternating hands while she "sings" the ABC song or Camptown Races or Sesame Street.  She makes us sing along.  She loves it when we clap at the end.  When I was little I wanted to know how music worked. Although I make my living as a performer now, I learned about the interpersonal aspects of music later.  Her immediate interest is in
2 comments
Read more

Cleaning Your Reeds

Updated: I've posted a video of my plaque cleaning technique HERE ! Oboe reeds are made from organic material, and over time it is inevitable that they will age and change. The first few days of change are usually quite welcome, as you break the reed in by playing and the opening gradually settles down to something you can be comfortable with and the response becomes more and more predictable.  You might even hit a plateau where it appears to be perfectly consistent and reliable for several days! But after that, the reed seems to be on a constant gradually accelerating downslope, until it eventually collapses into a sharp, non-responsive, mushy mess. We can rejuvenate the reed during this time by cleaning it, and can often extend its life as well! There are three good ways to do this. First, least invasively, you can just run some fresh water through and over the reed AFTER you play each time.  Go ahead and rinse that reed in the sink, shake it as dry as possible, and tu
6 comments
Read more

Knife Sharpening

I've gotten a lot of questions on this topic, and the most recent querent prompted me to make a video to demonstrate.  You can find that  HERE . Knife sharpening seems to strike terror into many hearts.  And it's little wonder.  Many famous oboists have gone on record as saying that a sharp knife is the most important aspect of reed making. People have entire systems of stones and strops and rods set up to sharpen their knives. And it is important, of course it is - but I don't believe that you need your knife to be razor-like, or objectively the sharpest blade of any in your home.  The reed knife has one job - scraping cane off in precision ways - and it has to be sharp enough for that, and sharpened optimally for that purpose.  More than that is overly fussy for my taste. This is not to say that I allow my knife to be dull.  A dull knife forces you to put too much pressure on the reed and can cause cracking. Obviously it can lead to terribly inconsistent scraping, an
7 comments
Read more