Does anyone know anyone who would be willing to sell an oboe, bassoon, or a clarinet? Preferably a bassoon?
The Irene Dalis Vocal Competition is rapidly approaching. I’ve attended the past few years and I’ve loved it. Sadly this year they’ve moved it to 3:00 so I’m unable to go, but I do recommend it to any of you who are able to go. Really. You’ll hear some mighty fine singing … and you even get to vote for audience favorite. So get those tickets! (Facebook folks can get a special deal, so if you want to know about that just ask me.)
This is from last year:
“When I came back to America I was trying to get jobs with bigger orchestras, but they were not interested. One orchestra told me they like my conducting and the board thought I had great ideas, but they didn’t know how to market me,” said Johnson.
“When I asked him for clarity, the guy on the search committee basically said, ‘You just don’t look like what our audience would expect a conductor to look like.’ That’s when I founded my own orchestra.”
She’s a woman. She’s African American. So an audience can’t handle those things? Or maybe just the guy on the search committee?
Well, okay … she even says that audiences expect something else. (There are a number of videos you can watch from this same place if you go here.)
So Jeri Lynne Johnson formed her own orchestra, the Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra. Kudos to her!
I read it here.
The less a conductor explains in words the better. There’s nothing a musician hates more than a conductor telling him for five minutes what he wants. A horse wants to run. An orchestra wants to play.
-David Zinman
Yep! Not only that, but a conductor should be able to speak primarily through her or his conducting. Tell me through gestures. Tell me through the way you move or even the way you nod your head. I’ll respond. Tell me by talking for five minutes (or longer) and I think we all tend to tune out. Not that a conductor can’t speak at all, mind you, but when they spend too long chatting rather than conducting they tend to lose us.
I’m going to have to be reminded to bring my oboe home with me, I think I am going to forget it otherwise
… it is such a forgettable instrument! 😉
