oboeinsight

Terry Teachout writes about the oath he took, among other things. It reminded me of what I signed when I took on my job at a particular university. I, too, swore an oath that I would “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic…”. I kind of laughed when I signed it, though. I’ll fight to the death with my music, I suppose.

Oh! But I do have reed knives and razor blades, so maybe I can truly do some damage! (I can damage with music too, yes? Just some bad intonation and a rotten reed should do the trick.)

His blog also reminds me, too, of the ever-so-brief time I was able to spend in a poetry workshop with Dana Gioia. I always wished I had been able to somehow do something with music and poetry but aside from the Christmas programs I used to do it never happened. At one point I was hoping to get to another workshop and see what Mr. Gioia could offer with this idea. Then we lost touch and now I’m too embarrassed to bother him, as he is a very important person and I’m a lowly oboist. Sigh. (Hmmm. Why do the words “lowly” and “oboist” seem to go so well together, I wonder!)

Anyway, I envy Mr. Teachout his position. But only in a healthy-envy sort of way! 🙂
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Well, I was the sole chooser of music on my way down to Irvine, but since I was driving Kelsey home, I let her do the choosing for the drive back up. Oh … except that since the radio was set to a jazz station we listened to that as we suffered through LA traffic. (HOW can people stand to live in that area? Ugh.)

So on the way home it was The Decemberists, The Roches, and Simon & Garfunkel. Different choices than what I would have put on, but fine, none the less. (Or is it “nonetheless”? Hmmm. Spell checker isn’t saying nonetheless isn’t a word.)

Many miles later (we took a side trip to see the Poppy Preserve) we are home safely. (I’m not sure about the sane part!)

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So, if the people written about in this article can walk 33 miles to New York to hear a concert, i wonder how many from UCSC would walk over the hill to hear a Symphony Silicon Valley concert. It’s close to the same distance!

It took the walkers 3 days to walk the 33 miles, which did seem like a lengthy time; I believe I walked 20 miles in one day when I was in high school. But then they probably had hills, and I walked around San Jose. Not a terribly hilly place!

But anyway, I liked the idea of doing this. And I think hearing the New York Philharmonic would be a great reward for those sore feet!

They took vans back home, by the way.
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So here I am in the exciting (not) city of Irvine! What got me here? Let’s see … Tuck & Patti to begin with. Nice latté and lemon-zucchini muffin music. Then I decided it was time for Flying Dutchman. Since rehearsals begin next Tuesday, and I’ve never played the thing before, I thought yet another listen couldn’t hurt. I’m looking forward to the opera! I have some good lines in it, and it’s beautiful music. Next I moved on to Mahler 9. (Yes, Dan, I did bring it with me!) Now listening to both the opera and the Mahler in our little Mazda Protege isn’t exactly the wisest thing to do, but I did it anyway. (No one ever accuses me of being wise.) Our car is far too noisy, and our speakers are too cheap. But that’s life.

The Mahler is really something else. Funny thing is, I remember the last movement so well, but the rest is sort of “in and out” of my memory. I honestly don’t know if I’ve actually performed it or not, but the English horn solo in the last movement makes me think I did. If so, I’m embarrassed by my memory and I’m hoping I played it a LONG time ago so I won’t feel so bad! I guess I’ll have to ask some San Jose Symphony (RIP) members if they have a list of all our repertoire (from 1975 on). I’d like to get that list anyway. I’m sorry now that I never saved programs. Rats.

Anyway, it was all good music for the trip.

Once Mahler ended (it finished prior to arriving in LA, thank goodness; driving up the grapevine to Mahler is great, but I don’t think I’d care for it as I drove through the traffic of the LA basin). So the radio station went on and for a while I put up with the classical station, and then switched to jazz. That worked for me.

And then I arrived. Just in time to see the end of Othello (with Fishburne and Branagh … never actually heard of this one). What a happy little thing to happen upon, eh? Lots of blood. Oh well. Makes me want to see the whole thing.

Oh, and one other little note about the Mahler. There’s this one snippet that occurs frequently that makes me think a particular musical composer must have heard this prior to his writing music for his rather popular Disney flick. I wonder. But I won’t tell you what it is because it may spoil Mahler 9 for you. (Or your favorite Disney musical! Heh.)