Nailed it.

I don’t often say that—ask my music pals and you’ll know it’s true! I always find something to point out that I disliked about what I did. But, well, I was happy with my work today. How ’bout that?

The really funny thing, too, is that after all my turmoil last night and today a fellow musician came up to tell me her husband (a former San Francisco Symphony player) had only compliments about what I did last night. I was close to telling her, “But I didn’t play perfectly,” but I managed to keep my big mouth shut.

After the concert we waited for the hall to clear out and refill, and then we played Beethoven for (and with) the doctor who hired us to do so. There was a pretty good audience, and they took pictures before and after the event. This is normally a no-no, but for a special event I think it’s perfectly fine. While it wasn’t a flawless performance (it’s not an easy work to conduct!) it all went fine. Pam (principal oboist) was commenting on the situation; one can come a conduct and manage okay. But could someone who isn’t an oboist pay to sit in one of our chairs? Or any chair in the orchestra for that matter. So … well … what does that say about the conductor “chair”? Huh? Huh? 😉

Just goofing off … I do realize that conducting isn’t easy and takes great talent. (I have no talent for conducting and I will demonstrate that clearly to the San Jose Youth Symphony tomorrow when I coach the woodwind section!

Over
So now it’s done. No more playing work. Nothing until the first opera rehearsal on August 30th. Is that scary? I think so.
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