Return to Loveland (pt.2)
After the mad hub-bub of travelling on Tuesday, Wednesday started out at a leisurely pace. Director Peter Toews (rhymes with “waves”) came to the hotel to pick up me and Tom Leslie, the guest conductor from UNLV, and take us to a fantastic breakfast place called “The Egg & I”. Then we headed to Mountain View high school, where I ran into a bunch of students from my last trip here a year and a half ago, as well as a few of the students who I’d met at the Midwest Convention a few weeks ago, and even a few that I’d met on myspace.com.
Soon enough, it was time to start rehearsal. Pete started out with Courage & Compassion, a piece I’d dedicated to my grandmother. This is a deceptively difficult piece -- the notes are pretty simple, but it requires a great deal of expression and commitment from the musicians. I was blown away by the rehearsal -- clearly they had been working very hard on this piece, and Pete had obviously devoted himself to the score and led the ensemble with really moving expression and nuance. This piece is always difficult for me to hear -- I started writing it when I found out my grandmother was dying, and I was unable to find anyone to play it before she passed away -- she only ever heard the piano sketch. The process of writing this piece (which took 10 months) was like a battle against time; and a great deal of my heart and mind is caught up in that piece. I made a few small suggestions to help them with their interpretation, and then it was time to move on.
Tom Leslie took the podium next, to conduct another one of my pieces, Reflections in a Tidal Pool. Tom and I go way back -- he commissioned and premiered Chaos Theory, and in doing so, he was the first person to give me a stab at writing serious wind ensemble music. He also commissioned and premiered my arrangement of Hopak, and he also premiered Reflections in a Tidal Pool. To top it off, he took all of BCM under his wing when he and his wind orchestra at UNLV recorded our first album, “BCM... Saves The World”. Tom has been unceasingly supportive of me and my work, as well as the rest of the BCM composers -- we call him our Impressario, and we are very grateful everything he’s done for us. With all that in mind, it was a huge deal for me to be sharing this concert with him. But I had no idea what it’d be like to see him clinic a new ensemble. He was truly AMAZING -- quite frankly, I’ve never seen anything like it. He was educating, engaging, and most importantly, his work was effective. He introduced concepts that took the sound of this ensemble to a whole new level -- not just on Reflections, but for every piece they’d play on this concert. We all learned from what he had to offer, and were all switched on by his enthusiasm and drive to make great music.
For me, the afternoon was filled with hanging with the students, a little practice time, and a maddening game of phone tag between me and Nicki -- we just wanted to check in and see how each other was doing that day, but fate was not making that a simple endeavor!
Tom and I had a nice, relaxing dinner at P.F. Chang’s with Shilo Stroman, the other director at MVHS, and a MONSTROUS musician (much more on that later). Then we headed back for the evening rehearsal in the legendary Mountain View Audigymateria (think about it).
This place takes a tremendous bashing, but to be honest, it sounds better than a LOT of other spaces I’ve performed in. We started with the other piece Tom would be conducting, TranZendental Danse of Joi. This would also turn out to be my first live performance on bass guitar -- I’d recorded the occasional bass track in the past, but that’s an entirely different thing than playing it in front of an audience. Tom had only had about a day to prepare for this challenging, odd-mixed-meter piece -- but once again, he dug into the music and the ensemble and by the time the rehearsal was finished, he had us sounding like a whole new band.
Next came Sticks & Stones, the piece commissioned for this concert. This is a drumset feature, and it really puts all the pressure on the drummer to put in a killer performance. Shilo had put a lot of woodshedding into this piece, and it showed -- he was ripping the piece up (in a really good way!) and quite obviously having a great time doing it. The band also sounded really great, and gave him the support and extra firepower he needed to really shine on this piece. I asked for some minor adjustments to interpretation, and Shilo and the band were very responsive to whatever I had to offer. It was a huge relief to finally really hear thiis piece -- it was in good hands, and I could finally let it go, and let this piece stand on it’s own.
The last thing to rehearse was the third movement of Chaos Theory. Since Pete, Shilo (now playing bass guitar!), and some of the students had done this before, we really only had to run down a few spots and kick ‘em back into place. I kicked on my distortion pedal and SQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAK!!!!!!!!!!! Instant feedback loop. Evidently, somebody cranked the gain and distortion up to the max. It only took a few seconds to get my setup back to some semblance of sanity, but it is unfortunate that people find it amusing to mess around with my instrument. Otherwise the rehearsal went smoothly and there was only a minimal amount of changes that had to be made.
It was a long day, and all the musicians put a tremendous amount of focus and energy into our time together. I couldn’t be more grateful for their dedication to the music, and I couldn't wait to hear their performance the next day.
Soon enough, it was time to start rehearsal. Pete started out with Courage & Compassion, a piece I’d dedicated to my grandmother. This is a deceptively difficult piece -- the notes are pretty simple, but it requires a great deal of expression and commitment from the musicians. I was blown away by the rehearsal -- clearly they had been working very hard on this piece, and Pete had obviously devoted himself to the score and led the ensemble with really moving expression and nuance. This piece is always difficult for me to hear -- I started writing it when I found out my grandmother was dying, and I was unable to find anyone to play it before she passed away -- she only ever heard the piano sketch. The process of writing this piece (which took 10 months) was like a battle against time; and a great deal of my heart and mind is caught up in that piece. I made a few small suggestions to help them with their interpretation, and then it was time to move on.
Tom Leslie took the podium next, to conduct another one of my pieces, Reflections in a Tidal Pool. Tom and I go way back -- he commissioned and premiered Chaos Theory, and in doing so, he was the first person to give me a stab at writing serious wind ensemble music. He also commissioned and premiered my arrangement of Hopak, and he also premiered Reflections in a Tidal Pool. To top it off, he took all of BCM under his wing when he and his wind orchestra at UNLV recorded our first album, “BCM... Saves The World”. Tom has been unceasingly supportive of me and my work, as well as the rest of the BCM composers -- we call him our Impressario, and we are very grateful everything he’s done for us. With all that in mind, it was a huge deal for me to be sharing this concert with him. But I had no idea what it’d be like to see him clinic a new ensemble. He was truly AMAZING -- quite frankly, I’ve never seen anything like it. He was educating, engaging, and most importantly, his work was effective. He introduced concepts that took the sound of this ensemble to a whole new level -- not just on Reflections, but for every piece they’d play on this concert. We all learned from what he had to offer, and were all switched on by his enthusiasm and drive to make great music.
For me, the afternoon was filled with hanging with the students, a little practice time, and a maddening game of phone tag between me and Nicki -- we just wanted to check in and see how each other was doing that day, but fate was not making that a simple endeavor!
Tom and I had a nice, relaxing dinner at P.F. Chang’s with Shilo Stroman, the other director at MVHS, and a MONSTROUS musician (much more on that later). Then we headed back for the evening rehearsal in the legendary Mountain View Audigymateria (think about it).
This place takes a tremendous bashing, but to be honest, it sounds better than a LOT of other spaces I’ve performed in. We started with the other piece Tom would be conducting, TranZendental Danse of Joi. This would also turn out to be my first live performance on bass guitar -- I’d recorded the occasional bass track in the past, but that’s an entirely different thing than playing it in front of an audience. Tom had only had about a day to prepare for this challenging, odd-mixed-meter piece -- but once again, he dug into the music and the ensemble and by the time the rehearsal was finished, he had us sounding like a whole new band.
Next came Sticks & Stones, the piece commissioned for this concert. This is a drumset feature, and it really puts all the pressure on the drummer to put in a killer performance. Shilo had put a lot of woodshedding into this piece, and it showed -- he was ripping the piece up (in a really good way!) and quite obviously having a great time doing it. The band also sounded really great, and gave him the support and extra firepower he needed to really shine on this piece. I asked for some minor adjustments to interpretation, and Shilo and the band were very responsive to whatever I had to offer. It was a huge relief to finally really hear thiis piece -- it was in good hands, and I could finally let it go, and let this piece stand on it’s own.
The last thing to rehearse was the third movement of Chaos Theory. Since Pete, Shilo (now playing bass guitar!), and some of the students had done this before, we really only had to run down a few spots and kick ‘em back into place. I kicked on my distortion pedal and SQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAK!!!!!!!!!!! Instant feedback loop. Evidently, somebody cranked the gain and distortion up to the max. It only took a few seconds to get my setup back to some semblance of sanity, but it is unfortunate that people find it amusing to mess around with my instrument. Otherwise the rehearsal went smoothly and there was only a minimal amount of changes that had to be made.
It was a long day, and all the musicians put a tremendous amount of focus and energy into our time together. I couldn’t be more grateful for their dedication to the music, and I couldn't wait to hear their performance the next day.
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