Like Riding a Bike

Last night was the first time this season the whole orchestra rehearsed together. The first rehearsal with the entire orchestra always feels a bit foreign. We were, as we are a good deal of the time, on the stage of the Tennessee Theater. Even before we started to play, I noticed the acoustics of the hall. Has it always been that resonant? Even verbal instructions seemed to reverberate more than I remembered from last May. You could almost see the final note of our run-through of Pictures bouncing around the empty seats in the house.

I had also forgotten the sheer force of the orchestra. In loud passages you can feel the music with your entire body. Vibrations from lower instruments can be felt across the stage. There is also the sense of being swept along with the group.

At the beginning of the rehearsal it felt like everyone was remembering where they fit into the group. Even though it's awkward at first, I'm always surprised at how fast we all fall back into it. When we first started rehearsing last night I was overwhelmed by the sound. It was difficult to pick out and pay attention to the individual parts I needed to listen to in order to make my part fit in. I also noticed my bow arm was sore because I was playing too loud in order to hear myself. After the first twenty minutes of rehearsal I regained my equilibrium. From what I heard, the rest of the group had too. People were joking and happy. It was a great start to the season.

December

December is an unusual month in the KSO's season. Other months of the season are predictable concert-wise. We have a Masterworks concert and then usually a Chamber or Pops concert along with a smattering of community outreach performances by small ensembles. In December, we turn away from our usual schedule of classical music and direct our attention to the upcoming winter holidays. Even though we don't perform concerts in our usual series, we manage to keep plenty busy. Last week we performed a holiday concert at Lincoln Memorial University. This past weekend we performed the Nutcracker with the Appalachian Ballet Company. On Thursday we will perform a holiday concert in Morristown. Next week we will begin rehearsals for the Clayton Holiday Concert. There are also small ensembles from the symphony that are doing special outreach performances at area businesses and hospitals.

While the music we play for our holiday programs is not as technically difficult as our usual fare, I actually think December is one of the most challenging months in our season because everything gets turned on it's head. In other months we tend to have the luxury of having rehearsals for one or two programs at a time which are followed closely by performances. In December this is not always the case. For example, last week we rehearsed the Nutcracker on Tuesday and Wednesday and then performed it Saturday and Sunday. In between the rehearsals and performances of the Nutcracker we had a rehearsal for our runout concerts which we performed last Thursday at Lincoln Memorial University and will perform again this coming Thursday in Morristown. In the midst of those programs, the quartets have had recent performances at Oak Ridge National Lab, First Friday at the Emporium Building, and other area businesses and hospitals.

The time lapse between rehearsals and performances is not a big issue musically, it's just different than our usual schedule and requires a different mindset. December is about keeping all the balls in the air without dropping any.

Nutcracker

This week the KSO starts rehearsals for our performances of the Nutcracker with the Appalachian Ballet Company. I really like the Nutcracker. We play it every year and I never get tired of it. The music is challenging but familiar. It doesn't take much rehearsal or practice to get it back in shape. I think this is what makes it so much fun for me. Usually when we play difficult music I haven't had the luxury of performing it many many times. The Nutcracker is comfortable. I no longer need to count rests because I just know when to play. The music is familiar enough that I can sit back and play but the part is meaty enough that it's not mind-numbingly boring.

Another thing I like about playing the Nutcracker is that we are in the pit. I expect I'm in the minority amongst my colleagues in feeling this way. We are pretty cramped for space. I shudder to think about having to evacuate in the case of an emergency because it's difficult to move around down there. Still, I like playing in the pit once in awhile not because of the pit itself, but because it signifies a different kind of playing. When we are in the pit, the orchestra takes on the role of supporting what is happening on stage. Musical decisions are based on how long it takes a dancer to land a jump or how many steps they need to fit in a certain amount of music. For Masterworks concerts it is rare that we make cuts or add repeats. We generally play the music as it is on the page. Sometimes we don't play every repeat but that is about as far away from the printed music as we get. For opera and ballet performances the music is more of a suggestion. We make big cuts, we swap pieces around, we add repeats, and we even extend or contract note values based on what is happening on stage. I find the process interesting.

It is very rare these days for smaller ballet companies to perform with live music. Knoxville is lucky to have the Appalachian Ballet. I am very much looking forward to our collaboration with them.

Feel the Burn

The Seventh Symphony is one of my favorite Beethoven Symphonies to listen to. Whenever I have had the chance to play the piece I have really looked forward to it. After the first rehearsal, though, it always comes flooding back to me how physically demanding the seventh symphony is and I start to plan how to make it through the week without injuring myself. Tonight after the dress rehearsal, Concertmaster Mark Zelmanovich joked that there were two orthopedic symphonies: Beethoven's Seventh and Schubert's Great. I don't think he's too far off.

I know, “My, what an athletic group of people” is probably not the first thought that enters your mind when you see the Knoxville Symphony on stage. There is no KSO baseball team or even fantasy football league. But, like professional athletes, we have worked for years and years to train our bodies to do what we need them to do. The difference between, say, the KSO's viola section and the LA Lakers is that we in the viola section have spent our time honing our fine motor skills while the LA Lakers have been focusing on gross motor skills. All of the musicians in the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra are elite fine motor athletes.

The element that makes Beethoven's Seventh Symphony so physically challenging is rhythm. The entire symphony is driven by repeated rhythmic figures. In the hands of a lesser composer I could see this being boring or even irritating for the listener. Not so with this symphony. Actually, the repetition of rhythm is what makes the first and fourth movements so exciting to listen to. It is music that GOES somewhere.

Everyone sitting on the stage has a turn at driving the rhythm, but Beethoven seemed to be particularly fond of putting the second violin and viola sections in the driver's seat. In the fourth movement, the seconds and violas play pages of fast notes. This is after we have played everything else on the program. If the concert were a marathon, the last movement of the Beethoven would be right around mile 20 where people start hitting “the wall” and feel like they can't go on. Tonight during the dress rehearsal I hit the wall about half a page into the last movement. I had a cramp in the bicep of my bow arm. (I didn't know it was even possible to have a cramp there!) The muscle started twitching. My shoulder burned. But, like a runner, I powered through and felt exhilarated at the end.

We are the Borg. Resistance is futile.

When I stop to think about it, one of the things that amazes me the most about an orchestra is the ability of the players to play together. The number of musicians on stage varies depending on the piece we are performing. A symphony by Mozart generally requires less players then a symphony by Mahler, for example. Still, there are usually between 50 to 100 musicians on the stage at KSO Masterworks performances. Regardless of the number of musicians on the stage, at some point some of us have to play the same notes at the same time.

To understand why this is truly amazing, it's necessary to understand beats and tempo. Simply put, a beat is an even division of time and tempo is the speed of the beat. A tempo marking of 60 means that every beat is roughly one second long. That's a pretty slow tempo. Many of the fast pieces we play have a tempo two or even three times as fast, and often times we play several notes in one beat. So, if the tempo marking is 120 and everyone is playing 4 notes in one beat, that means that each note takes one eighth of a second. Does your head hurt from the math yet? Mine does. This is crazy enough, but when you consider that when the full string section is playing in unison there are 45 people sitting from one end of the stage to the other all playing the same thing at the same time, it is mind boggling. Yet, somehow we usually manage the impossible. Maestro Richman helps by (among other things) clearly showing the tempo when he conducts. We also watch each other and listen. But, ultimately, there is a bit of a mind meld going on.

I'm hard pressed to think of many other professions that require such unison precision from a large group of people. Ballet comes to mind as do cheerleading and the Rockettes. I think I'll stick with the viola.

Preparations

One of my favorite aspects of my job is that I have the opportunity to play chamber music on a regular basis. Don't get me wrong, I love playing in an orchestra. It is a tremendous experience to sit on stage in the middle of all that sound. In orchestral playing, my job is to do my best to help bring the conductor's vision of the piece to life. Whether I agree with that vision or not is irrelevant. Chamber music is different. A string quartet consists of four musicians with four different ideas about how the music should be played. We come to the music as equals, almost like having four conductors.

This season the Principal Quartet has two new violinists in Edward Pulgar and Sean Claire. I have known Edward and Sean for awhile and was excited to play with them. I was a bit nervous, though, when we had our first rehearsal at Sean's house and I spotted several swords above the fireplace. All string quartets have their disagreements, and the Principal Quartet is no exception. I was happy to sit near the fireplace that rehearsal. I wanted to be close enough to have the first choice of weapon just in case things got ugly. In reality, our rehearsal went as they usually go. We played, we discussed different approaches, we played again, we debated, and we then decided as a group which approach to take. No swords involved. A little disappointing, actually.

Even though our rehearsals are on the tame side, I am really excited about our collaboration. I have been looking forward to this upcoming concert since we settled on the program last winter. I love Smetana's first quartet. It has one of the juiciest parts for the viola of the entire string quartet repertoire. It is also one of the most difficult parts for the viola of the entire quartet repertoire. This is a piece where it would be useful to have more than five fingers on my left hand, but it is definitely worth the work.

Our concert on Sunday will also feature one of Mozart's later string quartets (K. 499 in D Major) as well as a short piece by Puccini. I know I'm horribly biased, but I think it will be a fantastic concert.

Chamber Classics Concert
with the Principal Quartet
Edward Pulgar, violin
Sean Claire, violin
Kathryn Gawne, viola
Andy Bryenton, cello
Sunday, November 9, 2:30 PM
Bijou Theatre
Tickets: www.knoxvillesymphony.com | 865-291-3310