The concert began with "Ficciones" by contemporary Mexican composer, ML. Nice piece, kind of abstract, but interesting, experimenting with colors and rhythmic complexity. Unfortunately, however, in my opinion, not an opener for any concert, much less a season.
We played the piece, and when we finished the audience DID NOT clap. I swear, no applause. So our conductor, rather than turning around to clarify that the piece indeed had ended (to the audience's credit, it WAS an ambiguous ending) chose to begin applauding himself, without actually turning around. So he started clapping, but the audience couldn't really tell, and there was a slow trickle of applause that eventually crescendoed to a medium-sized golf clap. The conductor had each principal wind player stand during this sort of mezzo forte applause and then walked off. The applause died down long before he got off stage.
How do you say AWKWARD in Spanish? (Side note: I have yet to find a truly satisfying translation for this word.)
Well, I was thinking, at least that's over, it can't get much worse...
The concert proceeded with Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto- great pianist, Mr. Brazil (actually his name!) and the audience seemed to forgive us for the previous blunder.
Intermission, string piece, all that was left was Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet-no potential problems there.
We tuned; the conductor returned to the stage and raised his arms towards the bassoons and clarinets to begin the piece. Then, the principal bassoonist stood up and walked off the stage. Wait, that's not supposed to happen...
Conductor looked stunned. Another awkward 15 seconds passed in which everyone just sort of waited for something to happen. Nothing did. The principal clarinetist shook his head and mouthed "No viene" (she's not coming) so the conductor motioned for Bassoon #2 to move over, and we began. Eight bars into it, the conductor stopped (!?!), turned to the audience, apologized, and half-explained what happened. Bassoon #2 went off stage to find Bassoon #1. We waited, trying to avoid eye contact for fear of either cracking up or crying, and then Bassoon #2 returned, without Bassoon #1, and confirmed that she wasn't coming back anytime soon. So, we started AGAIN, and proceeded to play the most unfocused, bizarre version of R + J I've experienced.
Turns out the bassoonist, who had been sick, felt severely ill at the last second, and simply couldn't play. No hard feelings against her, of course. I have a lot of respect for her and trust entirely that it must have been an extreme situation. I only wish it wasn't so hard to bounce back from something like that, as an orchestra, so our opening concert hadn't been a sort of circus.
Well, we hope for the best on Sunday...
¡Hasta la vista! (Get it?)
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