It was a gorgeous day, probably in the forties and fifties with sunshine all through the town of Mayenne. I woke up from my slumbers at noon after getting in at about 4:00 from the Night of Prayer (see below for more information). I was overwhelmingly excited about performing with the orchestra this afternoon. I mean, I just got here, for crying out loud, and I'm already playing in a concert! (Less than three weeks!) Rapid learning plus developed sight reading skills= the perfect combination for an orchestra musician. I can thank all those years of youth symphony, All-state orchestra, and school orchestra. And to make it even more interesting, M. Bergeon put me second chair! So I was in the front in plain view so that everyone could see my "pretty little face" and my violin.
After our warm-up rehearsal at 15h, I got to talk to the English ladies that play violin. It's good to get to speak in English even for a couple minutes (especially seeing as I am the only American in Mayenne, and the nearest native English speaker is in Laval). One of the English ladies told me about a choir that meets in Evron (20km from Mayenne), and I told her I was interested. They meet on Monday nights. That's fine with my schedule. And they sing mostly baroque music. Score! I will have transportation from a guy in the orchestra who passes by Mayenne on his way. So, it appears that everything will fall in place for me to sing with them. Wow, I'm becoming much more busy but no less excited about being in Mayenne and getting to know so many different people in this area.
As for the concert, everything went very smoothly. The orchestra members clearly know their parts well and have been working on their music for a long time. I, on the other hand, just got the music two weeks ago! We started out with the first movement of "Pictures of an Exhibition." Then we did Farandole from Bizet's Arlesienne Suite, Carillon Suite from Arlesienne Suite, Brahms' Hungarian Dance No. 5 (which I sightread the whole way through), "The Sorceror's Apprentice"from Fantasia, and the Pirates of the Caribbean suite. All things considered (including my rapid integration into the orchestra), the concert was great! I had an amazing amount of energy and smiled throughout the Farandole and Pirates of the Caribbean. Music is a source of true joy both for the musician and the listener. It's great to share in this experience time and time again.
"Thank you for the music." -Abba
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