It is likely we will get snowed out for this Thursday’s rehearsal. If so, that will leave us with only one rehearsal (dress) before our March 6 concert. I think we could put this program onstage tonight and it would be received well by our audience. But it would put us into a lower level of performance that makes me cringe, the level of “Good Enough.” If that’s what’s handed to us by the weather then it must be, but let’s never become acclimated to Good Enough as our standard. The standard in our personal practice AS WELL AS in rehearsal must always be Excellence. Typically 8-9 rehearsals is sufficient for us to perform superbly, however, we are playing a technically challenging concert (1941, Mambo, America…) and I counted on 9 rehearsals.
Let me challenge you this week to analyze where you are in your personal preparation. Are there two or three passages that you need to master? Once we meet, the greatest responsibility will be on me to keep it all together. I will be analyzing my preparation as I pour through my scores.
Finally, how we choose to meet adversity when it is thrust upon us defines who we are as musicians and as artists. Musicians are technicians-artists take their audiences on extraordinary journeys! We could accept this challenge, if it comes, and turn it into something amazing! I promise you I will be ready to lead the journey whenever we meet again.
If we meet Thursday, here’s the plan. RUN-THROUGHS. No more than 10 minutes on each song if needed. If we miss this Thursday this will be the order for the 27th
- 20th Century Fox Fanfare
- Star-Spangled Banner
- Fantasy Adventures at the Movies
- Bond, James Bond
- Gee, Officer Krupke
- America
- Wicked
- Pure Imagination
- Disney at the Movies
- March from 1941
- Mambo
- Somewhere
- Golden Age of Broadway
- Magnificent 7