Alphorns, attack!

This was one hell of a long day. I felt like I had about four hours worth of sleep, and I woke up nervous because my piece was not yet ready to go. It was a triple expresso shot breakfast and then up to the Music and Sound building. We were on an extremely tight schedule as 10 composers in the band each had only 30 minutes to present and rehearse their piece.

I got my piece ready with about half an hour to spare. It's always a challenge to present a graphic score to people unfamiliar with new music, but the orchestra did me proud. Overall it came off close to how I imagined. We rehearsed the until 5:30 and then after dinner, we were to present these pieces to a sold-out audience in the Rolston Recital Hall.

I was pretty dragged out after I completed my section of the rehearsal. I rejuvenated myself by eating lunch and dinner outside on the patio of the main dining hall. If I hadn't said it before, this place has got to be in one of the most bloody spectacular settings in the world. The music building is designed and situated so that through the windows of the Rolston Recital Hall, where we've rehearsed every day, there are magnificent and inspiring mountain views. I needed a little time outside to recharge my batteries and it worked, or maybe it was the two desserts.

A bonus was that I ran into some of my Banff buddies from previous years here, Mark DeJong and Keith Kruschel, who were up here for another program. It's like being part of an exclusive club - these guys will be friends forever.

At any rate the concert was an overall success. Some of the pieces were a little shaky in execution, but probably the audience never knew the difference. We'll have another chance to rehearse them tomorrow, then record some of them on Wednesday.

My piece went off relatively well. There are some sections that will need tightening up, but I can address them tomorrow. During the performance, at one point when the percussion section were instructed to let their parts degenerate, I turned to see two of them sword fighting with their sticks. It worked for me. On the break someone told me it sounded like cartoon music, which I took as a compliment. If I could even begin to emulate the sounds of Carl Stalling, the brilliant writer of those Bugs Bunny soundtracks, I'd be a very happy camper.

At the last moment, I was able to add in a couple of more instruments - an aplhorn which was about 10 feet long, and a valveless baroque trumpet, in addition to the cello, which I added in the morning rehearsal. I'm really thrilled with this turn of events and Hugh would have thrown me the kitchen sink had he been able to unbolt it in time. This is another aspect of the Banff experience - there is a wealth of really talented musicians here and you can take advantage of that.

A really nice bonus was that my cousin Valerie, her husband Ron and daughter Kim came up from Calgary for the concert. It meant a lot to me.

I joked that I had a real winner here with my arrangement. I'm going to sell it to Kendor Publishing - it will be great for those high school stage bands who want to feature 4 marimbas, cello, baroque trumpet and alphorn.

Some of the other composers were not as happy with how their pieces went, but there's more time to work them up.

A lot of the pressure is off me now, so I can relax a bit. My job for the next two days is to get my piece polished and recorded. It will get back into high gear on Thursday when Chucho arrives. Time to go to the after party...