Playing in the Orchestra

Since those early days in the River Heights School orchestra, I have had wonderful experiences playing in orchestras. I have played every one of Beethoven’s symphonies. I have played Handel’s Messiah and experienced the thrill of the audience when they all stand for the much-anticipated Hallelujah Chorus. All of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, countless overtures, waltzes and marches. I’ve played in the pit for Gilbert and Sullivan high school productions and for the Nutcracker Ballet. It has been humbling to be inside the music, rehearsing music that had always been familiar to my ear and discovering the composer’s intention and the inner workings of these pieces.

The cacophony of the rehearsal space, as people are unpacking and warming up, or the sound from the stage or the pit, before the performance has begun, is one of the few sounds that promise order out of chaos. The order begins with the A from the oboe, which we in the string program did not have. But there was a piano or a pitch pipe. Something I only remember our choir teacher using. Mrs. Martin, tiny, bird- like, grey blue hair. She told me not to sing the high notes. Pussy willows, Cattails, Soft Winds and Roses. We sang at The Manitoba Music Festival, where choirs compete for the coveted first place spot. Mrs. Martin focused a lot on the emotion of the piece, coaching us to sing softly here and with a plaintive swell there. I couldn’t find all the high notes, but I sure could emote! People love the sound of children’s choirs. I get it. Every year I play for The Hamilton City Ballet’s production of The Nutcracker and that part at the end of the first act when the children sing, tugs at my weak heart strings every time. If the second violin part wasn’t so murderously difficult, I might break down in weepy tears every year. But Tchaikovsky's Snowflakes won’t allow it.

In the pit for The Nutcracker.

The Kelvin High School Choir under the direction of John Standing was the choir to beat at the Music Festival. It was a known fact among students who sang in choirs. In my final year at Kelvin, myself and Shona McKenzie were tasked with learning the accompaniment for two violins for Elgar’s lovely The Snow. We practiced during our lunch break, under the tutelage of Mrs. Whyte. I think she played with the symphony. She had been brought on board to coach Shona and I on this part. It is not an easy piece, but she got us there. The choir took home top honors that year, and many said it was those violins that clinched the victory. My mother was in the audience – as she most often was, even for those tedious afternoons of sixteen performances of Pussy Willows Cattails at the Winnipeg Concert Hall. Her assessment was simply – I don’t know how you could stand there and be so calm. It was my nerve that impressed her. I was extremely nervous. It's hard not to be. I am most definitely not a soloist. My happy place is in the middle of the section.

I did sing in a few choirs. A German Children’s choir and the choir in Queenston School. There was something about singing that eluded me. During my final year of high school I tried out for the chorus of Fiddler on the Roof. Until then I had played in the pit while my friends were all stomping around on stage having a blast. I am not a strong singer. There is something too direct about having someone hear me sing. Mr. Standing knew I wanted to be with my friends in my final year. I think that’s why I got to sing in the chorus that year. And we did have a blast! On stage and off. It was the year Olivia Newton-John’s Let’s Get Physical album came out. For the final number we all turned our babushka’s into headbands and came out onto the stage to sing Tradition, Tradition!

While I was playing in the string orchestra at River Heights Junior High School, I also made my first foray into a real orchestra. The Winnipeg Junior Youth Orchestra. The rehearsals were at my school, River Heights and the conductor was none other than my music teacher, Carlisle Wilson. It was a full orchestra with winds and brass and percussion and even three double basses. Of note, on principal flute was Mr. Wilson’s daughter, Keri-Lynn. She went on to become a world-renowned conductor. Keri-Lynn, already a superior flautist had a sharp sense of humor and a spot on Carol Burnett impression. She had perfect pitch and would entertain me by guessing (always correctly) which random note I struck on the piano. Her nickname for me was Jazzy Petunia. 

Keri-Lynn Wilson - She made it to the Met!

My good friend, Jennifer Smith sat next to her on second flute. It was my aim at each rehearsal to catch her eye and to get her laughing into her flute. 

My friend Jennifer and I post performance, Winnipeg Youth Orchestra.

Also, in this orchestra were future stars, Martin Beaver, violin and Thomas Wiebe, cello. These three musicians already stood out, occupying the first seat of their sections for all the years I played in this orchestra and on into the Youth Orchestra. 

We often played from poorly photocopied parts and there was one rehearsal when my stand partner, Andy and I were playing along and then suddenly we both ground to a halt, peering at the music and looking at each other. We were lost – a not uncommon occurrence in those early days. Finally, something about the music clicked and I picked it up and turned it over. We had been reading the music upside down. It’s a testament to our great skill that we even managed to play a few measures of upside-down music before realizing something was not quite right. Andy moved on to play the viola. He probably thought if he could read his way through an upside-down score, he could probably manage the alto clef.

The repertoire included Beethoven 1^st and 3rd symphonies, Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 3,  the overture to Wagner’s Die Meistersinger and excerpts from Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and of course, Sibelius Finlandia, Bizet Carmen Suite. But the piece that I remember feeling most profoundly, most moved. The piece I thought of as the most stirring music ever written was Pachelbel’s Canon in D. Having played and heard this piece hundreds of times now, it bears mentioning that every string player will at some point play it and hear it for the first time and fall in love – cello players excepted. Their part is murder by repetition. But the rest is an exposition of simple bliss. The harmonies and the spare variations passed around the string sections are breathtaking. This piece was programmed once for a summer fundraiser for one of the orchestras I’ve played with, and the conductor refused to hear our grumbles and coached us to hold back and play each phrase with delicacy and reserve and easy on the volume. To try to sit with it as though it was that magical first time and every note was new to us. Our performance of this tired, familiar, light classic left us in awe once again. The audience held their applause momentarily, bathed in the stillness the music left behind.

Soon after I joined the Winnipeg Youth Orchestra, the brochures for the International Music Camp at the Peace Garden in North Dakota were sent home with all members. This would be a one week intensive camp for young musicians from all over the world. The week would also include ballet dancers and cheerleaders. We from the factions of fine art did our best to deride the efforts of the cheerleaders masquerading among us as artists.

I attended the music camp for three consecutive summers. I loved these weeks at the camp. So different from the church camp I went to where the purpose was to make crafts and fight off home sickness with cans of Cragmont soda and bags of Whoppers. At the Peace Gardens there was an instant community and sense of purpose in rehearsing music and preparing it for a performance. We had sectional rehearsals – my first experience with this dreaded practice device. Each section finds themselves in a small room and they hack through their parts without the cover of winds and brass. This happens not just in student orchestras, I have discovered. And it still sounds the alarms and strikes fear in musicians when the conductor announces a sectional rehearsal.

I left Winnipeg for Toronto and found an orchestra there, The North York Symphony, directed by another intense conductor who took on Bruch and Sibelius Symphonies. My hours spent perfecting my faking skills paid off when performing these demanding works. The people were nice and there were cookies at break. I remember one concert where the conductor was sick with a nasty cold that resulted in uncontrollable spasmodic coughing fits. During rehearsal he just let it rip. But a coughing fit struck during the performance, and watching the poor man sweat and suffer while he choked back the urge to cough and conduct with some semblance of normality has been imprinted on my brain as the highest form of service to the music. The show must go on.

Then came a period in my life where I moved around a lot and played very little.  I have lived on all coasts, east, west and north. Eventually I ended up back in southern Ontario, living in a small apartment in Burlington. Time to pull out the violin and get practicing. One day, with the window open, I was playing Bach, the Partita in D. As I played, a strange thing happened. I could hear myself. Not just in the room, but the sound was coming from outside. I kept playing for a few bars and then stopped. The sound from outside continued. I looked out the window and there was a man in the parking lot, playing a violin, and the same Bach piece. He was looking up at my window, grinning from ear to ear.  Tom, my neighbor, played the violin. And this was his way of introducing himself. He lived next door with his wife and two kids. He played in the Burlington Symphony Orchestra and would take me to a rehearsal if I wanted to check it out.  He did say it might be best for me to sit at the back of the seconds to start with. Fine with me. James McKay was conducting and Tom introduced us. Tom sat in the first violin section. Here I was again, sitting in an orchestra while the concert master stood up and waved his bow at the oboe and then the brass. People were welcoming and effusive. I made some great friends there. Thank you, Tom.

Burlington Symphony Orchestra 

From Burlington to Oakville. I heard from my stand partner, Erin, that there was a group rehearsing Verdi’s Requiem Mass. The Masterworks of Oakville.  I asked her if she could get me in, like it was an exclusive club with a secret dress code and velvet rope. Sure, she said. Always room for violins. Snacks? Of course. Charles Demuynck, the music director, only had one question. Did I want to be paid? These orchestras hire many professional musicians. Community players fill out the ranks for free. I was elated to be invited in and to take my seat next to Erin. At no cost!

Masterworks of Oakville 

As with so much music that I love to hear, I discovered the Verdi Requiem Mass to be exceedingly difficult to play. But, by this point in my career as a not-for-profit second violinist, I had mastered the art of playing what I could and faking the rest. The key to success is to know the music. Know where your part fits in and count, count, count and never, EVER, play in a rest. Especially in a grand pause, a moment during which the entire orchestra holds its breath.

I first played in an orchestra with choir during a student recital. The students were studying conducting and had to perform a couple of pieces each. Gwen, my teacher, and I volunteered. One of the pieces was the Sanctus from Gounod’s Requiem. Often, in those early days, when sight reading music, I had no idea of what was coming. The conductor raised his arms, we played the notes and suddenly the tenor sang a sublime, melodic line. Distractingly beautiful. Then, the low hum of the choir. The sound swelled and swallowed up the trembling orchestra. I nearly fell out of my chair.

It was the most startling, gorgeous music I had heard. I started listening to Requiem Masses. I think it was my Onkel Detlef in Cologne, Germany who played the Verdi for me for the first time. When I got home, the first thing I did was buy a recording to listen to over and over. That opening scene in the movie Amadeus – that’s Verdi, Dies Irae. Day of Wrath. 

A note about Beethoven’s 9^th. If it ever comes on the radio when I am driving, I have to concentrate to from running the car off the road. I find this to be one of the most joyous, uplifting piece ever composed. I have had a chance to play it and for those of you who love the Ode to Joy, please pay attention to the forty-five minutes and three movements that the orchestra plays before the choir even stands up.

Playing in community orchestras has given me a ring side seat as to the hardest bits in the orchestral repertoire. By the time you hear a professional orchestra play Beethoven’s 7th or Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite, it all sound pretty seamless.

Tear it apart, slowly, bar by bar and try to put that murderous minuet together, or that section where the orchestra plays in different time signatures, and you gain a whole new appreciation for conductors and the answer to the question, “What exactly does a conductor do?” The conductor knows how the piece fits together. They understand the arc of the story: beginning, middle and end. Their job is to pull that out of the performers and present it to the audience.

Oakville Chamber Orchestra

I now play in three orchestras: The Oakville Chamber Orchestra, The Masterworks of Oakville, both led by Charles Demuynck, and The Cricket Chamber Orchestra. This is a student orchestra run by the indefatigable couple, Maté Szigeti and his wife Anita Hiripi-Szigetiné. These people know what it takes to get the best out of their students. They rewrite music so that the parts are playable. The get professional soloists to perform with the orchestra. They have section leads who are advanced players so the students can hear the part they are playing. They understand that music does not exist in a vacuum. It is a communal experience where the musicians serve the music. Anita and Maté do an exemplary job of teaching the students how to layer musicality on top of technique. Technique alone will never result in a profound performance. These students get a world class experience under the direction of Anita and Maté . They are demanding in their teaching and effusive in their praise. It is by far one of the most rewarding orchestral experiences I have had. I take my place among the students, and I learn.

Cricket Chamber Orchestra

What does the conductor do? They do wave their arms around, sometimes a lot. The conductor interprets the piece and then coaches the orchestra. They understand the balance, the nuances, the tempos, the dynamics, the swells and quiet moments. Where the theme has to be heard and when the violins have to be quiet. How often have I heard: “Listen to the cellos here. That’s what’s important. What you are playing is not.” Sometimes the notes that are not important and accompany a melody elsewhere, are very hard and have been practiced a lot so, we want to be heard!

Now you know what the conductor does. Go and see for yourself. Support your local orchestra. Go and hear them play. They have worked hard. There will probably be snacks. You’ll love it!

I made it to Koerner Hall! (Toronto, ON.)