In the late 90s, I played in a local per service orchestra for a while. It was a bit of a sketchy outfit, and the violin section had some real characters in it — they were always bickering with each other over bowings, intonation, and who’s turn it was to sleep with the conductor.
One concert, we played the Prokofiev / Lt Kije Suite, which is one of those rare classical pieces that tastefully utilized the tenor saxophone. We hired a local pro, Kipp McGillicuddy, but he missed the first two rehearsals due to not getting the emails we sent to him — his AOL dialup account was never online, because his first wife was ALWAYS on the phone with her mother, talking about how Kipp was still making a living as a musician, and speculating as to when he would get a real job.
Anyway, we had only one more rehearsal, and since Kipp was AWOL on AOL, we had no choice but to bring in another saxophone player. Her name was Claire de Jeune Lune, a French doctoral exchange student in Eugene Rousseau’s studio at the University of Minnesota. She was also taking improvisation lessons from the legendary Herman von Schlutzenfreud of New Ulm, and was said to have quickly learned all the changes.
Hours before our penultimate rehearsal for the big concert, Kipp finally got into his AOL account. Noticing the gig rehearsal schedule, and understanding his reputation in this town was in serious peril, he put on his finest Friday casual wear, and made sure to be at the hall exactly 15 minutes early. Claire beat him by 5 minutes, wearing a sweater that honestly hung a bit lower in the back than was comfortable for the rest of the woodwind section, nearly driving the trombone section to leave for The Ground Round early. They say deep breathing is essential for getting a great tone, and that evening, the winds had never sounded better.
Upon seeing Claire in his chair, Kipp was immediately pleased with his decision to dress it up a bit, even more so when he remembered he wore his new brown leather penny loafers. Claire, being French, was equally well put together that evening, and nearly knocked the wind out of Kipp when she said hello, in English, but also in French, if you know what I mean.
The conductor decided to allow each to run through the well known solo excerpt in the second movement, “Romance.” Kipp went first, and if I didn’t know better, I’d wager that even his D’Addario Reserve #3 was weeping by the end of the movement. I was listening, but also watching the young Claire watching Kipp. While the left corner of her mouth was turned up in a subtle yet confident smile, at one point I caught her looking at Kipp‘s Mark VI and I noticed she actually bit her lip a bit harder than I think she intended. It took several moments for the rosy color in her lower lip to return. She wasn’t embarrassed by this — she was French.
It was rumored Claire’s grandfather was a friend of Prokofiev, meeting him while on a cultural exchange to Leningrad after the war. It was her turn on the “Romance.” Perhaps for her grandfather, and perhaps to destroy what was left of the trombone section, she melted the room with her phrasing, authentic vibrato, and her Guerlain Shalimar. At the end, everyone knew she’d be on the concert, and would probably get double scale for no good reason.
She looked at Kipp when she was done and said to him in French, “Don’t hate me because I play more beautifully than I look,” but what Kipp heard in English was, “Meet me in practice room #3 on the break.”
And that’s exactly what happened. While the rest of the orchestra ran through the bombastic Bruckner, we all thought we heard fantastic new percussion parts being prepared down the hall. The sounds of intercontinental exchanges in turn set the violin section on edge, as the conductor’s current pairing had recently moved down a chair from concert master Laura Bronstein to concert mistress Jessica Lowe. What started as an up bow “accident” devolved like a short ride in a fast machine into a spontaneous stabbing incident. The tuba player eventually stepped in, after setting down the only book those guys ever read, “Song and Wind (and how to break it),” putting himself between the two ladies and the maestro, who orchestrated the whole mess in the first place.
We called it a night after things cooled down. The concert went well, although we had to hire a substitute concert master from one of the groups across town. And at the end of it, in the lobby, I let the conductor know I would not be returning for the following season.
“Why?” He asked.
“Too much sax and violins,” I replied.
Dad jokes rule.
–Steve Kriesel
President
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