It really does seem like yesterday that I was gearing up to meet with a few other people for this "idea" for a chamber orchestra. Then, after a few weeks of organizing and setting up a first reading, I was in Prague, on vacation with my parents, and any time I met anyone new, this was all I could talk about. They wanted to know about my life as a grad student in Boston, and I responded with a starry-eyed description of the birth and potential of this nameless, conductorless chamber orchestra that I was starting with some of the most amazing people around. Here we are now, on the verge of our second full set of concerts. We've been riding an exhilarating wave all the way here and honestly, I could still talk about it all day long. The buzz is clearly there - people are talking in Boston (and elsewhere), people are offering us help and advice, and we're busy dividing tasks to carry us through the business aspect so we can be totally devoted to making music.
Spending this many hours with all or most of fifteen other strong personalities is, as a friend of our observed, like watching a social experiment. I could definitely see that and I found it amusing, and then realized that I couldn't choose better people for this so-called experiment. We've become quite a family, which means getting personal and comfortable, and sometimes even a little grumpy, but in the end we still love each other. We're all really excited for our concerts in Vermont this weekend. Handel, Tchaikovsky, Part, and Quantz are all becoming our own and we're ready to share our dynamic and transcending interpretations with everyone else. The character with which this all started remains with us and feeds the interaction in our playing and what transmits through the music. How lucky I am to be a part of this....
