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Kelley Hollis
CODED: Rehearsal Week Reflections

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CODED: Rehearsal Week Reflections

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Vermont Thank You

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yu-hyunah-05.jpg A Far Cry has returned from its fourth trip to Vermont, where we played two concerts with Capital City Concerts. We played a number of pieces with flutist Karen Kevra, which is always a pleasure. We also had the great honor of performing with Hyunah Yu, a gifted soprano I have admired since I was a freshman at the Peabody Conservatory, where Hyunah was at the time completing an Artist Diploma. The Montpelier audience was, as always, fantastic. Thank you, Vermont!

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Portland Debut

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Our Portland, Oregon debut is behind us, and we are now in the home stretch, with only the Memorial Day Seattle concert left to perform. But I'm still thinking about Portland. Portland has been, for me, an almost mythical place. In conversations with friends in Boston, when the question comes up: where do you want to end up?, the answer is invariably Berlin, Germany or Portland, Oregon. Berlin is self-explanstory I think, but why Portland? Now I have a much better idea.

Yes, it's a big city with big city amenities, clean air and water, excellent public transit, and stunning natural scenery easily accessible. But more than that, the people of Portland are energized! 75,000 of them will go to a political rally. They recycle. And, they go to concerts of young, unconducted chamber orchestras. We had such an enthusiastic audience, it was overwhelming. Thanks Portland! If you are reading this and were part of our Portland crowd, please leave a note telling us what you thought!

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San Francisco Debut

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A Far Cry played its first public concert on the West Coast last night, at the Koret Auditorium of the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco! When we first entered the space, my breath was taken away. What an amazing theater. The seats rose steeply from the stage, with rows of mod leather armchairs separated by red-LED-lit aisles. The front and back-of-the-house staff at the museum were all extremely friendly and helpful, which allowed us musicians to concentrate on the music. We drew a wonderful audience of new and old friends, and we'd love to keep in touch. If you saw the concert last night, thanks again for coming. If you'd like to stay in the loop, sign up for our mailing list here. Also, we'd love to hear your feedback - click the "Audience Comments" link below and let us know what you thought!

Aftershocks

Well, "Words and the Night" is behind us. Without a doubt, it has been our most challenging, most risky, and ultimately most successful concert cycle yet. There were many new faces at our performances this week, from curious Globe readers to members of HUMANWINE.

If you saw a performance, please tell us and the world about it by clicking the "Audience Comments" button below.

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Welcome, Globe Readers!

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If you read about A Far Cry in Friday's Boston Globe, thanks for stopping by to check us out! Take a look around our website - there's much to discover. If you haven't seen the online-only slideshow (complete with narration from Margaret and Jae), check it out here. The incredible photography is by Yoon Byun - see more of his work at yooners.com. Most of all, don't be a stranger! You can leave a comment right here on the blog by clicking "audience comments" below. You can sign up to receive an occasional concert notice email by clicking "Contact Us" above and joining our mailing list. Or (I saved the best for last) you can come see A Far Cry live in concert next weekend. Tickets are available through the "Concerts" link above.

Youtube feedback

As we are preparing a new round of videos from our recently-completed "Remixed Classics" concerts, I decided to check out the videos we posted already, of some of our previous concerts. There was a lot of great feedback! Here's what people are saying about our online videos: Corelli Concerto Grosso op.6 #9 (1463 views)

  • Just Wonderful...............thanks for posting!
  • wow, super!
  • mejor imposible. SUENA A GLORIA BENDITA (Jesse: not sure what this is about!)
  • Awesome!

Elgar Introduction and Allegro (part 1 1032 views, part 2 1106 views)

  • All of you sound amazing. Your intonation is right on. The dynamics are so well expressed. Elgar's Intro and Allegro: probably the most beautiful way ever played.
  • immaculate
  • wow! this is so awesome! you guys have such a great sound!
  • omg we're playing this right now in orch, it's soooooo hard!!
  • OMG so am I! And yes, it's a hard piece, but it's also really awesome. Probably one of my favorite string orchestra works! These guys do a remarkable job, not counting the fact that it's without a conductor. The fact that it's without conductor is remarkable in and of itself; one of the reasons that this piece is so hard is because it's so lushly written. So, congratulations to these guys for attempting the piece and playing it incredibly well!
  • Introduction and Allegro is NOT an easy piece to play, but they did VERY well. I don't even know them and I'm proud of them
  • WOW WOW THIS IS TOTALLY FANTASTIC we played this and did NOT do it justice in the slightest - this is unbelievable. WOW.

Quantz Flute Concerto in G with Karen Kevra (942 views)

  • holy schnizzle...you guys sound amazing! orpheus, watch out!
  • Yeah, they are beautiful performers!
  • Yeeah, je veux le jouer comme ça ce concerto !! bravo =P

Tchaikovsky Serenade for Strings (4th movement) (1587 views)

  • wow, very good!
  • wish i could hear more of the bassline cause that's my favorite part, but that was very very nice (Jesse: the little camcorder microphone was clearly not worthy of Karl's awesome-ness)
  • mmm...tchaikovsky wrote a note for this piece that the bigger orchestra the better...but wow you guys sounded like a whole orchestra of 60

So... our videos have been watched over 6000 times, and that's what we're all about - reaching people! To find these videos yourself, just go to youtube.com and search for "afarcry" - as of now, 5 will come up, and shortly there will be some excellent new additions!

And thanks everyone so much for being so generous with your feedback. You know how to make a musician feel good :-)

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We live for this!

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Wow. A Far Cry in day-to-day life is amazing: a great collection of individuals, always an exhilarating experience, always striving for bigger and better things. Then A Far Cry performs, and everything ratchets up about 10 notches. Consider an Italian sports car: no matter how comfortable it is to tool around town, no matter how cushy the leather seats or how harmonious the surround-sound, you simply won't understand the soul of the machine without taking it to the race track and pushing it to its limits. A Far Cry is the Italian sports car of ensembles. One simply forgets, in day-to-day activity, the almost terrifying potential and power that lurks in the belly of the beast.

A Far Cry lives to perform. If you haven't experienced A Far Cry's current program, "Remixed Classics," you have one more chance: in a free performance at Cochran Chapel at the Andover Academy this Friday, February 1.

If you saw A Far Cry in concert this week, thank you so much for coming to support us! We'd love to hear from you - just click "Leave a comment..."

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Concert Feedback

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Thanks to everyone - criers, guests, volunteers, venues, recording engineers, mentors, teachers, sox, and especially audience - for making our Cambridge and Brookline concerts of the last two days such wonderful events. We hope that our music uplifted the spirits and stirred the passions. If you were at the concerts, we would LOVE to hear from you - any thoughts at all about any aspect of the evenings! Simply click "leave a comment" below.

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