Rehearsal moved to New Rochelle HS Band Room

You may have noticed that I was purposefully vague with my post yesterday about the site for Wednesday. We learned two days ago that the booking we thought was confirmed for Wednesday was, in fact, not confirmed. We scrambled, David Church acted quickly and decisively, and we received confirmation from New Rochelle just a little while ago. I didn’t dare put out the change until we had that confirmation.

IMPORTANT: Please contact your principal to confirm you received the message about the change. Principals – please contact anyone who you don’t hear from by Tuesday evening. To paraphrase the obvious: No musician left behind!

Please leave enough time for travel and parking. We need to start on time, as the maintenance people will want us completely cleared out of the building by 10:00 pm. That means a fast packup, reset of the room (which we know is very important), and getaway.

And, remember to follow these directions — don’t follow your GPS — to the Band Room at NRHS.

Confirmation of Schelle notes

I had a request to repeat the notes that I gave quickly during the last rehearsal of the Schelle Extraction. Double check to make sure you caught all of this, that I went through quickly:

• The “blur” of fast notes is ok; the listener is not expected to hear individual notes after m.23.
• The “big events” after each “chaotic event” are the most important. They serve as temporary relief before the drilling starts again. The “big events” are:
  • m.9 – Dies Irae
    
  • m.43-44 – Brass cluster/screams
  • m.68-83 – “This Old Man,” children’s “Na-na-na-na-naaa-naa,” and Dies Irae
  • m.90-91 – Power tools, tenor sax solo
  • m.105 – Phantom of the Opera motive
  • m.106-end – Coda/Recovery
• Longer value notes should always be heard over shorter values.
• Improvisation reductions, for those who benefit from a smaller pitch palette (all pitches noted are concert pitches):
  • For F# minor – focus on F# – A (m. 48, 55, 62, 97)
  • For F major – focus on F – A (m.60, 95)
  • For F7 – focus on F – Eb (m.61, 96)
  • For D7 – focus on D – C (m.64, 99)

Thank you for your flexibility. See you Wednesday promptly at 7:30 pm in New Rochelle.