I hope everyone enjoyed the Thanksgiving holiday. Please remember that we are rehearsing this week, December 1, at Scarsdale Middle School. See the Rehearsal This Week page for our rehearsal order and directions to SMS.

On Monday, we’ll be handing out the Hunsberger arrangement of Colas Breugnon, and collecting the Beeler arrangement. Please make sure you have the Beeler with you on Monday for the trade.

Please bring your Exchange Commitment Forms on Monday night. As we discussed, if you are unable to absolutely commit by Monday, please indicate your best intention at this point, and give us a date by which you can confirm. If you need another copy of the bulletin or commitment form, click here. We are hoping for as close to 100% participation as possible, which is what we saw in the informal count last year.

I realized tonight that the emergency post about the rear parking lot seemed to have been emailed multiple times. I apologize for this!

One more note – a performance opportunity: John Palatucci, who subbed in on euphonium with us last spring, is inviting players to play for a performance of Pepper Choplin’s “Once Upon A Night” at his daughter’s church.  Details include:

IMPORTANT! It’s very important that no one parks in the rear lot tonight!
Beginning tonight, until further notice, there is no parking available in the rear lot behind TMH, as they prepare to resurface the entire space.
Please plan ahead to park elsewhere.
Spread the word to those who may not check their email in time, and remember that we are setting up to start at our regular time, 7:30 pm.
See you then.

I just heard from Karina at the Music Hall this morning, and the children’s theater booking on Monday night is canceled – therefore, we can start at our regular 7:30 pm time tomorrow night. Please share this information with anyone who doesn’t read their email regularly so we have everyone for an on-time start.

After much ado with the release of our original travel agent, and hiring of Bruce Bevan and World Class Vacations, plus development and editing, I now have our Chicago information ready to distribute. Click here for the November 2014 Exchange Bulletin, which contains information about our itinerary, flights, home-stays, hotel, plus the Commitment Form for everyone to complete and return, and a letter for music educators who need documentation for school administrators to justify the day off on Monday, June 15. (I will be happy to customize this letter for anyone who needs it tweaked.)

Please read this important information and we will answer questions at the break on Monday. We are asking to get commitment replies back by Monday, December 1.

I have also edited the rehearsal plan for tomorrow night to reflect the 7:30 pm start. Please review. I’ll see you then!

I’ve updated the rehearsal plan for Monday’s rehearsal. Please remember that we start at 8:00 pm, following the children’s theater event. I recommend arriving at 7:40 pm. Please help us set up the stage quickly. Remember that the TMH staff is there to help us; if there’s an issue, to speak to a Board member.

The parts for the Carmen Fantasia rental, including the solo parts, only arrived yesterday. The piece is 26 minutes long, and I need to cut 2 or 3 of the movements to make it manageably in the 15 minute range as I had planned. If I can confer with Bill & Chris in time, we’ll hand out and read the appropriate sections on Monday. If not, I’ll extend the Tschaikovsky section of the rehearsal and start some “meat and potatoes” rehearsal of that piece right away. As I wrote earlier this week, the Tschaikovsky Finale parts are ready for download. Please go to this link, find your part by instrument family, download/print your part, and be sure to begin to practice this part before Monday.

Please also note that I’ve updated the Resources & Forms page on this site. Included/updated now are the current brochure, current ad form, and current spreadsheet for repertoire for the season, including the recently updated instrumentation for the Winter Concert. If you’re a section leader, check out the Winter Instrumentation tab of that spreadsheet to see the part distribution.

See you Monday!