The string players met this morning for "string orchestra" while the wind players had some time off.
My time was well spent: a lie-in, followed by a mammoth cooking session in which I turned all the fresh meat and turkey in my fridge into meal sized portions, most of which are now in the freezer.
I also practised the bassoon part of the Mozart Wind Sinfonia Concertante, and listened to the CD on my CDROM. I haven't actually tried playing with the CD, though.
Then the great bedroom reorganisation got started: everything came out of the ottoman bed in the third bedroom so that it could be moved into the back bedroom, where it is replacing the zip-and-link beds, which have moved to the front bedroom. The general junk which has accumulated over a couple of years of non-use all had to move from the front bedroom to the third bedroom. Sort of musical bedrooms, or it would have been if I'd put the CDROM onto continuous play and had the Mozart running the whole time:-)
Stephen phoned up during the afternoon to say that someone had advertised a water softener for sale and when he checked it out, it sounded ideal for my kitchen. Originally I was going to go with him to look at it, but time was against me, so he ended up getting it while I was out playing chamber music this evening. It turns out to be slightly too wide for the gap between my sink cupboard and my fridge-freezer, but we will work out the logistics. I'm looking forward to no more limescale.
So now we get to this evening's chamber music: it was at Dilys's place, and we were divided into three groups. There was a string octet in the front room downstairs; a smaller string group with a flautist in a back room downstairs; and ten wind players in the front bedroom upstairs. Fitting in ten wind players, plus stands, when there are still beds in the room is an interesting exercise. The four clarinets, three horns, one flute and one oboe sat in a circle with their stands in the centre of the room and I sat on a quite high piano stool behind the circle, as that gave me the clearance I needed for my bassoon, and also ensured that I was far enough away from the clarinet to my left that I didn't brain him if I leant forwards!
With this band of ten wind players, we decided to attempt the Mozart Serenade for Thirteen Winds. We did try to persuade a cellist to join us to play their choice of second bassoon or string bass, but couldn't get any of the cellists to venture up into wind territory. Maybe it's just as well: I don't know where we would have fitted a cellist! Anyway, we made quite a creditable rendition of the Mozart, even if a couple of parts remained unplayed. There are a couple of tricky bassoon bits which made for exciting sight reading: I had to try and play them by seeing the note and fingering it without having to use my brain in the middle as there just wasn't time.
The Mozart took us over an hour, as we did all the repeats, and had to stop a few times when things got out of sync. As there was still time before supper, someone had a copy of the Gounod Petit Symphonie, so we had a go at that. One of the horn players switched to trumpet and played the second oboe part. It may have been more of a challenge when played that way: oboe players generally don't like it as there isn't enough in it. I believe that Gounod wrote it for a friend who wasn't very good and only merited a token appearance in the performance. I think two clarinettists shared second clarinet and one clarinettist got out his bass clarinet and played first bassoon on it, while I played second bassoon. There are lots of bottom B flats in it, so it's better to play second on a real bassoon as I don't think Terry's bass clarinet goes down that low.
The Gounod went pretty well, and we even did some of the repeats, but judiciously left some out so as to be down to supper before the string players scoffed the lot! Actually, there were plenty of nibbles to go around. Over supper, we worked out the logistics of Wednesday's chamber music, which is taking place at several venues, as nobody among the Wednesday hosts has a large enough house to accommodate all the participants.
Tomorrow morning I will be going to an orchestral session, so I'd better finish up here and get some sleep so that I'll be bright eyed and bushy tailed in the morning.
Helen
Last Revised: 10th August, 2001.