Friday, July 20, 2007

I pulled into Lancaster at 4:30 pm., parked a couple blocks away and walked to the Elks Lodge where the Chicago Brass Quintet was finishing their last four selections. Even though we have known each other for ten years or more, this was my first time to see them and I just barely made it.

I dashed back to the Zane Bandstand to prepare to be entertainment on WBNS-10TV’s 5:15 m. weather segment with Chris Bradley. Gary chatted and I played When the Saints Go Marching In. Millie and Byron Kohn, my McArthur, Ohio adopted parents, were having their happy hour at the Shaw Hotel’s Bar and I stopped in for a bowl of soup, before a 6:30 pm. rehearsal for the Lanfest Orchestra’s Twentieth Annversary Concert, the following evening.

I should have planned for a 6 pm. rehearsal; I was a half hour late. Maestro Sheldon was understanding of my error and we backed the show up to my part. I played the Allegro Movement of Franz Joseph Haydn’s Trumpet Concerto in Eb, which includes a solo cadenza that I patterned after a Wynton Marsalis recording.

My twist on the cadenza was to work the solo into the Lancaster High School Fight song, that Mike Smith had sent me days earlier on an e:mailed mp3 file. I played it in rehearsal and it fell like a lead balloon. Maestro pulled me aside and nicely said, “ I understand how it could be humorous, but maybe see how you can shorten it.” I said that I would and proceeded to get on with the rehearsal like a professional among professionals. I didn’t forget that I was a guest soloist.

Bugler’s Holiday got its rehearsal with six trumpeters; Ross Beaucraft, Richard Burkart, David Hunsicker, Mathew Lee, Loren Topliz and Arnett Howard. After rehearsing the third trumpet part for less than a week, I was pleasantly confident when Maestro tweaked for mistakes, he didn’t include me.

We rehearsed the fireworks Americana finale, which featured the Lancaster Chorale. I marched from the back of the audience playing The Saints and it took four choruses to get on stage; I needed to walk faster as showtime. Rehearsal finally finished at 8:30 pm. and instead of following the orchestra gang to a favorite watering hole, I went to the home of my host, Jeanette Scholl, like I had good sense. It has taken me decades to finally make some clear progress in the good sense department.

Jeanette is a retired Lancaster middle school teacher, sports fan and her biggest pride is her students/kids who have gone on to sporting pursuits in colleges. We met in the 1980s, long before I had good sense; some how we have remained friends and this is the second consecutive year that she has hosted me during Lanfest.