MOST HILARIOUS INSTRUMENT-RELATED QUESTION OF THE MORNING:
"Do you have to put a loonie in it??"
MOST HILARIOUS NON-INSTRUMENT-RELATED QUESTION OF THE MORNING:
"Do you have a husband??"
BEST REACTION OF THE MORNING:
Theatre organ. Hands down.
Last time I did an EME, my supervisor played it, because I didn't think I was prepared enough. Today, I had no choice but to do it myself, because, well, it was just me.
I was contemplating whether or not to take a risk on it. You see, last night, I looked at the chords for the first few opening bars of the Phantom of the Opera theme. I figured it would be pretty sweet on the gigantic theatre organ. This is because you get the maximum effect from the theatre organ by using a massive, knock-everyone's-socks-off opening. If you start with something soft and sweet, the general response might be, "Oh, that's pretty cool." But something that instantaneously and overwhelmingly puts the theatre organ's full capabilities right in your face (or ears, if you will) will get no less of a reaction than "WHOOOOAAAA!!!" But I had not actually played the Phantom theme on the theatre organ! What if it sounded terrible, or just didn't work out the way I thought it would? I contemplated this dilemma while the kids finished taking turns playing on a synthesizer set up for them to try.
After I'd sat them all down around the organ, succeeded in creating even more of a dramatic buildup of an explanation than I had on Monday for it, swung onto the bench, and warned them all to back up a bit, because it's quite loud, I decided I just had to go for it.
"Are you guys ready?"
"Yesssss!!"
Are you SURE you're ready??"
"YYYESSSSSSSS!!!"
"Okay - here we go!" I told them, as I started flipping down every stop on the entire console.
flipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflipflip (yes there really are about that many stops) flipflipflipflipflip It's a very gratifying feeling to simply flip down all the stops on a theatre organ, never mind play it, I have to say. It feels like you're powering up something REALLY HUGE or REALLY AWESOME, like a supercomputer, or a rocket launcher, or a heap of lights for a really important concert. Clearly this is where the expression "pulling out all the stops" comes from. You're getting set to give it everything you've got to throw at it.
So then I put it all on the line, and hit the opening chord. And I've got to tell you, the sound I got out of the organ was fifteen times better than I'd hoped, and their reaction was twenty times better than I'd hoped. It totally rocked, and a couple of the parents told me after that it was their favourite part. I'm pretty sure the entire city block could have heard the strains of Phantom of the Opera if they listened hard enough right then.
Linus & Lucy was next on my slate, so I reassigned particular stops to different manuals: a heap of xylophones, a glockenspiel, and a handful of reedy pipes for the melody on the top manual, and the fattest, richest pipes for the bass on the bottom manual, with a few flashy percussion instruments and some extra depth on the foot keyboard for the right moments. AAAAND, they loved it to death. AND they all knew the tune, which was exactly what I was hoping for. So when I finished my truncated-for-time's-sake version, the whole pack of them applauded wildly, laughing and cheering and pointing and shouting "Charlie Brown!", and the kids were literally begging me to do it again! Of course, just like in the world of magicians and illusionists, if you do something twice, it's never as cool the second time, so you have to leave it - sadly for them.
But here was the funny thing for me as a musician. The vast majority of my performances, both growing up, and in post-secondary, have been very serious affairs involving weeks or months of intense preparation and worry; quiet audiences who applaud perhaps enthusiastically, but always politely; heaps of pressure to remember your notes, remember your dynamics, remember your articulation; and the great imperative to "express something profound" with your playing. This was pretty much the exact opposite. Quite frankly, the musical quality of my playing would be pretty poor, to the ears of another trained musician. I'm not an organist at all, so somethings were muffed up, I slipped sometimes when I was trying to change manuals on the fly, my legato was definitely not all there because of nerves and excitement, and there were probably even some wrong notes here and there. But those two minutes at the organ were probably the most fun performance of my entire life. And I've certainly never had a more enthusiastic audience. There was no pressure to be perfect, or be profound. It was just supposed to be 100% fun and exciting for the kids. It was a fantastic experience, and a good reminder about some of music's other purposes.
WHAT MADE THE WHOLE MORNING MOST WORTHWHILE:
Yes, it does make you feel pretty good to have a bunch of kids think you're really cool because you can play the Mario theme or the Darth Vader theme using previously-meaningless triangle waves or sawtooth waves on a synthesizer, or when you watch their utterly astonished faces while you show them how amazing sympathetic vibrations are right before their eyes, or when they all run up afterwards while they get their coats on and thank you for teaching them so much awesome stuff today, and tell you about their favourite parts so animatedly.
I was pretty floored this morning, though, when, at the very end, as I collected their clipboards from them before they rushed off to get their coats, one girl came up to me, gave me her clipboard, and then said, "Here," and stuck out a tiny, folded up piece of paper towards me. "I made this for you." I was taken by surprise, but took it from her, having no clue what it was, and said, "Thank you..." She skipped off down the hall, past the Moog synths, and I had to slip the little paper into my pocket while I supervised the remainder of the class wailing away at the Theremin.
I forgot about it while we cleaned up and shut down, and I forgot about it while I hung around the interpreters' office afterwards, chatting with the other leader about the morning's events. Then, while I sat out at front reception, killing time with a can of Coke, waiting to talk to one of the program officers, I remembered that it was there, folded up inside my pocket. I took it out, and unfolded it, extremely curious, and read what it said:
On the back was a drawing:
Now, I'm not one to usually (or almost ever, in fact) think kids are cute. But this was pretty darn cute. And I really like it. In fact, I put it on our fridge (after debating about whether that was creepily mom-like or not. I decided it wasn't.).Here's to jobs that actually invest in people's lives.
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