hehe
so ino im a dork etc etc but for all my fellow music ppl...
Guide to the Orchestra
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
by Garrison Keillor
To each person, God gives some talent such as comedy, just to name one, or
the ability to suffer, and to some persons God has given musical talent,
though not to as many as think so. So for a young Lutheran considering an
orchestral career, the first question to ask yourself is, "Do I have a
genuine
God-given talent, or do I only seem talented compared to other young
Lutherans?"
Because most Lutherans aren't musicians, they're choir members. Mostly
altos
and basses. And they can be sure that their gift is God-given, because who
else but God would be interested? Nobody goes into choir music for the
wrong
reasons. But orchestra... do you know what you're getting into? You're
getting
into opera for one thing. Don Juan and Mephistopheles, pagan goddesses
screeching
and being strangled and thrown off balconies. And even if you stick to
concert
music, where are the Christian composers? Modern ones are existentialists,
the romantics were secular humanists, the 18th century was all rati
onalists,
and the 17th were Italian except for Bach. And you can't make a living
playing
Bach. In the Bible, we read about people singing and playing musical
instruments,
including the harp, the last trump, the cymbal, the psaltery. But in the
Bible, music was in praise of the Lord, not for amusement. We don't read
that our Lord Himself ever played an instrument or enjoyed hearing other
people play theirs. The apostles did not attend concerts. They weren't in
the arts--maybe there's a reason for that. You play in an orchestra, you're
going to be devoting your life to music that sort of swirls around in
spiritual
mystery. Searching for answers that people could find in the Epistle to the
Romans if somebody just showed them where it is.
But if you're determined to play in an orchestra, then you ought to ask
yourself,
"Which instrument is the best one for a Lutheran to play?" Which instrument
would our Lord have chosen, assuming He played an instrument? And assuming
He was Lutheran.
Probably not a French horn: the French horn takes too much of a person's
life. French horn players hardly have time to marry and have children. The
French horn is practically a religious belief all by itself. In some
orchestras,
the horn players are required to be celibate--sometimes by their wives.
Because
they think about the horn all the time anyway.
Should a Lutheran play the bassoon? Not if you want to be taken seriously,
I don't think so. The name kind of says it all: bassoon. It's an instrument
that isn't playing with a full deck of marbles. Maybe it's something you'd
do for a hobby ("Hey honey, let's go bassooning this weekend!"), but not
as your life's work. Some bassoonists filling out applications for home
loans
just say "orthodontist."
Many Lutherans start out playing clarinets in marching band and think of
it as a pretty good instrument and kind of sociable. You pick up a
clarinet,
and you feel like getting together with other people and forming an "M."
But the symphonic clarinet is different: clever, sarcastic, kind of snooty.
It's a nice small town instrument that went to college and after that you
can't get a simple answer out of them. It is a French instrument, you know.
Ever wonder why there are no French Lutherans? Probably the wine wasn't
good
enough for them. The oboe is the sensualist of the woodwind section, and
if there is one wind Lutherans should avoid, it's probably this one. In
movie
soundtracks, you tend to hear the oboe when the woman is taking her clothes
off. Also a little later when she asks the man for a cigarette. You start
playing the oboe, you're going to have babies, take my word for it.
The English horn [cor anglais] sounds Christian, maybe because we think of
it as the Anglican horn, but it's so mournful, so plaintive. And so are
English
horn players. They all have deep complicated problems. They're all down in
the dumps, especially at night, which is when most concerts are. Maybe
because
they want what oboists have, I don't know.
The flute is the show-off of the wind section, the big shot: Jean-Pierre
Rampal, James Galway--both millionaires. (How many millionaire bassoonists
can you name real fast?) Well, that's fine. Everybody knows it's the
hardest,
blowing across a tiny hole with your head tilted all your life: it's like
soloing on a pop bottle. The problem with the flute is that it vibrates
your
brain, and you start wearing big white caftans and smocks and eat roots and
berries. You become a pantheist and sit in meadows, and you believe that
all is one and God is everything--God is a column of air vibrating--and you
know that's not right.
The last member of the woodwind family is the flakiest and that's the
piccolo.
It's never in tune. Never has been, never will be. All you can play with
it is the blues. Which, being a Lutheran, we don't have anyway.
We come now to the string section. Strings are mentioned in scripture and
some young Christians are tempted to become string players. But you want
to be careful. Bass, for example. A very deliberate instrument, the plow
horse of the orchestra: and bass players do tend to be more methodical, not
so spontaneous or witty or brilliant necessarily, but reliable. Which makes
the instrument appealing to German Lutherans. And yet bass notes do have
a certain texture and a tone, a darkness, a depth that--my gosh, when you
see those guys pick up their bows back there, doesn't it make you think the
same thing that I do? And if we do, just think what they're thinking
about....
The cello section seems pleasant, and cellists seem like such nice people.
The way they put their arms around their instruments, they look like
parents
at a day care center zipping up snowsuits. They seem like us: comfortable,
mid-range, able to see both sides of things. And yet, there's something
about
the cello that's hard to put your fingers on. It just doesn't seem right.
Maybe, it's the way they hold the instrument the way they do. Why can't
they
hold it across their laps? Or beside themselves? I'm only asking.
The viola section is no place for a Lutheran and here you have to take my
word for it, because I know violists and they're okay until late at night,
they like to build a fire in a vacant lot and drink red wine and roast a
chicken on a clothes hanger and talk about going to Mexico with somebody
named Rita. Violists have this dark, moody, gypsy streak, especially when
they get older, and they realize that their instrument for some reason
cannot
be heard beyond the stage. You think you hear the violas, but it's really
the second violins.
The first violin is a problem for a Christian because it's a solo virtuoso
instrument and we Christians are humble and decent people. The first
violins
see the maestro look to them first, and most of them believe that he
secretly
takes his cue from watching their bows go up and down. The maestro, who has
a great nimbus of hair and is here on a temporary work permit, is
hypnotized
by listening to the violins and forgets which page he's on and looks to the
violins to find out what's going on--this is what most violinists believe
in their hearts. That if the maestro dropped dead, the orchestra would just
follow the violins while his little body was carried off into the wings,
and nobody in the audience would notice any difference except that now they
would have an unobstructed view of the violin section. Is this a place for
a Lutheran to be? Did our Lord say "Blessed are they who stand up in front
and take deep bows for they shall receive bigger fees?" No, He did not.
The second violin section is attractive to Lutherans because these people
are steady, supportive and helpful, but look who it is they help--they help
out the first violins. You want to play second fiddle to that crowd? (No,
I hope not.) One thing you may not know about second violins is that the
parts are so easy they never practice and they wind up staying out late in
singles bars on the freeway near the airport and dancing with software
salesmen.
But I guess that's their way.
Let's be clear about one thing about the brass section. The rest of the
orchestra
wishes the brass were playing in another room. So does the conductor. His
back is toward you so that you can't see what he's saying to them but what
he's saying is, "Would you mind taking that thing outside?" The brass
section
is made up of men who were at one time in the construction trades. They
went
into music because the hours are better and there's less dust. They're
heavy
dudes and that's why composers wrote so few notes for them. Because after
they play, you can't hear for a while. The tuba player is normally a
stocky,
bearded guy whose hobby is plumbing. The only member of the orchestra who
bowls over 250 and gets his deer every year and changes his own oil. In his
locker downstairs, he keeps a pair of lederhosen for free-lance jobs.
Anyway,
there's only one tuba in the bunch and he's it.
The trombonist is a humorist, sort of the brother-in-law of the orchestra.
He carries a water spray gun to keep his slide moist and often uses it
against
his neighbors. That's why they duck down back there. He's nobody you'd ever
want to see become artistic director; you just hope he doesn't sit right
behind you.
The trumpet is the brass instrument you imagine as Christian, thinking of
Gideon and Gabriel, and then you meet one in real life, and you realize how
driven these people are. They don't want to wear black tie; they want to
wear capes and swords and tassels; they want to play as loud as they can
and see mallards drop from the ceiling. Of the people who've keeled over
dead at orchestra concerts, most of them were killed by a long trumpet
passage.
And most of them were glad to go.
There are two places in the orchestra for a Lutheran and one is the
percussion
section. It's the most Christian instrument there is. Percussionists are
endlessly patient because they hardly ever get to play. Pages and pages of
music go by when the violins are sawing away and the winds are tooting and
the brass are blasting, and the percussionist sits there and counts the
bars
like a hunter in the blind waiting for a grouse to appear. A percussionist
may have to wait for twenty minutes just to play a few beats, but those
beats
have to be exact, and they have to be passionate, climactic. All that the
Epistles of Paul say a Christian should be--faithful, waiting, trusting,
filled with fervor--are the qualities of the good percussionist.
The other Lutheran instrument, of course, is the harp. It's a good
instrument
for any Christian because it keeps you humble and keeps you at home. You
can't run around with a harp. Having one is like living with an elderly
parent
in very poor health: it's hard to get them in and out of cars, and it's
hard
to keep them happy. It takes fourteen hours to tune a harp, which remains
in tune for about twenty minutes, or until somebody opens the door. It's
an instrument for a saint. If a harpist could find a good percussionist,
they wouldn't need anybody else. They could settle down and make perfectly
good music, just the two of them.
Guide to the Orchestra
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
by Garrison Keillor
To each person, God gives some talent such as comedy, just to name one, or
the ability to suffer, and to some persons God has given musical talent,
though not to as many as think so. So for a young Lutheran considering an
orchestral career, the first question to ask yourself is, "Do I have a
genuine
God-given talent, or do I only seem talented compared to other young
Lutherans?"
Because most Lutherans aren't musicians, they're choir members. Mostly
altos
and basses. And they can be sure that their gift is God-given, because who
else but God would be interested? Nobody goes into choir music for the
wrong
reasons. But orchestra... do you know what you're getting into? You're
getting
into opera for one thing. Don Juan and Mephistopheles, pagan goddesses
screeching
and being strangled and thrown off balconies. And even if you stick to
concert
music, where are the Christian composers? Modern ones are existentialists,
the romantics were secular humanists, the 18th century was all rati
onalists,
and the 17th were Italian except for Bach. And you can't make a living
playing
Bach. In the Bible, we read about people singing and playing musical
instruments,
including the harp, the last trump, the cymbal, the psaltery. But in the
Bible, music was in praise of the Lord, not for amusement. We don't read
that our Lord Himself ever played an instrument or enjoyed hearing other
people play theirs. The apostles did not attend concerts. They weren't in
the arts--maybe there's a reason for that. You play in an orchestra, you're
going to be devoting your life to music that sort of swirls around in
spiritual
mystery. Searching for answers that people could find in the Epistle to the
Romans if somebody just showed them where it is.
But if you're determined to play in an orchestra, then you ought to ask
yourself,
"Which instrument is the best one for a Lutheran to play?" Which instrument
would our Lord have chosen, assuming He played an instrument? And assuming
He was Lutheran.
Probably not a French horn: the French horn takes too much of a person's
life. French horn players hardly have time to marry and have children. The
French horn is practically a religious belief all by itself. In some
orchestras,
the horn players are required to be celibate--sometimes by their wives.
Because
they think about the horn all the time anyway.
Should a Lutheran play the bassoon? Not if you want to be taken seriously,
I don't think so. The name kind of says it all: bassoon. It's an instrument
that isn't playing with a full deck of marbles. Maybe it's something you'd
do for a hobby ("Hey honey, let's go bassooning this weekend!"), but not
as your life's work. Some bassoonists filling out applications for home
loans
just say "orthodontist."
Many Lutherans start out playing clarinets in marching band and think of
it as a pretty good instrument and kind of sociable. You pick up a
clarinet,
and you feel like getting together with other people and forming an "M."
But the symphonic clarinet is different: clever, sarcastic, kind of snooty.
It's a nice small town instrument that went to college and after that you
can't get a simple answer out of them. It is a French instrument, you know.
Ever wonder why there are no French Lutherans? Probably the wine wasn't
good
enough for them. The oboe is the sensualist of the woodwind section, and
if there is one wind Lutherans should avoid, it's probably this one. In
movie
soundtracks, you tend to hear the oboe when the woman is taking her clothes
off. Also a little later when she asks the man for a cigarette. You start
playing the oboe, you're going to have babies, take my word for it.
The English horn [cor anglais] sounds Christian, maybe because we think of
it as the Anglican horn, but it's so mournful, so plaintive. And so are
English
horn players. They all have deep complicated problems. They're all down in
the dumps, especially at night, which is when most concerts are. Maybe
because
they want what oboists have, I don't know.
The flute is the show-off of the wind section, the big shot: Jean-Pierre
Rampal, James Galway--both millionaires. (How many millionaire bassoonists
can you name real fast?) Well, that's fine. Everybody knows it's the
hardest,
blowing across a tiny hole with your head tilted all your life: it's like
soloing on a pop bottle. The problem with the flute is that it vibrates
your
brain, and you start wearing big white caftans and smocks and eat roots and
berries. You become a pantheist and sit in meadows, and you believe that
all is one and God is everything--God is a column of air vibrating--and you
know that's not right.
The last member of the woodwind family is the flakiest and that's the
piccolo.
It's never in tune. Never has been, never will be. All you can play with
it is the blues. Which, being a Lutheran, we don't have anyway.
We come now to the string section. Strings are mentioned in scripture and
some young Christians are tempted to become string players. But you want
to be careful. Bass, for example. A very deliberate instrument, the plow
horse of the orchestra: and bass players do tend to be more methodical, not
so spontaneous or witty or brilliant necessarily, but reliable. Which makes
the instrument appealing to German Lutherans. And yet bass notes do have
a certain texture and a tone, a darkness, a depth that--my gosh, when you
see those guys pick up their bows back there, doesn't it make you think the
same thing that I do? And if we do, just think what they're thinking
about....
The cello section seems pleasant, and cellists seem like such nice people.
The way they put their arms around their instruments, they look like
parents
at a day care center zipping up snowsuits. They seem like us: comfortable,
mid-range, able to see both sides of things. And yet, there's something
about
the cello that's hard to put your fingers on. It just doesn't seem right.
Maybe, it's the way they hold the instrument the way they do. Why can't
they
hold it across their laps? Or beside themselves? I'm only asking.
The viola section is no place for a Lutheran and here you have to take my
word for it, because I know violists and they're okay until late at night,
they like to build a fire in a vacant lot and drink red wine and roast a
chicken on a clothes hanger and talk about going to Mexico with somebody
named Rita. Violists have this dark, moody, gypsy streak, especially when
they get older, and they realize that their instrument for some reason
cannot
be heard beyond the stage. You think you hear the violas, but it's really
the second violins.
The first violin is a problem for a Christian because it's a solo virtuoso
instrument and we Christians are humble and decent people. The first
violins
see the maestro look to them first, and most of them believe that he
secretly
takes his cue from watching their bows go up and down. The maestro, who has
a great nimbus of hair and is here on a temporary work permit, is
hypnotized
by listening to the violins and forgets which page he's on and looks to the
violins to find out what's going on--this is what most violinists believe
in their hearts. That if the maestro dropped dead, the orchestra would just
follow the violins while his little body was carried off into the wings,
and nobody in the audience would notice any difference except that now they
would have an unobstructed view of the violin section. Is this a place for
a Lutheran to be? Did our Lord say "Blessed are they who stand up in front
and take deep bows for they shall receive bigger fees?" No, He did not.
The second violin section is attractive to Lutherans because these people
are steady, supportive and helpful, but look who it is they help--they help
out the first violins. You want to play second fiddle to that crowd? (No,
I hope not.) One thing you may not know about second violins is that the
parts are so easy they never practice and they wind up staying out late in
singles bars on the freeway near the airport and dancing with software
salesmen.
But I guess that's their way.
Let's be clear about one thing about the brass section. The rest of the
orchestra
wishes the brass were playing in another room. So does the conductor. His
back is toward you so that you can't see what he's saying to them but what
he's saying is, "Would you mind taking that thing outside?" The brass
section
is made up of men who were at one time in the construction trades. They
went
into music because the hours are better and there's less dust. They're
heavy
dudes and that's why composers wrote so few notes for them. Because after
they play, you can't hear for a while. The tuba player is normally a
stocky,
bearded guy whose hobby is plumbing. The only member of the orchestra who
bowls over 250 and gets his deer every year and changes his own oil. In his
locker downstairs, he keeps a pair of lederhosen for free-lance jobs.
Anyway,
there's only one tuba in the bunch and he's it.
The trombonist is a humorist, sort of the brother-in-law of the orchestra.
He carries a water spray gun to keep his slide moist and often uses it
against
his neighbors. That's why they duck down back there. He's nobody you'd ever
want to see become artistic director; you just hope he doesn't sit right
behind you.
The trumpet is the brass instrument you imagine as Christian, thinking of
Gideon and Gabriel, and then you meet one in real life, and you realize how
driven these people are. They don't want to wear black tie; they want to
wear capes and swords and tassels; they want to play as loud as they can
and see mallards drop from the ceiling. Of the people who've keeled over
dead at orchestra concerts, most of them were killed by a long trumpet
passage.
And most of them were glad to go.
There are two places in the orchestra for a Lutheran and one is the
percussion
section. It's the most Christian instrument there is. Percussionists are
endlessly patient because they hardly ever get to play. Pages and pages of
music go by when the violins are sawing away and the winds are tooting and
the brass are blasting, and the percussionist sits there and counts the
bars
like a hunter in the blind waiting for a grouse to appear. A percussionist
may have to wait for twenty minutes just to play a few beats, but those
beats
have to be exact, and they have to be passionate, climactic. All that the
Epistles of Paul say a Christian should be--faithful, waiting, trusting,
filled with fervor--are the qualities of the good percussionist.
The other Lutheran instrument, of course, is the harp. It's a good
instrument
for any Christian because it keeps you humble and keeps you at home. You
can't run around with a harp. Having one is like living with an elderly
parent
in very poor health: it's hard to get them in and out of cars, and it's
hard
to keep them happy. It takes fourteen hours to tune a harp, which remains
in tune for about twenty minutes, or until somebody opens the door. It's
an instrument for a saint. If a harpist could find a good percussionist,
they wouldn't need anybody else. They could settle down and make perfectly
good music, just the two of them.