Dear Blog-o-sphere:

Well, once again over a month has passed since my last blog and once again the good folks here at myauditions.com are gently reminding me that it’s past time to post again. So here I go, again.

It’s not that there’s been nothing to blog about, on the contrary, there’s been so much that I’m at a loss as to where to begin.

Part of my problem was taking a trip to the mainland for the ten days just prior to the start of the new symphony season. Once I got back I hit the ground running and have not really caught up yet.

Another part of the problem was the storms; not only Katrina and Rita, which seemed to put any commentary I might have about ANYTHING into such a feeble perspective that it didn’t seem to be worth the trouble to write; but also Jova, Kenneth and Norma. “What storms are those?” one might ask, unless one lived in Hawaii this September and was watching nervously as a collection of five storms grew in a row, tic-tac-toe, all pointed right at us! Luckily, so far all have missed us, although Kenneth actually did go over the state in a greatly reduced state as a tropical depression this past weekend. Even as just a depression, old Kenneth gave us some 50 mph winds, rainfall totals of over 6 inches in some places, and even hail and a tornado! Not the usual idyllic tropical-paradise-weather the Chamber of Commerce wants us to promote, but hey, in the blog-o-sphere, we tell it like it is!! What with watching all the death and destruction in the Gulf, you can be sure that I was busy getting in all the stuff in the back yard that might turn into a projectile put safely away. One of these days I’ll precut window coverings, too, and get them set aside for quick use when the ‘Big One’ arrives. It’s just a matter of time. I’ve been a resident of this state for two ‘Big Ones’ already (Iwa in ‘86 and Iniki in’ 91), luckily for us, both of them wobbled at the last minute and hit Kauai, one island to the west, instead. Not so lucky for Kauai, which was totaled. They are still recovering.

But I digress.

Our season opened dramatically enough with a musician from the Louisiana Philharmonic (Robyn Jones) subbing as second clarinet. The HSO musicians held a fund-raising drive in the lobby during intermissions and raised a few thousand for the LPO musicians. All of our best wishes go to the LPO musicians and we hope that orchestral music is an integral part of New New Orleans.

(New Orleans2 ?)

Having touched on that, let me go back to the blog item that I had planned to post upon my return from my August trip to the mainland, pre-Katrina. This item is still timely, as the Pittsburgh Ballet musicians are still locked out of their jobs. Anyone who tells you that this is not an unfair labor practice does not know labor law. You can’t fold an orchestra in the middle of negotiations without getting the Feds involved; I predict a Federal case coming up should this situation not be resolved. (Of course, these days, the threat of the Feds making an intervention may or may not be much of a threat; but again, I digress.)

Just before I left on my trip, the HSO musicians were in the pit for a run of ‘Coppelia’ with the Hawaii State Ballet. Rehearsals were going fine, if a bit slapdash, as only two rehearsals had been scheduled, until the last 15 minutes. Long story short, due to the need to clarify tempos with the principal dancers, we went overtime; however, the stage manager pitched a fit and was in denial that we had gone a minute into overtime and threw away the remaining 9 paid minutes of overtime that they had incurred and started running the tape for the last number of the piece.

Ka-boom! What a change! Going directly from dancing with live music to canned taped music was an amazing shock. What I especially noticed was how immediately different the dancers were. No longer was there any give and take with the tempo. (Note that we had been adjusting for the correct tempi to suit the dancers just before the intrusion of the tape.) The body language of the dancers was no longer confident and soloistic, they were instantly turned into zombie-robot dancers that were dancing to the same old tape that they had rehearsed to for God only knows how many months previously.

It’s a pity that there was not a member of the Pittsburgh Ballet board or management present for this demonstration of the difference between live music ballet and canned music ballet. No comparison. One is alive, the other is half-dead. Talk about dissing the dancers! What can the Pittsburgh Ballet management be thinking? A living example of cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Now THAT’S karaoke! Maybe we could call it ballet-oke?