Happy Daylight Savings!

I survived last night�s concert, although I wished at one point that someone would just drop me over the balcony railing to the sanctuary floor three stories below. The rehearsal in the afternoon was long, much too long for a dress rehearsal the day of a concert, because we actually fixed things, and I ended up exhausted and sung out by the end of it. I was also suffering from menstrual cramps, so I took a couple of advil with my tea after supper. Big mistake. I would have been better off being in pain. At least then I would have been more alert.

We ended up with seven for supper: the Serbian violist and two of Little Princess� friends joined us. We decided to take two cars, so Hubby left before me in the Subaru with the violist and one of the friends. Buddy Boy declined the concert, since he was feeling rather ill after his all-nighter the night before. So at 7:25 I tried to start the Volvo, which died after idling for 30 seconds and wouldn�t start again. At this point I called a taxi, which got us to the cathedral 10 minutes before show time. I�m sure the advil was keeping me from panicking at that point.

Anyway, I sang beautifully, or so I�m told. During the second movement of Hubby�s piece, where I have a really big solo with the choir, I totally got messed up on a long held note over the strings playing 16ths. I recovered after three measures of flubbing around, and I thought it was because I was not quite all that alert. The violist told me afterwards, when I showed her the spot in the score, that the conductor had pushed the tempo there, and even she had a hard time following her. The difference was that they were playing a moving line, while I was just wailing away on a long note, so I totally lost the beat. The next big mistake I made was during the other composer�s piece where I got lost trying to figure out where the choir was, and totally missed an entry. It wasn�t important in the big scheme of the universe, but I felt pretty stupid, even though no one else seemed to notice, except for the conductor and the composer. Argh!

For the audience (Hubby sat in the sanctuary for the first half since he only played in the second), the sound was different than for the performers. They were treated to the reverberation of the cathedral walls and vaulted ceiling, so the mistakes that I thought were so horrendous up top were actually hardly noticeable below. Which is a good thing.

There was a reception at the house of the conductor and composer (for yes, they are a couple) whereat I had one beer, which made me the designated driver. Little Princess came with her friends, who helped load music stands in the back of the Subaru (the violist had headed back to Montreal, so we had enough room for all of us this time). I just wanted to go home to bed, but waited patiently for Hubby to finish schmoozing. The choir members sat around the diningroom table and sang their little hearts out. I remember those days.

Now I sit in my bathrobe, not looking forward to the rest of the day, which consists of teaching a lesson to the fellow whose lesson I missed last Monday, and going to my recital student�s concert tonight. I just want to go back to bed and sleep for another week. Sigh.

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