The situation

I was summoned once again at the last minute by The Dallas Opera. I got a text on Friday afternoon asking to play for a Saturday night show of Hansel and Gretel.

I didn’t know why I was called, but I got the scoop once I got there. The wind section does Covid tests a couple times a week, and the regular piccolo player had a positive result on Friday.

I had subbed on the piccolo part for one rehearsal two weeks ago (no singers were present), and boy, did I ever thank myself for being over prepared at that rehearsal!!

Preparation

As far as the opera itself, I had already been through it 6 complete times- listening, studying the full score and my part, and playing once at the rehearsal.

I thanked myself once again for recently spending time developing my piccolo sound and technique. That’s the kind of thing that you can’t possibly cram. It’s got to be there, ready to go… especially at the last minute!

In the ~24 hours I had to prepare for the show, I went through the opera three more times. Fortunately, I realized pretty quickly that I had retained most all of the information from my preparation a few weeks ago.

Here’s what I did:

1. Friday night: Full run-through with the recording and playing my part
2. Saturday morning: Score study. Listened to the opera while studying my part, skipped over long tacet sections (and managed complete this before the kids woke up, yay!)
3. Saturday mid-morning: Piccolo warm up, practicing my part
4. Saturday afternoon: Final score study, focusing on the trickier entrances and skipping everything else

The performance

It went well! Definitely as smoothly as once could ever hope in this situation. I knew the part well enough that I could focus on adjusting to the group- intonation, phrasing, and style.

I missed a couple of small entrances, but I knew where my exposed moments were, and made sure to be there. I was even able to give the conductor my eyes at those moments. If I’m not familiar enough with the part, I can’t do this for fear of messing up the notes.

I was hoping to reassure him that I would be there at the right place at the right time, because there were several other personnel changes at the show as well. The piccolo has a couple of exposed entrances in the prelude, and since I nailed those, I think he was able to trust me.

After the performance, I got several compliments from the woodwind section, which felt really good. I knew I had done a pretty good job, and it was a great feeling to be acknowledged by other fantastic musicians for it. This is especially true because in the context of auditions, you rarely get feedback on your playing, and if you do, it’s on paper and mostly negative.

Thoughts

What an adrenaline rush!

More than music

My husband, who I was planning on attending the show with, observed on the way home that I deal well with pressure.

I think that is one my strengths as a performer- I can take a lot of pressure and still hold myself together. When I got the call, I focused very quickly and efficiently on preparing myself.

The whole experience felt pretty surreal. I mean, it still does. I sort of can’t believe I just did that, and that they trusted me enough to be professional in this situation. What a crazy set of skills we need to navigate this career!

It’s totally not all about the musical skill- there’s so much self-management of emotions, time, and life in general in order for us to perform successfully and consistently.

Intellectual assets

The other thing I realized back when I prepared the rehearsal is what an asset knowledge is. I understood that if I studied the heck out of that score, it would be valuable to me (though I didn’t realize it would be so soon!). There are many great players around, but to successfully perform, you have to know how the music goes.

If you don’t know how the music goes, it doesn’t matter how awesome of a player you are. You’ll get lost.

Knowing a piece of music gives you an intellectual asset. This is another thing that can’t really be crammed. Deep understanding of a piece and all its details takes a lot of time, because there is so much information.

The same thing is true with conductors- they are being paid for their knowledge of the score, the music, the history, the style, and skills with getting the orchestra to produce that. At the end of the day, the movements they make are not vastly different. The inside of their heads is what makes the difference.

You can bet I’ve already started studying the operas they are performing in the spring. I don’t know if I will be called again, but I’ll be ready if they do. And if nothing else, I’ll have fun learning these operas, and grow my knowledge of the rep.