Christopher Smith wrote:
On Jun 17, 2006, at 11:44 AM, Chuck Israels wrote:
On Jun 16, 2006, at 5:12 PM, Christopher Smith wrote:
I see it quite a bit in the shows I have done or checked out. Kiss of
the Spider Woman, the Producers, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, all use
violin/viola doublers. I think they really try to squeeze as many
different colours out of the few players they have as is humanly
possible, and make a nice taste for the guys who are making doubling
money.
IMO -and experience, this is a compelling reason. Better musicians
can be kept in mind numbing pit jobs if they are being paid for a lot
of doubles.
Good point.
Another thing I see quite a bit - the single passage (or two, or three)
in each musician's book that is an absolute bear to play. This is the
detail that caused my brother to characterise pit gigs as "two hours of
sheer boredom, interspersed with thirty seconds of sheer terror."
I think Bdway orchestrators put these passages in to keep the musicians
practicing. It is an easy way for the musical director to tell if the
player is in shape or not.
The worst of these I saw (in my book) was in Company. There is a solo
trombone obbligato in solotone mute that sits up around C, and hits high
E (a 10th above middle C) with lots of large leaps to start off "Side By
Side By Side". I am both proud and ashamed to say that I nailed it night
after night for about twenty shows - except for one night when I crashed
and burned so spectacularly that the other musicians (professionals,
all) had trouble keeping from dissolving into giggles for the rest of
the tune. Thanks, guys! 8-(
Pit work is always an interesting balance of challenge and boredom, with
a subtle spice of "oh, bugger, here come those dopey chorus girls again
... except for the second one from the left who's kind of cute."
Most shows have long stretches of "I'd be reading the paper now, but the
conductor would get mad", middling stretches of just plain work, and a
few instances of "let's hope I survive this bit tonight", but they
almost always have something associated that's good for stories that
last years.
F'rinsance:
I played in the pit for a production of "Seven brides for seven
brothers" a while back, and while the music is generally not especially
challenging, and the play itself not especially enthralling, there is a
scene near the beginning where one of the characters has to drop a tray
full of dishes. After the first rehearsal with the cast, we in the pit
noticed that the blocking of the scene made it about a 60% chance that
at lest one of the cups would roll off into the pit and onto the drums
(or, just as likely, a cymbal). For opening night we pitched in and got
the drummer a hard hat and catcher's mitt.
cd
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