Anywhere but in the pit, where I sat for a number of years. Down there, where many players now wear earplugs to protect their hearing, one is highly focused on production but inattentive to the overall sound, which one cannot really hear, anyway.
There's an apocryphal story really understood only by pit musicians about two bassoonists who played side by side for two decades. Unexpectedly, one took a week's vacation right in the middle of the season. The first night he was away, his colleague looked up out of the pit and there sat his friend in the 10th row. Amazingly, he was there every night for a week.
When he returned, his buddy said, "I can't believe it. For twenty years you never take a vacation, then you take a week off and spend it sitting in the 10th row."
"Yeah," exulted his pal, "and you wouldn't believe what I heard. You know that part where we go BOOMP-boomp-BOOMP-boomp-BOOMP-boomp-BOOMP?"
"Sure. I know that part. What about it."
"Well, man, while we're doing that the orchestra is going (bursts into the Toreador Song)."
You may respond to this with a blank look but tell it to anyone who has played the same score every night for three months and they'll fall out of the chair.
Anyone else here done any pit playing???
There's an apocryphal story really understood only by pit musicians about two bassoonists who played side by side for two decades. Unexpectedly, one took a week's vacation right in the middle of the season. The first night he was away, his colleague looked up out of the pit and there sat his friend in the 10th row. Amazingly, he was there every night for a week.
When he returned, his buddy said, "I can't believe it. For twenty years you never take a vacation, then you take a week off and spend it sitting in the 10th row."
"Yeah," exulted his pal, "and you wouldn't believe what I heard. You know that part where we go BOOMP-boomp-BOOMP-boomp-BOOMP-boomp-BOOMP?"
"Sure. I know that part. What about it."
"Well, man, while we're doing that the orchestra is going (bursts into the Toreador Song)."
You may respond to this with a blank look but tell it to anyone who has played the same score every night for three months and they'll fall out of the chair.
Anyone else here done any pit playing???