A Lesson in Concert Etiquette

A revelation came to me the other night while I attended the CSU Symphony Orchestra concert. Audiences do not know proper concert etiquette. I was appalled at some of the things which occurred during the concert itself. As a result, I feel the need to give a small lesson in proper concert etiquette. Here are a few of the rules every person should follow while attending any sort of formal concert, whether it be a wind band, orchestra, choral, or theater event.

1) Turn off or completely silence your cell phones, pagers, and beepers. Having them go off during the concert is not only distracting to other audience members, but also extremely distracting to the performers.
2) Do not snack during the performance. If you must for some reason do not eat something which is crunchy or will make a lot of noise. Again this is extremely distracting to performers and audience members.
3) Bring cough drops. If you have a scratchy throat or a slight cough suck on a cough drop.
4)Do not talk during the concert. Even if it is as a whisper, talking creates a buzz through the audience, which becomes distracting to everyone around you.

These are only a few of the rules of etiquette which must be followed during a concert. For a more in depth listing please visit: http://www.menc.org/guides/etiquette/etiquette_home.html
And remember you are there to enjoy the music and the performance, as is everyone else so please do not be a distraction.

How is the Magic Restored?

As an instrumentalist there came a point in my musical career where the magic and enjoyment towards playing was lost. Gone. It had played a very nice, and amazingly real disappearing act. One day I loved playing, and the next that love was gone. Where it had gone, I had no idea, all I knew was I would do anything and everything I could to avoid practicing and spend as little time playing as possible. As musicians, I believe there comes a point in your career where things just don't mesh for one reason or another. Sometimes it is due to a teacher sucking the fun and desire to play out of you, other times it is because things have seemlingly become stagnant for no appearant reason, and in certain cases it is because something is no longer challenging- though this case is the most rare out of the three because there is always something that can be learned and improved upon. Some musicians never get past the stage of lost desire and quit playing altogether, and others get past it and move into the stage of regaining the magic and desire that was lost. The questions that arises is: how is the magic, the desire to be a musician restored once lost?
There is no straight answer for this. There is no instant solution. Each individual has to find their own solution. For me it was a combination of several different things. One of the biggest factors in regaining my desire had to do with my peers. I realized I had placed myself in a group of peers to whom it didn't matter if I was talented or I sounded good or if I played at all and that was not something I wanted to continue. The first step I took to fix this was to place myself in a different group of peers. Once I had done that my outlook on playing my instrument was completely changed. I wanted to play, not because everyone around me wanted to play, but because of the encouragment I got from them. The second factor in restoring my desire to play was a change of instructors. I was gaining nothing from the instructor I had been studying under and because of that I didn't want to play or practice. Once I changed instructors it was like a whole new world was opened up to me. I suddenly enjoyed practicing and wanted to practice as much as possible. The desire, the enjoyment, the love was suddenly back. What had been lost was now returned to me. It was amazing! The individual solution to regain the desire to play has to be searched for individually and for each individual it will be different, but once it is found it comes with this amazing feeling. Find the desire once more and feel fulfilled.

Movie Magic

All movies are a mixture of many components, though one of the most important in my mind is the music, words, and sound effects which are used. Sure acting and setting plays a huge part in making the film entertaining, but those 2 components alone are not near enough to create any emmy award winning film. Throughout history movies and films have never been solely images- images without sound, but they have been paired up with music and words of some sort. We see this to be true throughout history.
For example- the silent films of the early 1900's and 1920's were never truely silent. In all of the theaters where these films were playing there was a piano or a piano player. The presence of either of these allowed sound to be added to the films in which audio and video could not yet be combined on a single reel. The simple addition of some piano music, which in most cases was all improvised, made the films interesting and kept the viewers interested in the film.
In modern days audio is always paired with video. And in most cases it is the audio which creates an interesting film. Without sound all that is left on the screen is a series of pictures; pictures which may or may not make sequential sense to the viewer. This theory has been tested in many classrooms, and it can be tested in the home too. In order to test it pick a film and turn it on. Start with the sound on, about 5-10 minutes into the film mute the television. Make note of the amount of interest you now find in the film. In most cases it will have decreased. Without audio, films are nothing- they simply become moving pictures.
The magic of the movies is not found only in the visual aspects of the film, but is found in part in the audio portions. Music, dialogue, and sound effects create the magic that keeps viewers interested in the films.