As I have mentioned to several of you, I am in the process of editing several of my posts for inclusion in an e-book about my life. I have NEVER edited anything. I just sort of "pants" it and go. I did a bit of work on this, expanded it and tried to clean it up for language. I'm including the link to the original post, at the bottom. Anyone who cares to or who has the time to, is welcome to compare the two and make suggestions. I know you'll be kind, as you always have been to me. Thanks!
I
wonder if these are free-range violas, because, if not, the price has really
skyrocketed!
Q:
Have you heard about the latest form of urban violence?
A:
Drive-by viola solos.
So, here's a little number I cobbled up during the American Football season almost three years ago as we headed into our playoff season. Enjoy!
First
off, goals, schmoals – I should explain that this was written as
part of “where am I now” in the writing process of the #ROW80
group that I belong to. We try to set measurable goals for our writing, none of which has ever occurred for me. I am a slacker. Anyway, I got a
wild hair and was completely taken with this topic after what I
witnessed during a Falcons-I Forget (*scrolls down* – SAN FRANCISCO
49'ers!) playoff game in January of 2013. My latent low inhibition
just took over. Oh well, look at the happy part of this; I'm off the
streets and fending off muggers, and I'm not mugging anybody. Just
kidding.
This
is not your typical Sunday check in post. Nope, first off, it's
Monday and second off, here in the good ol’ U S of A, it is Martin
Luther King Jr.'s Birthday and President
Obama's 2nd Inaugural Celebration! So, what better way for me to
celebrate, than to write about 2013's NFC
Championship game between the Atlanta Falcons and the San Francisco
49ers that featured
guys
running over guys and plowing into unaware guys on the side-lines.
That’s right, “UNAWARE” guys on the side lines, during one of
two games that will decide which of two teams are going to the Hyper
Bowl, er, uh I mean, Super Bowl LXVII (is that 47 or 67? I failed
Roman Numerals in Ancient Times class, or I skipped that day.)
Sing
Along: "I see I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, XII,
XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII, XVII Wheels On The Big Rig" or however
the stupid song goes. Whip that out at parties, and you'll be asked
to leave.
Anyway,
dude got clipped below the knees and fell as if pole-axed, backward
onto that hard surface and landed backwards, head-first, with a
bounce or two and was thankfully unhurt. Apparently, he works at the
Atlanta Falcons field and this was their first ever(!) playoff event,
and really, he can’t be faulted for that part of it. The poor guy
had his back turned to the action and was most likely, looking at and
marveling at the crowd and all of their noise, hoo ha, folderol and
mostly, NOISE. And boy, howdy, there was a bunch of it, being as how,
my Google says, the Georgia Dome can shovel 71,250 people into
permanent seats.
The
first time I ever faced a crowd like that was when I played for The
Moody Blues. I was in my mid-30s and had been playing viola
professionally for about 20 years, by this time. My performing
experience went from symphony-polite-coughing and maybe a standing
ovation, or two. Occasionally, the standing ovations were prolonged.
Stunning,
wonderous. I love Mozzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..... *snore*
Once,
during a Grand Pause,
or a fermata, where the orchestra came to a screeching halt after a
fortississimo passage and it was deathly quiet, I had the great good
fortune to hear a bellowed “I FRY MINE IN LARD…” from the back
of the audience and then, stunning quiet. Nary a peep, cough, fart or
rustle.
The
fermata, unfortunately, is one of those musical devices that has no
metered time, so as the Conductor stared us all down, daring us to
laugh, and we all played “one potato, two potato, three potato,
four…” Concert master and Principal Second Violin and Principal
Viola and Principal Cello all sitting there, giving one another the
evil eye, the hairy eyeball, the stink-eye and it's all becoming
rather “High Noon-ish,” I and my stand partner who are on the
2nd stand, are not daring to look at one another, because
we are truly deranged idiots, pinheads, morons and jokers. We are
holding our breaths, and are puffing up like horses around rattle
snakes, or, horses being saddled, because HolyMotherOfGod,
I’mSoGonnaLaugh… I see his viola scroll start to shake out of the
corner of my eye and just then? As I start to go eeeeeeeeeee? As the
air is leaking out? And I think I hear a similar eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
coming from somewhere around the oboe section and I'm thinking “If
there is a God, may He smite us all now so that we may know His
mercy and NOT suffer the Wrath of the Conductor”, who is beginning
to sweat blood from his eyeballs, it would appear. . .
But,allofasudden,
the Conductor gives the downbeat and off we go. To this day, I do not
remember what on God’s Green Earth we were playing, probably
Rachmaninoff. I’ve been ambushed by him a number of times. Him and
his G. P.s. Well, that was a digression.
This
all changed when we started playing in open-air theaters and
stadiums.
Okay,
I haven't faced Wembley and I'm sure I don't want to; actually, I
probably do. We rocked it at 1-800-ASK-GARY Field. A name like that
for a Venue just drips class. I can't wait until Kotex, or Fleet
Enema buys a sponsorship and demands to have it named after their
company.
In
the summer of 1992, The Moody Blues were in a resurgence and instead
of having a summer off, we had a tour around the Midwest for a few
weeks. We had an afternoon rehearsal with their conductor who told us
the basics, miced us up and off we went. We had a full orchestra,
and plexiglass partitions between each section. I felt like we were
in cattle pens. That night, the orchestra was in place, when the
Blues with Justin Hayward took the stage.
There
were 10,000 people in the audience. Up to that point, I had never
played with that many people in an audience. When that audience
roared and that sound hit the stage, the orchestra, who for the most
part had not experienced that before, was pretty well aware that this
night and this concert were going to be different. But first, we had
to get over the shock of all of those people yelling. If we had been
zebras, and the yelling people lions, we would have been dead ones. We all just froze for about 2
beats and then our training kicked in and off we went.
It
was an exhilarating experience; I’ve always loved the Moody Blues
more orchestral stuff, but the conductor, Larry Greene is also their
arranger, and he had gone back and arranged some of their harder rock
stuff like “Ride My Seesaw” for strings and that’s even more more fun to play. I’ve found that I like music with a harder edge to
it. I’m sure it’s one of the reasons I don’t like Mozart and I
revere Beethoven.
Mozart
gets right up to an idea and then backs away. Beethoven takes it in
his teeth and just ragdolls it. I love that. I also love the fact
that he doesn’t bore the violists to death in his orchestral and
other ensemble writing. Mozart is pwecious, hard to play and there’s
damn little reward for all of that work; he’s insipid. Oops, lemme
get back to our sideline guy.
I’ve
enjoyed my rock ‘n’ roll violist career, which has also veered
off into blues, metal and a bit of rap, believe it or not. But, back
to our poor dude. Man, did I feel for him. Guy stood up; I was so
relieved, because he fell so hard. As he was turning around, the Fox Team,
(Terry, Howie, Michael, Jimmy and Whoever) were helpfully pointing
out that this was the Falcon’s first playoff Event ever. The guy
who had been knocked over was wearing a jacket that said “Event
Team” on it.
I hunted and hunted for the actual footage, but alas, it was not to be found. This is pre-game footage in the stadium prior to the NFC Championship game between the Atlanta Falcons and the S. F. Forty-Niners in 2013, which S. F. won by 28-24. The noise must have been incredible and it is understandable that Guy Who Was Knocked Down was a bit overwhelmed at first.
As
the man turned and looked at the camera you could see the horror slowly growing on his face. You could tell what he was
thinking: “That shit right there was just on tee vee. Oh... Dear... God... can I move to Saturn? Maybe to
Pluto. Pluto isn’t far enough away… My wife is going to divorce
me. No, that's not punishment enough. She's going to kill me and set
my ass on fire, and then EAT it! What was I thinking, looking at that stupid bunch of
loud-ass people? My ass is on the line, here. My ass... is my ass too
wide? Do these pants fit okay? My kids, my grandkids, my great
grandkids are going to be talking about this and wanting to hear this
story, forever! This is going to be on AFV, isn’t it?
"No, this is
too stupid for that. It's gonna be on World's Dumbest Workers #9 ! Heavens to Murgatroyd and Zeus! on National TV, no, INTERNATIONAL, TV! Gah! Did my Aunt in
Outer Slobovia see me? I hope I don’t get fired. Damn, does my head
hurt. Can I go home? Do I have a home? My wife has probably packed up
and moved by now. Mebbe my wife'll let me sleep in the garage or the
dog house. Mebbe in the trunk of the car. Mebbe I should just go to a hotel. . . Mebbe I can become a hobo. They still have those, don't they?”
Relax,
guy, if I hear you got in trouble over this, I’m writing a letter.
I’ve done so much stupid stuff in front of the public, it’s not
funny. I’ve fallen off stages, fallen out of chairs. Fallen off
risers. I very gracefully draped myself across 3 people once, along
with my viola and bow, held up over my head and rolled like a barrel
down to the floor, protecting my baby, my viola, Wolf. How I managed
that, I will never know. I’ve taken bows wearing Taco Bell on
formal, black velvet unknowingly, after playing a triumphant
Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. To make matters worse, my stand
partner’s fly was open during the whole performance which he proceeded to holler out to me, as we took our bows, during a standing ovation, as if I needed that information to make my post-performance glow complete. I don’t
think Beethoven would have minded.
The
point is, a roaring crowd is pretty impressive; I was awed by it when
I was on the “receiving” end of it the first time. It does take
some getting used to. So, Guy Who Was Knocked Down and Was
Embarrassed, don’t be. I hope you get a chance to get used to
playoff events as more come your way. I hope you are okay. You
totally made my day! Almost three years later, you are still a fond
memory.
2 comments:
I loved this . . . maybe because you are so right about the difference between Mozart and Beethoven. My daughter plays violin and married a violist. I still remember the day she came home from school to complain, "Mom, the kids nicknamed me Mozart. They don't know anything. They should have nicknamed me Beethoven." She was 7. Keep pantsing. Keep writing.
@Beth!
There are only 2 pieces by Mozart I like; his opera "Don Giovanni" and his "Mass in C minor". They are towering works and as he was months away from death, it's almost like he said, "oh, I guess I should write SOMETHING consequential". All else is bubble gum for the ears. I've always been harsh about Mozart, but the resentment stems from the fact we were expected to play this restricted, precise and dry music (to my mind). Bravo to your daughter for marrying outside her instrument! I married another violist. That's a hilarious story for another day! Thanks for stopping by!
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