Saturday, April 24th, 2010 was an absurdly busy and mildly stressful day.  The plan was to sleep in a bit, grab some coffee at Gold Bar, meet Jeremy Bell at school to take the metro into Phoenix for our concert, go to the airport, fly to Los Angeles to attend a performance of Osvaldo Golijov‘s La Pasión según San Marcos, and then drive back to Phoenix.  Simple, right?  That’s what I thought.

Prelude

The day did start out as planned.  I slept into until about 8:30am – downright late compared to my usual 7am wake up time during the week – took a shower, and wandered to Gold Bar for some caffeine.  Upon my return to my place of residence, I received a phone call from Thalia Coombs, the first violinist performing Everchanging Light early that afternoon.  She informed me that their violist had vanished due to a family emergency.  Now, this seems to happen to me more often than anyone would think.  I thanked Thalia for the information and went to work finding a replacement.  There were only three people I could think of who would be able to not only read the part, but perform it mildly accurate on a concert that was to begin in about an hour and a half from that movement.  Luck was with me for once, because the magical and wonderful Kim Teachout, a friend who had played String Quartet No. 2 and Faded White, was not only in town and available to help, but actually agreed to it!  I created a part for her, marked it up with cues, and met her to give her a brief rundown of the work.  I then called Thalia to ask if she could instruct the other two members of the quartet to meet 30 minute earlier for some rehearsal time, and then headed out to the school.

Jeremy and Elizabeth met me outside (Jeremy had been informed of the predicament), and we crowded into my truck to head to the museum, as the lightrail was no longer a viable option.  I then proceeded to miss every single turn I needed in order to get downtown… which was repeatedly pointed out by Jeremy…

Upon arrival, I met with Nancy Buck, the viola professor, and informed her of the situation.  The quartet gathered and began rehearsing, all the while tension built in the air as the time quickly approached the start of the concert.  Kim eventually approached Nancy to request a change in program order, moving my piece from first to last of four.  Yet another reason why Kim is wonderful and magical!  The quartet and I moved into the theatre behind the Grand Hall of the Phoenix Art Museum where they continued to do run-through upon run-through of work.  I was in awe of how quickly Kim was picking it up, and as we approach the new performance time, the tension subsided and the quartet seemed to regain confidence.  The performance came and went with relative ease.  It was rather remarkable how well the piece was performed despite the violist only having been involved with the work for about 2.5 hours.  Those that new the situation, including Jody Rockmaker and Jonathan Swartz, said that Kim is worth her weight in gold.  I agree (thank you so much, Kim, if I have not told you this enough)!

I then headed back home, changed, and was picked up by my travel party to grab lunch and head to the airport.

La La Land

Why was a flying to Los Angeles?  Simple!  Maria Guinand – described as the most important unknown conductor in the world by the Los Angeles Times – and her choir, the Schola Cantorum de Venezuela, were performing Osvaldo Golijov’s La Pasión según San Marcos (if you do not know this piece, please stop reading and go find one of the two recordings of the work – either by Deutsche Grammophon or Hänssler Classic, listen to it, and then come back) at Walt Disney Hall that evening at 8pm.  Maria is one of our editors at earthsongs, so I asked her for some tickets to the concert, which she got for us.  So, Roshanne, Jeremy, Elizabeth and I flew to LA, rented a car, and drove to Disney Hall to see this miraculous piece in action.  The trade off was that I had to transport a stack of books and music for Maria and give them to her after the concert.

Basically from the moment we landed at LAX, everything that happened from then on was either going to make or break whether we could get to the concert on time or not.  We exited the plane, and the three of us met outside the gate…  three?  Where was Jeremy!?!  He had not been able to get a seat next to us on the plane, so he was stuck in the back behind what looked like the oldest man on the planet.  It took him about 6 more minutes to get off the plane than the rest of us.  Meanwhile, Elizabeth headed towards baggage claim to change her clothes.  Roshanne, Jeremy, and I headed to the rental car shuttle area, where I was promptly pounced upon by a guy trying to raise money for workers that had been laid off by the airport during the recession.  In a mildly rude fashion, I kind of just walked away.  We met up with Elizabeth at the shuttle, and were whisked away toward National Rental Car.  50 minutes until curtain.

Here we encountered a huge line of people wanting a car and one single rental clerk to assist them.  I got in line and waited for about 5 minutes when suddenly three more clerks came out of the back.  The line went quickly, and I soon had my little pamphlet and instructions to go grab any mid-sized car in the lot.  What they did not tell me was that the mid-sized cars all basically sucked.  Cobalts, Jeeps, something that looked like a French toaster, and the Hyandai that we eventually agreed on.  We loaded up and Jeremy began to navigate us towards downtown LA.  43 minutes until curtain.

Getting onto the highway was relatively painless, as were the first 10 minutes on the interstate.  Then we hit rush hour.  Of course!  It was 7:15pm, and we ended up in the last 30 minutes of Los Angeles rush hour.  We mozied along at a whopping 10 mph, all the while Roshanne kept saying, “if we have 6 miles to go and we’re traveling at 10 mph, we’ll be there in 36 minutes!”  We approached our exit into downtown LA, and I decided to cut into the lane a little early to ensure I didn’t miss it.  I put on my blinker, was kindly waved into the lane by the drive to my right, and scooted into the exit lane.  Suddenly, I saw a reddish light behind me.  I didn’t think anything of it, until I realized that it almost looked like a police car.  I starred at it for a minute before asking, “am I getting pulled over?”  I changed lanes to the right to test this idea, and the cop quickly followed me.  I was!  I couldn’t believe it!  We had 17 minutes to get to the auditorium before the show started and I was getting pulled over in LA rush hour!  I rolled down my window, greeted the officer with my license and rental car contract, and sat quietly while he ran my information.  Upon his return, he handed me a ticket and proceeded to make it sound like I broke about 500 different laws by changing lanes, none of which he actually identified in any detail.  According to the ticket, I performed an “unsafe movement” and I now need to either appear in court in LA in June, or call the court and request I be sent to online traffic school…  great…  by the time I was done with the officer – or he was done with me – we had 12 minutes to get to Disney Hall.  Here we go!

Inching along, we followed another car that seemed to be heading in the same directions into the parking garage for the concert hall.  Roshanne graciously paid the $9 for parking, and we quickly zipped into the complex and awkwardly parked near a support column in a space that was big enough to hold a small semi truck.  We unloaded, I grabbed my bag, and we proceeded to sprint up the… elevator… to get to will call before they gave away our tickets.  The line was short, and I was able to grab the tickets with relative ease.  The best part was the ticket handler who apologized for “the wait” despite the fact that the 10 seconds I waited for her to get the tickets was the shortest period of time I had waited since the day began.  3 minutes until curtain.

I ran back into the lobby and handed out the tickets and we made our way up to the hall.  At the ticket takers, I was stopped by a guy who politely informed me that I could not take my bag with me into the hall.  I responded by explaining how I was carrying material requested by Maestro Guinand and needed to deliver them to her at the end of the concert.  He did not care and told me I needed to leave it with the coat check man.  The coat check man was nice enough to not require anything but my name and number, and I sprinted back to the hall.  I sat down as they were calling final seating, and 10 minutes later the performance began.

Broken Record

Flawless and enthralling.  That is the only way to describe that performance.  I had seen it in Eugene 6 years earlier at the Oregon Bach Festival, and Maria had given us free tickets then, too, but we were in the second row.  While we were able to see the performers sweat, and Maria rip her dress up the side during a cue, we were not able to see the translation and the performers at the same time.  In Disney Hall, we were sitting in row J, two rows behind the edge of the mezzanine level.  There was no better seat in the house.  The conclusion of the performance was followed by a 20 minute standing ovation unlike anything I had ever experienced.  With that, we stepped out, I instructed my party to remain on the floor while I went to go retrieve my bag and figure out how to find Maria.

The bag was right where I had left it.  The trick, though, was how I would get back up to the floor where I could move back stage.  Because people were intended to leave the hall at this point – not be heading into it – the escalators were all set to go down.  I asked one of the workers there how I would be able to get back up a floor.  He politely suggested that I run up the escalator really fast…  no joke…

So I did… no joke…

I reached the top of the stairs only to be stopped by another worker who politely informed me that I could not go any further with my bag.  I responded again that I’m meeting with Maria and needed the material in the bag for said meeting.  He let me pass.  I proceeded up the ramp and towards the green room where I was told Maria would be, again getting stopped more forcefully by another worker who politely informed me that I could not go any further with my bag.  After explaining the situation yet again, he decided to escort me to the green room entrance where I would be able to gain access to meet Maria.

At the base of the ramp going to the room, I was met by a guy who looked like he should have been bouncing for a bar.  He asked for my name and identification and – despite being on his list of approved visitors – proceeded to interrogate me for about 10 minutes regarding what I was doing there and what business I had with Maria.  After all, I was the only person on the list that was not Venezuelan and over the age of 50.  Once he decided I was no threat, he said I could pass… so long as I left the bag with him.  This was not an option at this point.  I debated with him for another 5 minutes, showing him the contents, asking him what harm would come to anyone if I brought up 10 conducting books, an earthsongs t-shirt, and a stack of music in a black backpack.  Finally, he let me pass.

Once situated in the green room (which was orange, I might add), I called Jeremy and told them where I was.  Because of the struggle I had getting to where I was, I made it clear that they probably would not be able to get in, and that they would just need to wait for me until I was able to give Maria her music.  2 minutes later the three of them walked into the room.  Stunned, I inquired as to how they got passed the bouncer.  Roshanne responded, “we just said we were with the guy with the bag.”