Oh. The BEST brass band in the world

Keith asked if I thought he should upgrade his jeans and t-shirt before rehearsal and I said I thought so. You only get one chance to make a first impression and why not just go up a notch. When I was packing, I specially asked him he wanted to wear his typical Disney aloha-style shirts for warm weather and he agreed that wasn’t really a Europe thing and opted for calmer shirts. Plus two Disney ones. He didn’t hesitate a second before choosing his Ratatouille shirt for band rehearsal one. “They might as well meet the real me.” I rather thought I should tell Alexander to get a box and send us shirts. We had dinner with Philip, the conductor, before the rehearsal. We met at The Lion and settled in on their covid-inspired outdoor patio. There was a great heater that kept us warm without coats on (it is in the mid 40s here and feels delightful). Keith was closest to the button and every ten minutes or so he needed to push the heater back on. We were chatting and swapping stories with Philip for a while after ordering when a waiter came out and asked if we had ordered. Um…yes. He said the computers had gone down and that our order would just now be processed. We were concerned about the time and asked him what was the fastest thing they could put together. He hesitated and I said go ask the kitchen what they can do. He came back with choices and we ordered two chicken burgers (I was very curious if that would be a ground chicken burger vs a chicken sandwich) (it was a chicken sandwich) and chicken strips (with sesame ginger sauce and they were terrific!) I thought that was super simple to remember, but he was using the end of an “ice cream paddle” (plastic spoon in American) to scratch our order on the back of a receipt. I don’t think we were “late”, but many people were there before us when we arrived at the rehearsal hall.

The rehearsal hall is relatively new to the band. It was a church and they have remodeled the sanctuary into rehearsal space. I sat in the balcony, between two older gentlemen, K and M. I asked how they were related to the band and K said they were patrons. They come to every rehearsal. M said his son is in the band. Or was in the band. His accent was beautiful, but left me lacking in understanding. I always feel bad asking someone to repeat and repeat, and I am afraid I didn’t get some of what he said. He offered me a black licorice hard candy, which I accepted happily because I love black licorice. Midway through the evening another man joined us and offered Werther’s all around. My friend, Maren, accuses me of loving old man candy, and it is entirely true. I was joyful when I realized I was eating old man candy with old men. (I use that term old only for literary reasons. I realize they are probably my age. I forget how old I am.) M mentioned Keith won for brightest shirt. Keith told me later that someone told him he won for longest commute. It was a winning evening.

Finally, the moment we had to come for arrived. Rehearsal with Cory Band. The first song was the march, The Red Shield. Downbeat and they took off. Keith has been so excited to play with a group where everyone brings their A game. He was not disappointed. I read that Cory is considered the best brass band in the world when this whole thing started. I used that phrase when I told people about what we were doing and where we were going. I did not really appreciate that phrase until I sat above them, listening to them create music. Wow. They’re good. A few tunes in, K leaned over and told me that the next piece would let the Eb shine. Keith’s solo bits were not great. I was suddenly quite nauseated. Not I-have-to-leave-now sick, but very worried. K told me he was fine, just needed to find his feet. He seemed to get more relaxed as rehearsal went on and I relaxed some. Philip mentioned there would be a dep (sub) on repiano and not to expect much conversation from the young man. I watched he and Keith chat and laugh throughout any breaks. Keith was definitely having more fun than I was. Which is great. I will now entice Keith with British candy to give us his take on the rehearsal. I know any bandsmen who are reading want to hear from him.

OK, this is Keith. And yes, I was offered (and am eating) British candy. It is delicious.

The downbeat of The Red Shield was a bit alarming. I learned within a couple beats that this is without any doubt the loudest band I have ever played in. This is what happens when you get together 30 people that all know how to fully support their sound and play with confidence. But, boy is it taxing. I usually last a very long time without any real endurance concerns, but that was one tiring rehearsal. I wasn’t terribly nervous for the most part, but I could tell it was there because I was making too many little mistakes and wasn’t really playing like myself. I think I spent more time analyzing what I was hearing around me than focusing attention on my own playing.

One thing I learned throughout the rehearsal was that the band played sharp to standard pitch, but they all did so together. And the pitch rose further as the rehearsal went on. And they all rose together. It honestly was rather magical, but also a bit of a learning experience, and I was slower to adjust than I should’ve been because I found it so unexpected. The further on the rehearsal went, the better I was getting at matching the pitch. In doing so, my endurance was returning as well as it takes much less energy to be in tune than to lip everything in tune. The first half the rehearsal was much more tiring than the second half.

Another thing that I was a little slow on the uptake for was noticing how short the short notes are in this band. I was basically raised in the style of an orchestral musician, where even the short notes have a bit of a ring to them. It was pretty late in the rehearsal that I was finally realizing that I needed to play many notes notably shorter and that I was the odd one out.

There is one piece of music in the rehearsal, Un Vie de Matelot (about 20 minutes into the rehearsal), which has a couple soprano cornet solos. Yup, that’s me. Now, I can’t say for sure that for the two times that we ran the solo bits it was the worst I ever played them, but it was awfully close. That was the first time in the rehearsal that I was actually dealing with nerves. Now that this first rehearsal is over, I expect that I should be able to open up more and just enjoy the piece and play it the way I know that I can. I wasn’t exactly embarrassed, but I wasn’t pleased either. It will go much better next time as the first-time jitters will be replaced with more of a focus on the music than the moment.

The band plays really fine music. Some of that really fine music is created by their conductor and music director (Philip Harper). The best way to make a great band sound absolutely stunning is to play music written for the players in the chairs. And it really shows here. Philip is an outstanding composer and arranger, and he clearly knows how to take advantage of the specific bodies. I have followed him for several years and am continually impressed with his body of work. The first concert that I will be involved in is this coming Sunday evening and the majority of the second half of the program is a suite based on the book Treasure Island in which Philip wrote all of the arrangements and a couple of the pieces are original compositions. It’s a beautifully done suite and I’m especially pleased to have the opportunity to play it myself. Three of the pieces from this suite ended the rehearsal and were the pieces that I enjoyed playing the most.

After the rehearsal I spoke with Philip. He pointed out that I was struggling a few times tuning with the front row cornets. Yup, I knew that. And he pointed out that I needed to play short notes shorter. Yup, I knew that too. And he mentioned the solo bits in Un Vie de Matelot, again saying what I already knew. I’m glad it stopped there, because everything he mentioned was something I already knew and there wasn’t some other disaster that somehow I hadn’t noticed. Phew!

So, my introduction to playing in Cory Band certainly had its ups and downs. But, in the end I wanted to come back for more, not just to correct my own wrongs, but to enjoy again being in a situation that is almost totally foreign to me where absolutely everyone on stage really wanted to be there and it showed in their playing. So, I’ll call that a win. And a big checkmark on my bucket list.