Last night Jamie played a concert with Nova Sinfonia. The program listed a Beethoven overture and Hayden's Lord Nelson Mass (not the official name, but it has become known by this name). I'm about to show my stupidity in all things orchestral, but I didn't know that it was common for composers to compose their own mass. Essentially the composer would take the parts of the Latin Catholic mass and put it to music with choirs, soloists, etc. The piece had all of the parts of the mass...the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, etc...I'm leaving a few out, but you get the idea.
I'm sitting there thinking this is the most entertaining mass I've ever sat through. Going to Catholic shool for 13 years and having mass every Friday for 9 years of school then having mass once a month for 4 years of high school, I've been to my fair share of masses. I got to sit there and watch Jamie do something he loves - playing trumpet with a great orchestra. He is sooooo good at it too. I can't imagine having so much natural talent that it makes rehearsal and everyday practice enjoyable. I can't relate. If I'm not good at something, I usually don't have the patience to practice at something so that I achieve some level of mastery. When I started tae kwon do, I can honestly say that I think I had a natural ability at it. When I played basketball and volleyball, I think I was pretty good at it. Was I going to be the star of the team? No, but I was good enough so that practice was fun - unless running suicides were involved.
The choir last night was fantastic. The soloists were great individually, but at times when singing together, it sounded like a train wreck where cars are running off the rails in all different directions. I'm sure the conductor was doing a fantastic job and keeping all of these different parts together as a whole, but to this layperson's ear, it was about as good sounding as a baby cutting teeth while sitting in a poopy diaper.
Back to Jamie, the Mass had a lot of trumpet parts with fanfares and all. He did an excellent job. I tried taking a movie of a portion of the performance to post, but I'm not that happy the recording. Me and every old lady within a 15 mile radius of the Church thoroughly enjoyed it. You'll have to trust me - it was the best mass ever.
2 comments:
Well, I've been told that Jamie's trumpet playing at my wedding made my entrace "magical". I'll be honest, I didn't really hear any of the music. But I received nothing but compliments on how wonderful it was.
People should read this.
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