An Early Christmas Miracle

So... my mood has been swinging back and forth this Thanksgiving weekend. One minute I'm full of hope, and the next I feel my stomach turn as I imagine the inevitable evolution of my job description to read "Does whatever the athletic parents want, by order of her Imperial Majesty, Principal Palpatine"

Anyway, I had to put that aside for a few hours as I was helping execute the fall concert for the youth orchestra I work for on the weekends. Now, understand that I had another whole level of stress over the concert. I'm one of five conductors working with three different performing groups... and going into it I was really worried that my part of the program was going to be the weakest. I was conducting two difficult pieces, and I didn't feel that I had enough podium time on either of them. They were both danger of falling apart. At the last rehearsal (yesterday) they couldn't make them through either one without stopping. I just had to let it go. It was going to be what it was going to be.

So tonight, when I got to the concert hall, I looked at Robert (program director) and said "I don't know about tonight... especially the Brahms. I think it has a 75% chance of falling apart." Robert looked at me and said "It's your call." Jacob, one of the other conductors looked at me and said "Well, we could announce that we're holding off for a later concert." I shook my head, "No... the kids don't like it all that much. If we held on to it for another three months it'll be like punishment. We do it tonight or not at all." Jacob looked at me and smiled "Well, you know what Bernstein said.... 'You never know what might happen'...." I laughed and said, "Okay... let's rock n' roll then."

And wouldn't you know it... the one and only time that group held the Brahms together was on the concert.

I'm really glad I didn't pull it. I'm really glad I put my faith in them. I'm really glad I didn't "apologize" to the audience ahead of time. Yeah, I couldn't have been more proud.