PEI Symphony Orchestra
14 Dec 1997
My first concert with the PEI Symphony Orchestra I was allowed ( not asked ) to play one piece!
It was Brian Ellard's final concert and I played in Dvorak's New World Symphony! I practiced for months learning all the parts! I even showed my teacher Bill Bartlett something new....there was one big bass feature in one of the movements in the key of Db...terrible key for bass....no open strings..ugh....so I practiced this thing and there was a suggested fingering for it but I didn't like it....and for the first time I really thought for myself as a bassist...I discected those 8 parts of Db hell until I found something that worked...finding the right fingering on bass is like doing one of those word jumbles....where you've got 8 letters that are mixed up and you have to move them around until you find the word they're supposed to spell...you get closer and closer and you think you have it but you've got letters left over....etc...
...so I finally figured out a "formula" that worked for this fingering and in my next lesson we got to working on that part and Bill showed it to me his way and I said.... "What about doing it this way!?!" He watched me play it...and in one of his very rare moments...he commended me for my work and then said he'll tell the other bassists about this new fingering!
I felt like I conquered the world! and I also learned something very valuable for my future career as a private instructor.... Teachers Don't Know Everything!!! and they can learn a lot from their students, as I have done many times in the last number of years teaching.
