Life's Most Embarrassing Moments--in Blue

One of the interesting things about embarrassment is that its pain can be referred to others.  When a couple breaks into a fight at a party, or a woman walks through a restaurant with her skirt caught in her underpants, my cheeks blush, too.  How often I have thought:  “There by the grace of God, go I.”

Throughout my career as a pianist I have had a handful of memory lapses in performance.  There is nothing like the feeling of being completely lost on stage before an audience, trying to keep the music going while you wait for your brain to kick back in.  It is like losing your way in big city traffic while the GPS chirps, “calculating.”   I practice for just such moments, designing re-entry points throughout the score that will put me back on track.  But there is no protection against that first moment of pure shock—the second when you realize that the brain fart has, indeed, occurred.

As a musician, you take a personal risk every time you walk on stage.  Musicians understand the cost and empathize with other performers.  We have all been there. 

Back in my high school years, I played in a youth symphony.  I try not to admit that I actually spent time as a violinist.  I loved making music; as a pianist you are relegated to the sidelines as other musicians get to collaborate in the playing of Brahms and Beethoven Symphonies.  Although I was purely self-taught, I achieved enough proficiency to audition my way into our glorious ensemble.  We rehearsed religiously on Sunday afternoons—Miami Dolphins championship games notwithstanding.

During one particular season, a guest artist was rehearsing Rhapsody in Blue with our orchestra in preparation of an upcoming concert.  Our principal clarinetist, who would be featured in the famous opening solo, was a fabulous musician and popular man-about-town.  He sported a thick mane of bright red hair and made all the girls swoon.  I can attest personally to the power of the twinkle in his eyes.  One week he announced that he would miss the next rehearsal in order to visit colleges in New England.  My older brother, who was assistant principal clarinet, was elated.  This meant that he would get to perform the opening solo with the 17-note glissando that was beloved by clarinetists everywhere.

Night and day my brother practiced the elongated Gershwin phrase, with the low trill on the tonal F rising to the high B-flat that set the key for the piece.   Written as discrete notes, the glissando was done originally as a joke in dress rehearsal in preparation of the piece’s premiere.   It is achieved by slowly gliding the fingers off the keys rather than fingering them individually.  George Gershwin, who gave the first performance of the piece himself, loved this treatment and asked the clarinetist to play the glissando in the live performance.  It has been done this way ever since—marking one of the great signatures of American “classical” music.

Finally, our Sunday rehearsal arrived.  The orchestra tuned up and settled down.   The soloist took her seat at the piano and gave the cue to the conductor that she was ready.  The conductor gestured to my brother to begin and relaxed her hands over the score—not needing to conduct during the opening bar of the clarinet solo.  I crossed my fingers, knowing more than anyone there how much this opportunity meant to my brother.  His opening trill was elegant, achieving that beautiful hollow tone that only a clarinet can make.  His glissando was perfect—every bit as good as any recording, but more importantly, every bit as good as the absent principal. 

At the downbeat, the horns, trombones and lower strings entered, sounding immediately dissonant and sour.  Suddenly, my brother cried out, “Oh noooo!” and turned an interesting shade of red.  The conductor kept the beat and the musicians kept playing, but my brother was painfully aware that he had been playing on the "wrong" clarinet.  Clarinets, you see, are a B-flat instrument.  This means that a C played on a clarinet sounds like a B-flat to the ear.  Because this full-step interval can wreak havoc with the clarinetist—an orchestral piece played in E-major can result in the clarinetist’s having to play in the difficult key of F-sharp—orchestral clarinetists have a secondary instrument that is built a half-step lower as an A instrument.  My brother had forgotten to switch from his A back to his B-flat.

My heart sank for my brother.  He fumbled with his mouthpiece, changing it to his other instrument as we began again.  But I knew, as only a loving sister can, that the opportunity he had long awaited had been spent.  Rehearsal got back on track and the pianist dazzled us with her rendition of Gershwin's masterpiece.  The following week the principal returned triumphant from his college tour, his magnificent red mane just a bit fuller, his blue eyes even more twinkly.  He opened the Gershwin in rehearsal just as he would at the inevitable concert performance--note perfect, but oblivious to the far greater meaning that the phrase had to another. 

Tomorrow's blog:  Nothing in Life is Free