Learning from Failure as a Musician

So I haven't re-listened to the episode that I did on Life in the Pit, but I have a feeling that I might have shared a few more details about what happened than I will here.

And almost certainly, this will be a little bit different.

I'm sure I'll get some details here that I didn't share there.

So important to note, this happened in 2021, and I was basically in my 10th consecutive year of doing steady music directing slash keyboard slash conducting gigs, mostly on a community theater level.

I'd worked with a lot of different directors, a lot of different community theaters, and probably four or five different cities by that point.

I'd also worked with some schools, including a couple of colleges as well as a few high schools.

And the feedback that I got allowed me to think that I was one of the most valued, most highly sought out people in my area for community theater or for school theater.

And through that experience, and along with the podcast, Life in the Pit, where I talked to a lot of musicians, I was able to create a network, and that network allowed me to have the opportunity to play very briefly for a Broadway tour.

Now, some of my friends know what this show is, but I'm not going to say it here.

It wouldn't take a whole lot of researching skills to figure out what it is when you consider where I live, where I would have to go in order to play for a Broadway tour, and also the timeline.

But this particular production, they have traveling musicians for some of the instruments, but they don't travel with the full complement of musicians that they need for a production.

They rely on the local metro areas for the contractors there to hire musicians.

And sometimes that's for the full run.

Like, I know that when I was there that they had a local musician playing French horn, playing trumpet, trombone, auxiliary percussion, and one of the keyboard books.

I was hired to come in as a substitute for keyboard two.

It was understood that during their three weeks, I believe that they were here, that I would probably get at least one show per week, but probably an extra.

So I was thinking I would probably be playing four, maybe as many as five times.

So when they came into the city, there is an all-day two-part rehearsal.

So there's a rehearsal that begins after lunch.

You get a break for dinner, and then you come back and you have an evening rehearsal and then go home.

And then the next day would be basically a dress rehearsal or a sitzprobe.

I'm not sure because I didn't make it that far.

And then you go right into opening night.

So I had a good two solid months with the book to practice, and it was challenging.

Some of the things that I had to play with the left hand and the right hand were very difficult to coordinate.