Pardon my venting here, but this weekend I had an experience not unlike Nick D's situation with the kid playing tenor sax. I sit in with a local college
wind ensemble and our concert was Friday. We had no student oboe player this semester, so the director hired a ringer. As soon as I walked in I recognized
her from two years ago. She's the one who asked the trumpets to point in a different direction last time - as if we are supposed to face backwards or
something. (I think I vented about that here at the time.) Well there she was, sitting by herself warming up on stage. (The rest of us all go to the
rehearsal room to warm up, but she has to sit there on stage and show off.)
The concert progressed OK and I did not pay much attention to her - except that when she kacked the tuning note I nearly broke out laughing. As pros go, this woman's playing ability is definitely bottom of the barrel. She had a very hard, forced sound that sounded like her reed was very stiff, not the sweet, flowing sound that I hear from quality oboists. But she was two rows in front of me and basically out of my sightline, so I was able to ignore her. I did pay a lot of attention to the bassoon ringer because she was sitting near me and was fantastic!
But after the concert my wife and some others complained to me about the obnoxious oboe player who waved her head around whenever she played to attract attention to herself. And to top it off, there were several times when the brass were playing that she made a large gesture and covered both of her ears. Just absolutely rude, childlike behavior. We were doing Music from Prague (Husa) and it is outrageously loud. The the tympani was less than a foot from my ear and gets slammed as hard as humanly possible. The percussionists started joking with me about it ("How can you can stand our playing?" "What, did someone say something?") and suggested I put in earplugs (which I did), but I did not go making gestures or throwing a hissy fit.
This is pure venting, but it would be fun if some of you others shared your war stories of prissy, egotistical orchestra players.
The concert progressed OK and I did not pay much attention to her - except that when she kacked the tuning note I nearly broke out laughing. As pros go, this woman's playing ability is definitely bottom of the barrel. She had a very hard, forced sound that sounded like her reed was very stiff, not the sweet, flowing sound that I hear from quality oboists. But she was two rows in front of me and basically out of my sightline, so I was able to ignore her. I did pay a lot of attention to the bassoon ringer because she was sitting near me and was fantastic!
But after the concert my wife and some others complained to me about the obnoxious oboe player who waved her head around whenever she played to attract attention to herself. And to top it off, there were several times when the brass were playing that she made a large gesture and covered both of her ears. Just absolutely rude, childlike behavior. We were doing Music from Prague (Husa) and it is outrageously loud. The the tympani was less than a foot from my ear and gets slammed as hard as humanly possible. The percussionists started joking with me about it ("How can you can stand our playing?" "What, did someone say something?") and suggested I put in earplugs (which I did), but I did not go making gestures or throwing a hissy fit.
This is pure venting, but it would be fun if some of you others shared your war stories of prissy, egotistical orchestra players.
