Successful Tour:

The Hope College Symphonette 2015 Midwest Tour was a success! We performed 7 different concerts during our 5 day trip at different locations in the Michigan and Illinois area. Our 16 member group was able to all fit onto a large charter bus with enough room for instruments on board and all of our luggage and equipment below. It was nice to have a smaller group than usual in the fact that we were a lot less squished and had more space on the bus. The smaller group allowed for a stronger sense of camaraderie amongst the group as well.

Program:
We performed 5 different orchestral works:
-Mozart’s “Divertimento in D Major, K. 136”
-Elgar’s “Serenade for Strings in E Minor”
-Tchaikovsky’s “Andante Cantabile from String Quartet No. 1, Op. 11”
-Bartok’s “Rumanian Folk Dances,” a suite of seven short pieces composed by Bartok and arranged by Arthur Willner
-Britten’s “Simple Symphony.”

The Divertimento in D Major, K. 136 was the earliest work we performed and consisted of many fast passages for the first violin section. The Elgar and Tchaikovsky were latter works from the Romantic period of music and had much more blending of difficulty for all the string parts, these pieces showed more gradual dynamic changes than the Mozart. The Bartok and Britten were the latest works and had many string crossings and difficult rhythmic passages. It was a great selection of music that spanned a large range of time and different stylistic elements for stringed instrumentalists.

Venues:
We performed at 3 churches and 3 schools. On tour, a virtue that is very important to have is flexibility. Different venues lead to different spacial and acoustic obstacles or benefits. With some churches and schools the stages were smaller than others and we needed to adjust our set-up accordingly. Also the different materials or structure of a hall leads to different sounds and resonance. Because we are playing on acoustic instruments that are not hooked up to an amp, all of our sound resonates purely from our instruments. In rooms that are smaller and made of harder materials the instruments are able to resonate and the orchestra fills up the room with a beautiful sound. If a room is very carpeted our sound will be muted and it is sometimes harder to hear other members of the group.

Tour Life:
With so much traveling, waking up early, set-up and tear-down tour life can get exhausting. Thankfully we had free time to explore some of the towns we visited and were able to eat at some wonderful restaurants and even got to hear a performance of the Chicago Symphony. Due to performing our program together so many times and traveling in such close quarters we were all able to bond as a group and experience the power of music even more than in normal rehearsals.


Below are pictures of some of our performances and free time activities. If you ever get the chance to go on tour with an orchestra make the most of every moment. :D

First Performance

Rehearsal in South Holland, IL.

At a performance of The Chicago Symphony

Being Tourists at Millenium Park in Chicago, IL.

Hope you enjoyed learning a bit about what a tour with a small orchestra might be like!

See you all in your lessons this week :D
Larissa



More information on the tour:
http://www.hope.edu/2015/03/02/symphonette-strings-perform-pre-tour-concert-march-10#sthash.5iJaNJ9D.dpuf