Day 14

Date: May 28, 2011

Time: 11:54pm

Playing on iTunes: "Nocturne #11 in G minor" by Frédéric Chopin

Yesterday we had a man by the name of Ian Grom come in and help out the pit for a few days. He is an extrodinaire with technology, synths, and special effects (sounds). He was asked to put together a pre-show for the corps. The pre-show is something he put together on a program on his computer and was transfered to our sampler. A button on the sampler will be pressed and this entire opening thing will play. I will post recording of it at a later point. This will play before we're about to start the show when everyone is getting set up and getting ready to perform the show so there is no awkward silence. We got to hear what he made himself and it was absolutely incredible. It was a gorgeous combination of strings and latin choruses singing beautiful harmony combined with our whirlies and wine glasses. This sets up the show beautifully and very smoothly.

Since we got a new synth, I had helped out a little bit getting different synth patches for the different parts of the show since the new synth player was not used to the keyboard yet. He eventually became used to how to use the keyboard and has been setting up the different settings himself since the off-season. When Ian Grom came in, he pretty much changed EVERYTHING that we had put in their since December since it didn't sound good. Guess I gotta do some listening and try out some more patches (sounds on the keyboard). But he did his job...everything sounds absolutely amazing now. 

Horn line warming up for rehearsal

During ensemble tonight, we ran through the entire first chart and half of the second chart (the drum feature), and at the end of the night, George Hopkins told us that we sounded ridiculous. That's all he kept saying, and he also told us that he's "never been this happy on memorial day weekend since [I] was 10." This is an incredible thing to hear because to be in a place like the corps is now only 2 weeks in, is absolutely astonishing. We're going to be great this year and everyone will perform their hearts out at every show. 100% all the time.

After dinner, we were shown a 40-minute presentation of the history of the Cadets. We're the oldest existing corps, dating back to 1934; our inception. A lot of the pictures and videos that were showed were really awesome, exemplifying the greatest and perfection this corps strives for every year. Even since 1934. It was great to see a lot of memorabilia from the corps over the years. There were jackets, pictures, plaques, certificates, etc. out on the tables for all of us to see. It was great.

Also, got my entire front torso sunburnt. =)

Quote of the day: "Never judge someone by their looks or actions, there is ALWAYS something great on the inside...no matter how deep you need to go."