Tech Week in Chattanooga

Well, it wouldn't have been tech week without one or two things going wrong, right?  Going into the job, I knew that the biggest hurdle would be my getting used to the keyboard, the patch changes, volume changes.....basically the technological aspect of it.  So it posed somewhat of a problem when I got to rehearsal the first day and they'd forgotten to ship the keyboards from the warehouse.  We expediently rented some equipment from local music stores and did the best we could to integrate my part into the orchestra- without the proper sounds, of course (There are three new members of the 11-piece orchestra, so my integration was a large part of these rehearsals).  Luckily, my keyboard came in time for the sound check/wandelprobe.  Surprisingly, I'd never heard of a wandelprobe before this rehearsal process.  This entails the orchestra playing through all or most of the music while the cast sings a little and moves around- somewhat marking their blocking and singing and getting used to the stage.

I kind of lucked out with my roommate that was chosen for me.  He plays Belle's father, Maurice, in the show.  He's a great guy and it turns out that we know a lot of the same people in the Prather world.  This makes one aspect of this tour a relief.

I've only been with the band a week and it feels like I've known them for months.  It's a very closely-knit group, which is understandable, seeing as how eight out of 11 of them were here last year.  If there's one phrase I can use to describe them, it's this: "Work hard, play harder."  They are all fantastic at what they do.  The get to the theater quite early to warm up and practice.  Their execution and musicianship are outstanding.  But when the curtain falls, you bet they're immediately searching for a bar in order to while away the rest of the night.  Let's just say I'm doing my best to keep up while still keeping my liver intact.

We had two preview performances in Chattanooga at the end of the week, which went well.  I'm getting a good handle on my music.  Next, onto Nashville for our official opening.

Prelude- Chattanooga



I just flew in to Chattanooga.  And boy are my arms tired.  No, really- one of my bags was overweight at the airport so I had to spread it out into both suitcases.  That's life when you tend to over-prepare.  I can hardly leave for the night without turning back from the end of the street and wondering what I left behind.  So, packing for months at a time can be an overwhelming endeavor.  I spent most of the day travelling, about two of them actually up in the air.  But that's flying for you.  I almost gave up my seat on the second flight because they oversold it and would have received $400 in "Delta Dollars" in return.  But given my luck with Delta, they probably would have been redeemable only in some overpriced board game they sell at the duty-free shop.  They ended up with enough room, however, so here I am in Chattanooga with most of the night in front of me.

I've spent the last few weeks learning not only the Keys II book, but the Keys I book as well.  That's one of the big dividers between the amateur and professional theater worlds is that a lot of these touring folks learn more than just one "track".  They may even have to study three or four.  I just have the two, so I'll more than likely be in the conductor's chair a few nights throughout the tour.  My part will be contributing sounds such as bells, harpsichord, accordion, organ, harp, and different string sounds to supplement our live string players.  The tricky part about what I play is that it isn't necessarily pianistic, given that it's meant to sound as if it's being played on a different instrument, so it's required a little more work than you may assume.



A small part of my preparation was reading up on the creation of the music for Beauty and the Beast [and other Disney movies] by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken.  It's important to do this kind of background research with any show that you perform, but especially important with a show such as this that has endured the test of time and is still selling out across the country after almost 20 years.  One of my favorite factoids from what I read was this: When writing the music for The Little Mermaid, Ashman and Menken likened "Part of Your World" to "Somewhere That's Green" (as they're both songs of longing) from their wildly popular musical Little Shop of Horrors by jokingly referring to it as "Somewhere That's Dry".  That made me chuckle.

We begin technical rehearsals tomorrow.  In the morning, I get acquainted with my instrument (one of the more interesting/tedious things about being a keyboard player), and in the afternoon we start full-on orchestra rehearsals.  Many of the musicians are returning, so I'm sure it'll come together pretty painlessly.  So, I'm pretty excited for tomorrow and the rest of the coming week.