First Rehearsal for Beethoven 9

Transformed.  The 5th floor of HPAC was not the same place today.  People, people, people.  Alle menschen filled the hallways, bathroom and tiny kitchen.  The orchestra has swelled with extra players to match the volume of the 10,000 voices that will be joining us this weekend and all the extra weight meant it was a little harder to center the pitch, more difficult to feel a unified pulse with our peers on the other side of the room, and slower tempi in anticipation of a larger space.  The pocket of the rhythm target is a little larger, perhaps to be swallowed in the mass of sound.  As we took the day to waddle through Beethoven 9 backwards, a small camera crew came to document the process.  Tomorrow we meet at Osaka-Jo Hall to continue the brotherly music making.

Giant orchestra and cameraman on the balcony