My mighty glisses

[kreig-kitts]

During our performance of Niagara Falls today, I really got into those ffff glissandos on the last two pages. A few measures into the final stretch, things suddenly felt off and I realized I was hitting a space where a string had broken. I broke both the 2d octave D and E on one particularly “issimissimo” gliss. Our conductor is very fond of the piece so I gave him the strings as a souvenir, as soon as our assistant conductor was finished using them as bug antennae.

[Angela Biggs]

:O (That’s a delighted shocked-face!) Thank you for sharing. That made my night. 🙂

[katie-buckley]

hehe! Congrats 🙂 Those must have been some glissandi!!

[kreig-kitts]

I should clarify they were done with picks per score instructions, though it would be too painful to play three pges of ff and fff glisses without them. Having rehearsed the piece for a month with the band, it’s a minor miracle I never broke any before (I did replace one in the third octave a few days earlier, and no doubt its lifespan had been shortened). Too bad they waited until the performance to give out.

[tony-morosco]

That’s what my teacher used to refer to as “playing with gusto”.

[Author]

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