Sunday In The Park With George

[David Ice]

For what it’s worth, I’m in process of typesetting the harp part for this show.  It’s some of the most irritating manuscript I’ve ever encountered (all those cluster chords literally turn into a blob on the page!) and there are missing bars, beats, cues, etc.  And another harpist told me she also “crashed and burned” trying to read the manuscript part at the first rehearsal.   I’ll post when I have it completed and have it performance tested.  At present I have about 120 pages engraved and about 40 to go!

[Gretchen Cover]

David,  you are such a great guy to keep making these orchestra parts readable and then sharing your hard work.

BTW, I like your arrangement of The Lord’s Prayer better than the one by Salzedo.  Hope you will do more arranging. I know you have some music you planned to get published.

[David Ice]

Thanks for your kind words, Gretchen!   This SITPWG harp part is just mind-bogglingly hard to read.  Honestly, 3 weeks into it and suddenly I realize it’s an A and not a C….because the sloppy ledger lines have the A on the same level as the C–that sort of thing.  It’s hours of work, but I find that I can virtually sit there and sight read it, as opposed to taking educated guesses on every pass!

The Lord’s Prayer has an interesting story.  It’s based on the handwritten manuscript copy that Marjorie Call gave me eons ago.  I had wanted to learn it, and had purchased the Salzedo version.  To my utter astonishment she said, “Oh, throw that one away.  It’s awful!”  I asked why.  She told me, “All the beats and accents are in the wrong place.  I could never figure it out, until one day I asked Carlos, ‘were you thinking in English or in French when you arranged this?’  He said, ‘why French, of course.’  That’s why his version is so awkward…..the syllables and rhythms are all French!”

 

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