Sometimes you are pretty certain you know how a concert is going to play out, but you can never be too certain when you decide to play outside. Some musicians will actually rather lose a paying gig than to play outside and risk the uncertainty that is called Mother Nature. Since I'm always up for an adventure and I usually don't turn down a gig if I have a free night, I got to play with the Georgia Symphony Orchestra last night at their Fireworks Spectacular. I just assumed it would be like any other night this week, hot and humid. So I braced myself for a night of sticky playing. Boy, was I wrong!
The principal flutist and I pulled in the parking lot (with our matching convertible beetles) at the same time. The skies looked ominous, so we scurried into the nearest hall to the greens at Kennesaw State. No sooner had we walked in the door, but the heavens opened up and musicians poured into the hall. We all pulled out our phones to see what the weather radar was showing. We were all positive the show would be cancelled. After 10 minutes of sideways rain, the weather let up and all the musicians were curious to see how the sound engineers and stage outside were faring.
Lo and behold, the stage was up, sound checks were commencing, and there was a crowd of people patiently waiting on the lawn! So we decided to just go with it and start the concert. There was some light drizzling and we thought we'd never finish the concert, but then it stopped. At the end of "Salute to Rogers and Hammerstein" we saw a rainbow..even a double rainbow. Some enchanted evening ;)
The weather was downright perfect from then on, and I'm glad we decided to soldier on. It turned out to be a fabulous night...with the exception of the principal flutist's flute malfunctioning, all was remedied when the piccoloist offered her flute. It all worked out in the end!
