Sounds of the Season 2010

This was my 4th year performing with the Sounds of the Season Christmas choral concert that our city puts on every year. I absolutely love it - even though it definitely makes for a crazy time of year. This year was definitely a sacrifice for DH since I had to leave him many times with all 6 kids and MJ was less than ideal during many of those times. After the concerts were over we came to the conclusion that MJ is just more needy and whiny in the evening/nighttime hours. I think she did great every time I had a morning rehearsal, but towards the end of the season when I was practicing and performing in the evenings she was a pill. For the Saturday morning rehearsals I would get up early to shower and get myself ready and then I would go and wake up MJ so that I could give her a good feeding before I left. Usually she ended up going back to sleep and a couple of times she stayed asleep until I got home a couple of hours later.

This year the director arranged for us to have an additional concert on Temple Square at the Assembly Hall. It was a Sunday evening performance just following Thanksgiving. Unfortunately we ended up having a big snowstorm that day so traffic and roads were a mess. There were several people in my ward in the group this year so I was able to get a ride with them and we all went in one car. We left during church immediately following the sacrament (we have Sacrament Meeting last). I ended up going to the first part of Relief Society and then I went home during Sunday School so I could get MJ well fed and get a bottle ready in case DH needed it during church. I felt really bad having to leave church early and let DH fend for himself at Sacrament Meeting with all of the kids! I was glad that I got a ride though because we passed many accidents and slide-offs on the freeway. Plus I was traveling with the Stake President's wife who drove us there and then the Stake President met up with us for the concert time and drove us home afterwards. (We also had the Bishop's wife in the car with us for the drive there.) Apparently MJ cried a lot that evening so it was a good thing that DH was there to take care of her. At first we thought that DH would have to be at tithing settlements after church but the Bishop ended up not having any that day because he took his family downtown to hear the concert.

We only performed about half of our numbers for this concert because they have a different group start every hour so we had about 40 minutes to perform and then we had to quickly get everything off the stage so the next group could get setup to perform. It was definitely an interesting experience playing in the Assembly Hall. The sound in that building is incredible, but at the same time it was hard hearing the other orchestra members and the piano. There were a couple of songs with the organ and the organ and choir were completely off. The scary part for the orchestra was that we were right on the edge of the stage and it was a really long drop-off. The chairs we were sitting on made me feel like I was going to fall backwards off the stage. The director loved the experience though and is planning on having us perform there every year.