I told my daughter she does not have to go to the last musical performance

College Majors Music Majors
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<p>We saw her last night. I also stopped in at a practice for a short bit after the incident of her crying. I can see the problem. At the rehearsal, the choreographer was still trying to work on the choreography while the orchestra just sat there. My daughter said it was actually way better that day. Then at the musical, I realized that played constantly. The music never had breaks. Even when the singers were not singing, the music was still playing in the background. They had them all sit by 6pm. The show started at 7. They got 1 break at 8:30pm. And then the show did not end until shortly after 10pm. </p>

<p>And I know I might be being silly to be bothered by this, but people did not even realize there was a real orchestra there. There was a small thing about it in the program. But for everyone else, from the actors to the tech crew, they had short bios on them. Then on one page, they listed the instrumentalists. When I commented to a couple people who asked if I had a child in the musical, I said she was in the orchestra pit playing. They were shocked to find out there were people in there. I know they are supposed to be invisible. But at the end when they brought everyone and their dog out on the stage (including all the tech people and everything) couldn’t they have at least pointed to the pit people and let them stand up for even a moment? Instead, they were truly invisible, always, always. </p>

<p>Anyway, my daughter was saying how much she physically hurts after the performance. And I told her she did not have to go tomorrow (which is tonight). Would you have done the same? or am I being silly? There are plenty of other violists. I think I am going to take her to the chiropractor today too.</p>

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<p>I wouldn’t do that without telling the conductor I was doing that.</p>

<p>And I wouldn’t tell the conductor it was because I thought that the orchestra was a poor use of her time, and that the members of the orchestra were taken for granted. Even if that’s what I thought. Because I wouldn’t want to burn bridges.</p>

<p>I can’t say what I’d do in your situation, but if I were going to allow her to miss the final performance, I would tell the conductor that so much sitting upright and playing was causing her skeletal pain that lasts hours after the performance, that I was taking her to a chiropractor, and that I feared she might have to miss the final performance, due either to pain or to the doctor’s orders.</p>

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<p>I told her to call her conductor this morning right away if she is not going to make it. I had no intention of telling the conductor that it was a waste of her time, even though I felt that way.</p>

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<p>I think her biggest concern should be her physical health (and of course time wasted.) If she was in pain after yesterday, then she should truthfully cite her heath concern. She is in pain; she should not perform for all of those hours; she risks doing permanent damage. Try to find a specialist who is know for treating musicians, not just any doctor or chiropractor.</p>

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<p>There is an ortho pedist that I have taken her to in the past who works for sports teams. Would this be a good one? Or should I look for someone specifically for music?</p>

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<p>Wow. There is no way that I would have made that call. No way. Sorry, but you asked. I very much disagree with your decision. She made a commitment. Her commitment has been harder and much more annoying than she ever thought it would be. But she made the commitment and stuck with it all the way up to the final night of the show. One more night is going to kill her? It sounds like a mom’s attempt to make a point, more than anything else. I think that’s a big mistake. What about everybody else who was counting on her? Music is rarely, rarely ‘all about you.’ It’s a team effort.</p>

<p>I do understand your relative disgust with the lack of recognition for the pit. It’s not fair. But, have you been to many professional shows? In my experience, what you described is fairly common. In programs, the orchestra director is often given a bio – sometimes the concertmaster has a bio. Featured soloists are typically given bios. Generally, in my experience, the orchestra members are simply listed, by name, on one page. It’s part of the job – providing the music for musicals and knowing ahead of time that THEY are, for the moment, the featured ‘players.’ Heck, even in a professional orchestra concert, where the instrumentalists ARE the featured show, most of the members are simply listed by name on one page, without bios. At the end of the show, the orchestra director is often ‘invited’ (it’s planned, of course) on stage and takes a bow for the pit. He or she often gestures towards the pit, and they may or may not stand (in my experience, they typically wave their bows instead of standing). I totally agree with you that the organizers should have given visible credit to the conductor, whether on stage or while still in the pit. And if he got the visible credit, it would have been nice of him (and fairly standard) to gesture towards his instrumentalists. But giving credit to the individual pit members is not generally done – beyond listing their names in the program on one page. The fact that somebody was shocked that there were live people in the pit kind of speaks to their ignorance, not to the failings of the organizers, imo.</p>

<p>I, personally, think you sent the wrong message to your daughter. All she had was one more night. That would have been a much better, more productive, lifelong message. You can make it one more night. Put in the time on the last night, and then never sign up for pit orchestra again if you truly can’t stand it. </p>

<p>It’s good that she learned early-on what pit orchestras are all about – though this particular experience may have been a particularly harsh and unnecessary lesson. (It probably repeats itself at high schools all across the country.) But there were so many other lessons to be had! Like learning to back out early and sticking up for yourself early-on if you can’t stand the heat – or keeping your commitment despite the hardships once you’ve gotten yourself in that far. Or, like learning the simple fact that pit orchestras don’t get the public attention or credit that the other musicians on stage get. These are the very obvious things. There are many, many other lessons right there for the taking which I won’t bother to go into … but, imo, you took those lessons from her grasp. </p>

<p>Sorry. I know parenting is really, really hard. We pretty much all hate for our kids to be taken advantage of or suffer in any way. But, suffer they must. We all must. It’s just part of life. I’m sure you made the decision that you thought was right at the time. But since you asked … I’m going to chime in and say that I strongly believe it was the wrong decision. She can go to a chiropractor the day after tomorrow instead of today.</p>

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<p>I’m glad you went to watch the practice, to see how it all works. High schools around the country approach putting on musicals very differently.</p>

<p>My daughter plays all the woodwinds. When she plays in a musical, she is playing constantly, switching around up to four instruments often with only one measure rest before she needs to be playing the next one. It is very intense. It requires great skill and enormous concentration. When she has a few measures off from playing, she spends them wetting her oboe and English horn reeds, or adjusting her instruments. It is much more intense than playing oboe in an orchestra.</p>

<p>Often when there are string players in the pit, they too are playing almost constantly.</p>

<p>This is why musical directors need to treat the students as they would professionals. Rehearsals should be limited to three hours. Directors should use the orchestra time wisely.</p>

<p>My daughter had a similar experience to yours, when she played in her first high school pit orchestra when she was in 8th grade. Back then, she didn’t yet know clarinet, and had to learn it in order to play her part on oboe soprano sax tenor sax and clarinet. It was a great experience for her, as the director hired mostly professional musicians to play the parts, with a few capable students playing the rest. When a director hires professionals, rehearsals are kept to a minimum. After hours and hours practicing on her own, plus rehearsing with the pit and dress rehearsals, she got to play in three performances. Then she saw how little she was appreciated: during bows, the chorus handed out flowers to the professional musicians, but left out my daughter and the other high school player, a very competent double bass player. The actors had seemingly no idea what these high school musicians did for them, without being paid. People in the audience did not realize there was an orchestra back there.</p>

<p>The following month my daughter played in another musical, for another high school. At this school, the actors would come up to the pit musicians, half of them students, and thank them for their work. So my daughter learned that student actors can be taught to be polite.</p>

<p>I wrote to my daughter’s musical director (also the chorus director) and told him about my daughter’s experiences. He hadn’t realized that was happening, and thereafter taught his students about the importance of the pit orchestras, that the musicians there have a harder job than they do. I saw last night, during our school’s current musical, that the actors are far more aware of the assistance they are receiving than they used to be. It also helps that this year, the musicians are placed in front of the stage, to the side, where they can be seen.</p>

<p>However, keep in mind that the show IS about the actors. Most of the parents who go have no idea what a pit orchestra is, and I don’t expect them to. My daughter now treats pit playing as a business. If she is paid, or gets something of benefit out of it (such as playing alongside top military saxophone professionals), she’ll do it. Last year her school did Oklamama–no jazz, only used students musicians (which means more reherasals), so she didn’t do that one. Last night, she showed up to the performance one hour in advance to set up, played for three hours, packed up and left. No socializing–she knows most parents there have no idea that what she is doing requires much more knowledge than what most of the actors are doing. (Most parents also had no idea that they just heard two of the top sax professionals in the US playing). My daughter doesn’t treat it as she does a solo performance, so she is not disappointed.</p>

<p>As for not showing up for a performance, I agree with another poster that she should only miss a performance for cause, not because she doesn’t like being there. If a doctor or chirpractor tells her to lay off for a while and miss the performance, then you tell the musical director that and she misses it. My daughter has never missed a pit performance, even with such injuries. Professionally one cannot do that. </p>

<p>Regarding preventing injuries, your daughter needs to see a chiropractor or physical therapist regularly. Mine does exercises most evenings prescribed by physical therapists to avoid these type of pains that will occur. it is part of her daily practice schedule.</p>

<p>PM me with any more questions or concerns.</p>

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<p>I’d like to cross pollinate SimpleLife’s excellent point about following through with your commitment with glassharmonica’s concerns about health. </p>

<p>Clearly, health of the musician needs to be a top priority, but seriously? Bailing on the last performance? Try doing that as a professional and see how many gigs you get. Your reputation as a musician would be ruined…and the network is wide.</p>

<p>My advice: suck it up for tonight’s performance, rest as much as possible during it (talk with the conductor about this - if there are other violas, let them cover for you as much as possible), and next time decline the opportunity to play in the pit orchestra. If pain continues, go to full rest and go to a specialist. (And that’s advice from someone whose child has been sidelined with tendinitis for months at a time.)</p>

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<p>I already took her to the doctor as I was able to get her in today. And the doctor said she should not perform and needs to take a break. (and she has a lesson tomorrow so I wonder if I need to cancel that too). She is in a lot of pain and is just taking tylenol for now. </p>

<p>And to be honest, it is this sort of thing that makes me feel like perhaps she might not be cut out for this field. She has had exercises recommended before and she does not do them (at least not that I have ever seen). But, maybe I just need to support her and understand that I just don’t “get it.” I don’t know. I am clueless. I posted about this because I did want opinions. I feel like I am walking in the pitch dark with no idea where I am stepping.</p>

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<p>I’m glad you got her in to see the doctor.</p>

<p>Pain from playing is pretty routine for musicians. What’s important is how you/your daughter solve and manage the problem. It’s always a balance between practicing enough and resting/exercising enough. Musicians are always pushing their physical limits, as are athletes.</p>

<p>I recommend finding a good chiropractor who can accurately diagnose the problem, and a good physical therapist who can prescribe appropriate exercises to build strength and hopefully prevent most pain from occurring. I have found these two practitioners to be much more knowledgeble about repetitive stress injuries than regular doctors. It’s good to find a chiropractor familiar with musician’s issues, but one who specializes in treating elite athletes will be good too. Several years ago I took my daughter to a musician’s hand clinic as the bassoon had given her trouble. They gave her exercises, and then I took those instructors to a chiropractor near us, who then incorporated that material into his treatments.</p>

<p>At some point, your daughter does need to take responsibility for doing the exercises given to her. They need to be part of her regular practice routine, like doing scales.</p>

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<p>The exercises given to her were from when she was at Interlochen and also from her current private lessons teacher. She has a great chiropractor. I am unsure if he is particularly familiar with music injury types. I will need to ask.</p>

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<p>I’ve been reading your posts with interest. I can sympathize as we have been through the physical pain portion of this. What cured the pain for my kid are classes called feldenkrais long with dalcroze eurythmics. I now have a much happier kid, pain free and a much better young musician.</p>

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<p>LMK-
I am sorry your D is in pain like that. One suggestion I have may be to find another teacher to evaluate her setup (the way she holds the instrument and so forth), a setup that may work for one kid might not work for another, and I know of students and professional musicians who ended up changing the way they hold the instrument and so forth, because the old way caused physical issues. You may want to look into the Alexander technique, there is information about it all over, it really seems to work. I am grateful that my S’s teacher spent a lot of time on setup with him, he practices and plays a lot (and in the past year or so, has ratcheted it up even more so), and knock wood, no problem. </p>

<p>I also hear you with much sympathy about the pit band experience , I tend to get very upset with situations like that myself:). That said, I agree with others, if your D hadn’t been injured I would have said to play the last performance. It is important to keep commitments, and while a high school play isn’t going to do any lasting damage, in music reputations mean a lot, because a lot of the work happens through networking, and if you have the rep of not coming through, well, not good;).</p>

<p>That said, high school pit band and community pits bands can be the pits, and partly it is because the pit band are volunteers (or volunteered, as in the military, with ‘private, you just volunteered to take point’) i.e free labor, and the directors and choreographers thus do what many people do when something is free, abuse it. Professional productions would never, ever use musicians to rehearse basic stuff, when they rehearse the singers and dancers already know their stuff, and the rehearsal is to pull it together. It is just too expensive to have rehearsals lasting any length, and it is a waste of everyone’s time. In my experience, we had the director and choreographer working with people on stage for things they should have learned long before, and we either would be playing along or would be sitting there (I wonder how the choreographer or director would feel if the pit band director stopped the rehearsal, told the actors to stand by, while he rehearsed the clarinet section or something…). Sorry, but the OP who said the play is about the singers and actors and the pit band is just there is dead wrong, live music is part of the production, as are the kids who do tech and scenery and so forth, and basically telling them that is there role in things is insulting. Those kids volunteer, they have long rehearsals to get their stuff right, and I don’t care if the parent of the lead part thinks they don’t matter, they do. No, not every student is going to be acknowledged personally, but pointing at musicians is a way of saying thanks for your hard work, too, and it tells the audience that as well.</p>

<p>Unfortunately a lot of that is the people in the schools who put these programs on, they have that attitude (quite frankly, many of them see themselves as Michael Bennett and Hal Prince, or think they are going to be the next one, which is highly unlikely) and the actors and such pick up on that, they put on the full ego and it is pathetic. I was in a musical like that in the pit, and it got so bad when they had the cast party they invited everyone but the pit band, and it was deliberate (the girl who was the lead had this incredible ego, and she was stoked by the twit who was the director/choreographer, neither of whom every did anything but get old and fat as far as I know, and the party was at the lead’s house…). It caused some bad feelings, especially since we did a lot of rehearsals, well beyond the original schedule. The music director when he found out what had happened, told the woman running the shows that she better find donors to hire musicians, that he wouldn’t have his kids taken for granted like that…he was a pain in the tail at times, but he stood up for us and the woman learned, after that they were very, very careful to acknowledge what we did:)</p>

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<p>I wish they would stand up for our kids. They did have a wrap party and everyone was included except the musicians. And I saw the conductor walking with flowers after (I was not seeing the show tonight, I did last night) but then was told that the musicians were never pointed out at all.</p>

<p>I feel like saying something, but, I don’t want things to get worse for my own child. Maybe after graduation.</p>

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<p>At my daughter’s HS the Pit Orchestra practices separately from the rest of the show until about the week or so of long rehearsals, but by then everyone from Pit to lead actor to lighting needs to know there part. And then the kinks are worked out. The Pit records it’s music earlier for the actors to perform by, and then that final last week before dress rehearsal and musical it’s long rehearsals that put everything together. (Pit performs live). The kids know it will only last a week, and homework is lessened a bit and healthy food and drinks are provided for breaks by parents. Our school makes it a wonderful experience. My daughter is playing sax, oboe and English horn. The musicians are given the same amount of recognition and bio space as the actors. Otherwise, there would be a musicians strike and no show!</p>

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<p>The same scenario seems to be repeated throughout the US. High school puts on musical, gets free musicians to play pit who are then unappreciated, cast thinks they are great stuff, pit orchestra members are not even recognized at show’s closing night.</p>

<p>I did talk to, or e-mail, the musical director after my daughter’s first experience in a musical. He is also the choir director and head of the music department. My focus was making him aware that cast members were excluding the pit member students, and that they were rude. He sought to remedy that by talking to the cast about acknowledging the pit, which they have done since then, plus they also invite the pit members to the cast party (my daughter has never gone, but she wants to be invited). But–I also wrote to the principal and told him how much I appreciated the choir director including my daughter in a mostly professional pit orchestra, because it was a terrific experience for her.</p>

<p>The following year I got after the choir director when it snowed the night of the musical and he decided to postpone the production one week instead of one day. The musical was then scheduled at the same time as All-Districts Band. My daughter and another student were required to go to All-Districts and had to miss the musical, after practicing it for several weeks (that year they didn’t hire any professional musicians). I pointed out to the choir director that he again was not thinking of the pit orchestra as students who deserve consideration like the choir students–he would never have scheduled the musical during All-Districts Chorus. He was upset with me for a while, but he got over it. Another mom joined me in setting down some ground rules for pit members, and today things are much better. My daughter got four roses after last night’s closing performance.</p>

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<p>redeye made think of a few more things–At our HS, pit only did three rehearsals, which is with the cast, then three performances. Obviously, the student pit members have to be capable of learning their music very quickly. It is also one long week. Parents bring dinner–really good food-- for cast and pit during the three rehearsals, and pit members get to go to the front of the line. I agree with redeye that if these kinds of conditions are not there, the musicians should refuse to play.</p>

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<p>I can’t remember if you said, is this a high school production? Is your daughter paid? Are the other musicians in the pit paid?</p>

<p>It certainly sounds like the musicians are being slighted. Shame on the director. He/She should know better.</p>

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<p>We really had a different experience with the pit orchestra at my daughter’s high school and I’m sorry to read of so many bad ones. I think the tone likely is set by the teachers.</p>

<p>My daughter plays the flute and was in the pit for the school musicals three years running. Yes, they did have long practices, first on their own and then with the cast and crew, during the week (and on weekends, all day). During “hell week” the week before the show opener they went until 7 or 8 at night every night. </p>

<p>But the orchestra was recognized as an integral part of the show. Their names and bios were in the program like everyone else’s. The conductor when he entered the pit just before the beginning of the show received a big round of applause. At the end of the show, the pit stood up and received their own round of applause just like the cast and crew. You can bet the many music parents in the crowd would have rampaged otherwise.</p>

<p>And on the last night of the last show senior year, my daughter and another senior musician went up on stage to present thank-you flowers to the conductor, who was recognized right alongside the director, choreographer, stage crew chief and tech chief. I tear up just remembering it! Pit members also went to the cast parties and had a great time. Many of these kids played together also in marching band, school bands and bands outside school and pit knitted them together even more closely. </p>

<p>Our high school was not the best for music and my daughter had many complaints about aspects of the music program, but pit was not one of them.</p>

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<p>It is a high school production.</p>