<p>I am sitting here reading all of the posts and I do feel sorry that the pit musicians were not recognized by the Actors or director, that is just plain poor taste. My D has played Drums/Percussion in 2 or 3 musicals each year since grade 6 and she is graduating from college in a few months. The situation of not being recongnized has not happened but we have seen rehearsal last that long and when you are the drummer percussionist they are a lot longer. My D is responsible for bringing the drum set, and other percussion equipment before each rehearsal and performance and for staying afterwards to tear down. We have seen her needing to be there 1.5 hour early and stay an hour after having to lug all of this equipment around and not one single person would think of helping. The last one was 3 loaded car trips each way to bring the eqipment to and from. Does she regret it all, not one bit as that is the life she wants, knows what is involved and is committed to it. The commitment is the most important thing and yes we understand that some people do get hurt which is unfortunate but unless she is in the hospital there is no way she would reneg on that.</p>
<p>I agree with so much of what has been posted. I do not have a string player (well, he plays a little, but gave up lessons in 7th grade). But I do have 2 actor/singers and I agree that often times in HS productions time is wasted. There is a lot of sitting around - for everyone - chorus, minor characters, tech people, pit orchestra. Often times the HS directors are just unorganized or underestimate how much time things will take (teaching a dance routine to non-dancers, for example). My kids have wasted many a Saturday sitting for hours. </p>
<p>BUT, my kids (esp my son) have been in many professional productions and things are WAY different. Union rules!! In general, because time is limited, it is used much more efficiently. </p>
<p>There have been several occasions when my kids are so frustrated with HS shows that they want to quit/take a night off, etc. But, unless they are on death’s door - they don’t. They have attended dance calls even with broken toes, feet and twisted ankles. They can at least watch and mark the dances. My S just finished a HS run of a show that was not a good fit for his voice. By the end - it was getting a bit rough and uncomfortable. We checked with voice teacher and ENT and they assured us that it would be temporary so he continued (starts reparative therapy today!). Any career that is dependent upon your physical health is going to run some risks and be uncomfortable at times, but the show must go on. (and I told my Son when he was 8 that if he ever cried at a rehearsal again, it would be his last show ever!! And I mean it - no whiners!)</p>
<p>@simplelife-</p>
<p>I recommend re-reading some of the posts before saying things that aren’t true, in my reading, most people said LMK’s D should hold up to her commitment as I would with something I was doing and what I would tell my S as well (not that I would have to, he has gutted through more then a few unpleasant things). Music requires that kind of commitment, getting through the audition process with music schools alone is a major test of that, and it tests the commitment of the students and parents alike, financially, time wise and so forth. </p>
<p>I think people were commiserating about the experience LMK was having, saying they understand the frustration and more importantly, telling her that this was not indicative of what it meant to go into music, that high school and community musical pit bands are often hell, because quite frankly the musicians are often taken for granted. Speaking from personal experience (from a generation, mind you, that suddenly over the span of 30 years has gone from being spoiled kids, raised on tv, who would never do much, to suddenly becoming the purveyors of traditional values, even though we didn’t walk both ways,5 miles, to school, uphill <em>smile</em>) it wasn’t about the long hours, it was the presumption that somehow we were ‘the help’ or something that galled. In our case, no one expected to be in the program with bios, few do that, or any big deal, all we expected was to be treated with a bit of courtesy and respect, which last I checked, was an old fashioned value, too (like, as in the Golden rule, treat others as you would wish to be treated). The kids in the pit are giving up a lot of time to do it, they are sacrificing time they could be doing homework, doing individual practicing and so forth, and all this is about is getting a bit of recognition for that and not feeling like they were being taken for granted. As others have pointed out, the school music director and the person directing the musical should have someone kick them in the butt, since they seem to share the opinion about the musicians. I also will add that if the idea of school is to encourage kids to do things, treating them ‘hired help’ isn’t exactly going to encourage them. </p>
<p>Pit can be a wonderful experience, as is being in the musical, doing makeup, costumes, scenery and so forth, as long as it is a shared experience. The irony is that the actors would probably be throwing hissy fits if they weren’t acknowledged, they would probably get their nose bent out of joint if another person in the cast’s bio was longer then theirs, but they can’t see the other side <em>shrug</em>…it is no different then what I have seen with school music directors with talented students, but that is another story…</p>
<p>As far as pain and playing, I agree with GlassHarmonica, that it is important to get it checked out and if you think it is going to cause damage, or if a doctor recommends not playing, it may be wise not to. The same thing goes on in high school sports, where coaches would tell kids to ‘walk off’ injuries, tell them they are okay, and there are signs that things like concussions are causing damage at the high school level. One of the things to think about if doing other musical things, like pit band or whatever, is to judge that against the other things you have to do, like practicing repertoire if thinking of heading into music. When I was in high school, I was a casual musician (okay, I loitered in front of my instrument), so doing a 6 hour practice wouldn’t kill me, because I wasn’t practicing X hours a day, but for someone doing that, doing things like pit band might be really difficult, so think twice about it. </p>
<p>What I always told my S is if something turns out to be crappy, learn from it, learn the signs, and if something looks like more of the same of what he experienced, say no, especially when it is a volunteer thing. In the real world there are times when to make the rent you have to do crappy things with less then favorable people, but at least there there is pay; with a high school production from hell, you are putting in the effort as a volunteer and being treated like crap, what does that teach? It doesn’t do much musically, most show music, even for a crappy musician like myself, is not musically challenging, there is a reason why show music is not part of standard repertoire for music performance…</p>
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<p>And I said what that was untrue??</p>
<p>I don’t know if it was noticed, but all the cast, tech crew, even the cast where they were basically extras, standing in the background for 5 minutes, and the people selling candy and drinks at the concession stand were all given free tickets to the show. But the entire orchestra had to pay for tickets. That is not even asking for recognition publically. Why would they give free tickets to the extras and the concession stand people, but not the instrumentalists? The bios were also given to every single person, even the people who literally came on stage, stood in the background for a scene, and then left the stage. I am not pointing to any one thing as being solely the problem, but everything put together made the entire experience, for a lack of better word “sucky.”</p>
<p>Next year, my daughter will refuse to be in the pit. They probably won’t care. They have enough other kids to do it. My daughter was actually the only person who came to every single rehearsal, for the entire time of the rehearsal. Literally, no one else put in 100% of the hours (except the conductor and such I assume, but no other instrumentalist). If she had not been at the all the practices, several of them would have had no violists. AND, while this is not the fault of the theater people, there was a situation where seniors were given first dibs at all solos. So, my daughter, who is a junior, had no solos. Then, the seniors did not show up for most of the rehearsals. My daughter filled in and played the solos at almost all the rehearsals, including the dress rehearsals. She also played the part where they played little bits during the school day for the students (they did just a few scenes for the students to sample throughout the day, so she missed classes all day that day, even though she has 3 AP classes she needed to keep up in). But, then when the actual show came, the seniors showed and they still got to play the solos. Not like anyone watching would have a clue who played anything or solos or otherwise, but, that too bothered me. I can understand letting seniors have first dibs, but wouldn’t that be forfetted when the seniors did not even show?</p>
<p>Seriously, if this is the music industry, and how things go, I personally never could have handled it.</p>
<p>I agree with you, Simplelife. There are many times one enters into a commitment that ends up to be an unpleasant, unappreciated experience. Next time, you don’t volunteer to do so. But sometimes it is a requirement of a program or job, or something one has to undergo for better chances at other opportunities. Not saying the OP’s DD is in any of those situations. But the gumption one needs to have to is often built by these experiences. Anything unsafe, unhealthy, and truly abusive, and that would end the participation, but nothing i’ve read here indicates that this is the situation. </p>
<p>I, too, am a parent of musicians. One is pursing performance as his career choice, and a rough road it has been. He would jump for a situation like the one the DD is having, if it were a paying one and how he would be recognized or treated would not even come into the picture. He does a lot of backstage and set work now, and talk about being unappreciated. Whewiieeee. But it pays the bills and gets you into the picture so that you hear of opportunities and get to know others, very important in this world particularly when you are working from audition to audition. You do a lot of grunt work, thankless work in hopes that something pans out, and it usually does not but to find the few opportunities where it does, means going through all of this. </p>
<p>The music industry is even tougher than that, I assure you, as are the performing arts as a whole, on a professional basis.</p>
<p>^^Yes, it sounds like a pretty sucky experience for your D, lmkh70. No doubt.</p>
<p>But this latest iteration of transgressions is just proving my original perception and my lastest point: Your beef seems to be more with the mistreatment and lack of respect than with your D’s health. There’s nothing wrong with hating it and never doing it again. But your question in your original post was, basically, “Did I do the right thing when I told my D she didn’t have to go to the last performance?” </p>
<p>You already know my opinion now. There seems to be a lot of support here for ensuring your D’s health. I’m all for that, too. But ‘ensuring’ it just prior to the last performance after what I assume was at least a month of effort? </p>
<p>My perception was, and is, that the mistreatment is what got to you the most – not your D’s health. And I posted again (above) because it seemed that so many fellow CCer’s had latched onto the health issue to the detriment of the real issue – should she be encouraged to quit on the very last day? It seemed to me – still seems to me – that you were staging a protest of sorts, AGAINST the mistreatment as opposed to FOR her health, through your D (who would have had to live with the consequences, btw). I just thought it was a bad idea. I’m glad she chose to attend that last performance.</p>
<p>lmhk, what you are describing is nothing like the music industry. If a musician did not show up to a rehearsal (barring a pre-arranged absence), they would be out of the job, particularly in a pit orchestra. Each musician is hired for a particular role/job, so there is no trading back and forth on solos.</p>
<p>At my daughter’s school, NO ONE gets free tickets for musicals. They need the money to pay the professional musicians they hire.</p>
<p>lmkh … glad that your D was able to finish off that last show.</p>
<p>I agree with many of the posters above … finish your commitments, take care of health, make sure your violin is fitted correctly, avoid pit orchestra if you didn’t enjoy it overall, etc.</p>
<p>The add’l piece of advice from me is because your D is a junior (versus a freshman). As a parent, we want to help them work through these battles and struggles and help them in any way possible. If she is going to make it as a musician and many other things she could study, she will need to learn to speak for herself and stand up for herself when she is feeling left out, under appreciated, or unrecognized. In the case of this experience, I would step back as a parent. If your D complains about this experience, coach her through the process of working through it rather than live out out the details with her. For example, if the time waste is the biggest problem, a conversation could start like this:</p>
<p>D: “I hate pit orchestra and I refuse to go to another rehearsal.”
M: “Sorry to hear this honey, what is going on?”<br>
D: “My back hurts, it’s a waste of time, and I’m not even getting free tickets for my family.”
M: “Wow, sounds like something has been building up and you are frustrated. What is bothering you the most?”
D: “I have so much on my plate and I lost 3 hours just sitting there watching idiots run the show very inefficiently.”
M: “So what have you said to your conductor?”
D: “Nothing, I just wanted to vent to you.” or “Conductor, hmm, I never thought of telling him how frustrating this is … I’ll casually mention it tomorrow.”<br>
M: “Sounds like a great idea … I’m sure he’ll want to know if his pit crew is annoyed. What else is going on at school?”
D: “My back has been hurting … I think it’s because I’m sitting in a chair for 7 hours.”
M: “Hmm, that’s not good. How are those back exercises going?”</p>
<p>Anyway, you get the point.</p>
<p>^Wow. You explained that perfectly, SnowflakeVT. ;)</p>
<p>@simplelife-</p>
<p>The error I was talking about was claiming anyone was telling LMK that it would be okay for her D to skip the last night’s performance because she was upset at the way she was treated. Several of us, myself included, said if the pain was that bad and the doctor said she shouldn’t play, that she shouldn’t risk further injury, but that was it, no one said she should drop a commitment like that. And yeah, to drop it for medical reasons would mean the person literally couldn’t play, was in agony, etc. Again, no one said she should not go because she was angry at the way she was treated, we all simply said we understood how she felt but that commitments are important, and I said why (because working musicians’ reputations are critical to getting gigs). </p>
<p>Others have talked about having crappy jobs to pay the rent, and yes, that is true, I know a lot of working musicians in the NYC area, and they do a lot of things, including weddings, bar mitzvahs and occassionally a hipster dominated burlesque in Brooklyn (don’t ask), but that is to pay the rent and such. Quite honestly, if LMK’s daughter is serious about going into music, she probably would get a lot more out of working on repertoire and her own practicing then doing pit orchestra, you don’t learn a lot doing pit, and if they are dismissive about the pit musicians, to quote Jon Bon Jovi, tell them “Have a nice day” and don’t do it <em>shrug</em>. Put it this way, most of the musicians in the pit orchestras and NYC and elsewhere probably trained at music schools in performance and I would bet many of them never did pit work until they got to school or even when they were out and working…and they do just fine.</p>
<p>Like musicprnt, my posts were focused on the medical/injury aspects of playing in pit orchestra.</p>
<p>I think the OP muddied the water with her (righteous) indignation about insulting treatment. That’s a different issue. Since Mozart’s time and before, musicians have been treated like servants, dressed in livery, made to eat in the servants’ quarters, etc. You may think, based on the celebratization of a few performers that musicians are valued in our society more than they are-- but the reality is that, for purposes of survival most musicians take on a variety of work, some of which is quite far from ego-affirming. It’s something to get used to sooner than later. </p>
<p>On the other hand, it’s important to behave like a professional and to treat others in a professional way, always. That means keeping commitments (drop out of pit orchestra <em>after</em> the show, unless too injured to perform.) </p>
<p>I stand by what I wrote before: all musical “opportunities” are not equal. There are many factors. Don’t take work, even paid work, if it’s going to put you in danger of a career-jeapordizing injury. That sounds like simple common sense, but when you are in the trenches it is sometimes hard to tell what to do, when an opportunity comes in. And as you know, work begets work. Once you have a reputation for professionalism, more opportunities will roll in, and the timing is not always healthy, especially with a student schedule that includes many hours of playing and practicing. An injury will put all that on hold-- and my necessitate a leave of absence, or worse, from conservatory. It’s not worth it.</p>
<p>I suspect that some of the parents posting here, and I recognize their generosity and strong ethical intent, may not be completely aware of the potential for serious injury to a string player by sustained, repetitive playing. I know many (too many) young string players, several years into conservatory training, following a huge investment of time, energy and their family finances, who are struggling to recover from tendinitis, nerve damage, and other injuries brought on by overuse.</p>
<p>Injuries are not limited to string players. I know an oboist and flutist who have repeated problems with tendinitis that has impacted their performance/practice schedule at times.</p>
<p>My daughter, an oboist, uses a neck strap in order to reduce the chance of injury.</p>
<p>I suspect anyone doing repetitive motions, whether athlete, musician or whatever are prone to such injuries.</p>
<p>Waaay back in HS, I played violin in the pit for our musicals. Our rehearsal schedule matched the cast’s. We started off in the band room on our own learning the music, and spent the last few weeks in the theater. No doubt about it, we were second class citizens. Maybe even third class, after crew, who were considered “cool.” We had long rehearsals, but I always had snacks and something to read, and when I couldn’t sit anymore I would stand and stretch during the dialogues. Our acknowledgement consisted of a wave from the cast and our names in the program. Pretty sure no one ever verbally thanked me for my time. After my first show, my mother wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper about how great we were and called the orchestra the “unsung heroes” of the show. I think I still have that clipping.</p>
<p>Then the summer after 10th grade I was CM for a G&S, which meant you never got a break. We worked our fingers to the bone and no one cared. Meanwhile the kids in the cast had breaks during the scenes they were not on stage and had plenty of opportunities to socialize, get a drink, chat, laugh. Bottom line–they were having fun and I was not. So that was my last pit and since I could sing (probably better than I could play), I started auditioning. Man, was there ever backlash. I had teachers berating me the hallway about why I wasn’t playing. I had other violinists stop talking to me. I told them all the same thing, that I didn’t like playing in the pit because it was no fun.</p>
<p>GH’s comments about the way musicians are treated reminds of the greatest story of this (and someone actually sympathetic to the musicians). Joseph Haydn was the court composer to Count Esterhazy, and he and the musicians were at the count’s summer palace, and their stay there dragged on and on (story I heard was the count was throwing some incredible parties and just didn’t want to stop…). The musicians were away from their families and were anxious to get home, but of course they were pretty much servants. Haydn was sympathetic, and he wrote the Farewell Symphony, which by the end of it has a single musician left on stage, as the musicians douse their lights (candles in his day) and leave the stage during the last movement. Apparently Esterhazy got the idea, and the musicians were shortly headed home:)</p>