A Symphronica Tale: My Not At All Small Big Night In Music
March 28 2011

An urban prejudice the Pianobabbler once held met a happy demise this weekend.

A big city Toronto boy, the Pianobabbler prejudges (prejudice) smaller cities as, well, small. Thunder Bay, Ontario. 1300 kilometres to the northwest. Pop. 125,000. Small.

The Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra. Small.

The Pianobabbler came to Thunder Bay this past week to perform his Symphronica project with the Orchestra. The only smallness about the event lay in my prejudgmental thinking.

I should have known. I first met conductor Stéphane Potvin over lunch a few months back. He wanted to discuss the scores. He had questions. He had studied the scores. I mean studied. Closely. I think he knew more about them than me. At bar 25 do you want the quarter notes held or short? The last 8 bars- do you prefer a gradual crescendo? Should the cellos, er, celli play sul ponticello throughout the piece?

Stéphane's sérieux, his attention to detail sung the harbinger's song of the rehearsals and performance to come.

Symphronica: twelve compositions for orchestra and my jazz trio. About 70 minutes of music. Not trivial. An orchestra playing Beethoven's 5th knows the music. The players have played it. Heard it. Studied it.

Symphronica: what's that? the players could well ask. The Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra had never heard or seen it. They faced the task of learning it in three rehearsals over two days.

Learn it they did. Stéphane, having mastered the music, led, taught, coaxed, pushed, pulled, urged, joked, yanked, smiled, scowled and begged the players through the tunes. By showtime, the musicians were playing Symphronica as though they'd written it themselves. They had taken on Stéphane's command of detail. They had committed to the notes. They filled the hall with passion.

The ensuing standing ovation and encore were as much for them as for me.

All prejudices ultimately fail. They are either tempered by, or to match, the truth.

Thank you Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra. Thank you Maestro Stéphane Potvin. I enjoyed playing together.

It was large.

The Pianobabbler has babbled.

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