Imagine my mild horror, when whilst studying, I realised that I hadn't written up the last spate of band related activities.
So: Saturday.
We were contracted to do the opening ceremony for the Red Bull MotoX at Cockatoo Island.
And that was when things stopped running according to plan.
Arriving at King Street Wharf, it became apparent that it would not be possible to get the entire band to the island in one boatload. It took three. Once at the island, we changed into our performance shirts and were distributed with earpieces, at which point we spent a lengthy amount of time waiting for someone to explain what it was we were to be doing.
Eventually all was explained, and equipped with drums, we went to a warehouse to practice. It was wondered whether it would have been a better idea to let us practice on the actual field (or whatever it is it's called), but that didn't come to pass. The other main thing which didn't come to pass was (apparently) telling the riders that they would be working with children. But more on that later.
When it eventually came time to perform, we stood, with our quaint little approximations of drums, for a very long time as a lengthy (and somewhat unnecessary) storyline was explained to the audience. The one highpoint of this was when the crew radio frequency was merged momentarily with the audience speakers frequency, resulting in this conversational gem.
*back of rider's jacket is pulled off to reveal name*
Organiser: Who is that? Will somebody tell me who that rider is?
Audience: IT'S TODD POTTER *assorted whooping*
And then it came time for us to "march up to the bikes, surround them, and then march off in an orderly fashion".
The only issue with that being the fact that no-one had told the riders that that was how it was going to go down. Imagine their surprise, when as they were kick-starting their bikes, they were suddenly surrounded by SCHOOL CHILDREN, thus constituting MASSIVE OH&S RISK, which they could only ameliorate by riding off AWAY from said children, AS FAST AS THEY POSSIBLY COULD. I use caps lock to give an idea of just how loud their exits were. Which is very.
Anyway, with our job done, we had nothing left to do but get our stuff together and head to the dock where we had been assured there would be a boat waiting to take us back to civilisation.
By now I probably don't need to state the obvious, but I will just for kicks. There was no boat.
And so we sat, for a good hour or so, on the dock, waiting for a boat. In time the boat came, and we returned home, confident in the knowledge that if we ever failed like the organisation of that gig failed, we would all be disembowelled by the conductors. And I say that in the nicest way possible.
Come sunday, much of the band were at Lewisham Public for Spec auditions. This did not deter Katrina from mandating that we would learn the passthrough. Which, for the record, we did. There was also much sectionals of music, which brings me to this:
you were all emailed your parts for Beethoven V. They are to be MEMORISED by the next rehearsal. That doesn't mean you can look at it a bit and then coast, that means you have the entire piece committed to memory, replete with time signature changes and ALL accents. Of which there are many. Learn them all.
In summary: learn your music, practice your 8:5, and whatever you do, stay away from men on large scary looking bikes.
That is all.
