Wednesday Update

Hola
Good day today in Paraguay. Got a great night sleep last night. Got up around 8am and went down and had breakfast and did some score prep for rehearsal today. Went out on a walk around town and did some shopping. Really nice morning for a walk. Came back and got my bag and walked to rehearsal. Had a juice and croissant at a German Bakerai before rehearsal.

Rehearsal went much, much better today, or at least most of it. the last 30 minutes were a bit tough as they were tired again. Started the rehearsal with the 1st and 2nd movement of the Hanson Symphony and we just read those two movements down. they really liked the pieces so I think they will be ready and willing to work on that tomorrow. Then we read through the Star Spangled Banner and America the Beautiful. Really nice arrangements and they played down just fine. Then we went back and played the Hoedown movement from the Rodeo Suite and the librarian had passed out new parts that matched my score. No problems this time. they will really play that well. Then we took our break. I have to give them a 30 minute break in the middle of rehearsal. Then we came back and Gustavo conducted his piece. It is a very nice piece and he did an excellent job. I think they were impressed with his presence on the podium. then we read through the John Williams Summon the Heroes. It went OK, but I don't really care much for the piece so I will probably pull it from the program. Then we finished out rehearsal with going back to rework the Buckaroo Holiday movement from the Rodeo Suite. It is the hardest movement and it probably wasn't that smart of me to do that at the end of rehearsal as they were tired and didn't want to stop that much to fix things. I need to keep that in mind for the rest of the rehearsal schedule. I just need to do easier pieces and just play during the last 30 minutes or so.

Gustavo and I went to the Bolci which is a little coffee/snack shop after rehearsal and had an empanada and coke light. I had another traditional snack but I can't remember what it was called. I think a croquette. Ground meat inside some sort of fried shell. Pretty good. Then we went to another little shop to have a chipa, the most common snack in Paraguay. A corn flour breading is traditional. I had one with four cheeses in it and it was really yummy. I also tried cocio which is a drink made by taking the herbs they use for terrera and mixing them with milk. Very "grassy" tasting to me. didn't care for it much, but at least I can say I tried it.

Then we came back to the hotel and I have been skyping, facebooking, checking email, and blogging for a couple of hours now. There is a big festival going on across the street in the park tonight with live bands, vendors, games, etc. Should be a great time so we are going to go over there and hangout tonight. Probably will go really late so not sure if I will be able to sleep or not due to the noise.

Tomorrow morning at 10am, the Paraguayan soccer team plays in the World Cup, so we moved rehearsal an hour later so everyone could stay home to watch the entire game before rehearsal. The percussionist bought Jim and I Paraguayan soccer jerseys so we will wear those to rehearsal tomorrow if they win. I think the group will enjoy that. Sure hope they win or I could have a pretty depressed group of musicians on my hands.

Going to start rehearsing the chamber music I brought along tomorrow after rehearsal. I have three pieces and Jim has 3 percussion ensemble pieces. We are hoping to do a little chamber music concert next week just for fun. I hope it works but we have to try to get everyone's schedules to work to rehearse the music. That is hard as they all have various things they do before and after rehearsal. We will see how that goes.

Things are good here in Pguay and I hope you are well back in the states. I miss my family mucho, mucho. I certainly enjoy coming down here to do this, but the downside is that I miss my family. Thank god for Skype!!

That is all for now. Have a great day and I will write again tomorrow. Ciao, Ciao