How does it feel to be in an orchestra

In the little time I've been part of my orchestra I've always wanted to share my thoughts on how does it feel to be in one.

I say my orchestra because everyone's realities are different and this is the way I experience it.

Leaving aside this informal preface, I'm going to tell you how did I end up in one

Since I was little I always felt an attraction to music, I wanted to be in an orchestra, after an extensive search I found the national system of orchestras here in Venezuela (El sistema nacional de orquestas) which is an organization created with the purpose of giving musical education to anyone interested in receiving it.

This organization has many centers across the country called "nucleos", I choose the one closest to my location and I registered there.

Initially I wanted to play saxophone, but I'm sure you know that saxophones don't normally exist in an orchestra, the closest thing to a saxophone was a clarinet but there was no professor available thanks to the country social/economic/political situation. Finding teachers (and also good ones) was hard work for the directive.

I joined in guitar waiting for a clarinet teacher to arrive, everytime that I went to my classes I heard the instruments being played in the orchestra and one grabbed my attention: The big violin (just kidding) The cello. There was a cello teacher so I decided to play one, I saw my classes and voila, that's how I ended up in my orchestra.

My first rehearsal

I was lost and nervous, for some reason, I felt the need to prove myself, It had been four months since I started learning the cello with the help of my professor (Which sadly left me because he needed to go to Chile, thanks again, Venezuela)

I remember perfectly the first piece that they played in that rehearsal, it was mission impossible (Yeah, in that moment they were practicing repertoire about movie songs) and in my first rehearsal, I realized many things:

The stress

Everything in the orchestra has to be "On the beat" no second less or more, you play a little bit late or afterwards and maybe the whole orchestra has to start all over again because of you in the same measure

Then the stress begins to creep up, the musician has to count in his mind non-stop the pulses of every measure, without losing track of it once, because doing it would be getting lost in a musical labyrinth, with a bunch of instruments playing around you, it would be overwhelming.

The "wataqueo"

I don't know this is called in your country, but in mine, playing by memory without counting in your head, depending solely on your memory it's called "wataca"

Wataquing (Yeah, i tried to translate wataquear into english HAHAHA) in many ocasions can be great, no one is going to be counting the pulses in every measure in their head when they're jamming with their friends, but here doing that is the equivalent of being a medic and giving paracetamol to someone in the middle of a cardiac arrest.

Yeah, maybe you can get away with it, but eventually people will notice that you're doing it, specially on moments that require certain rhythmic "precision" to play

The responsibility

It may be usual that the audience misses on some mistakes when every instrument in the orchestra is playing at the same time, but in orchestral pieces that's not always the case.

Sometimes someone will be playing alone being the center of attention and sometimes the responsibility of playing an important melody of the piece falls on a complete line of instruments and making a mistake will be noticeable by the audience

Sometimes you have that responsibility and it's big if you care about your partners and the overall public image of the orchestra.

The determination

You have to go everyday if it's possible and study everytime you can the repertoire (and also the technique of your instrument) to be prepared for the rehearsal

But, sometimes, you don't have the opportunity to do it, you can't plan everything so...

Sight reading

Sight reading: "Is the reading and performing of a piece of music or song in music notation that the performer has not seen before." (Thanks Wikipedia)

An essential skill that every orchestra musician should have, if you're interested in forming part of one, you should be developing this skill, the musicians that already have practiced sight reading have a great advantage over those who haven't, because besides being able to be a little bit lazy with your practice and just go and sight read your way out of a rehearsal, your capacity of learning pieces in general will improve.

Individualism doesn't exist

If you like to be the center of attention I'm sorry to tell you that you're in the wrong place, here every musician is united to create something together, without discriminating ones and highlighting others, everyone is part of the same ship.

You have to accept the fact that you're part of a mission that's bigger than you, that goes beyond your ego and thirst for fame.

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Final words

Being in an orchestra is an experience that you experiment once in your life if you're a musician, playing in a concert and being part of something bigger than you (like i said before) that goes beyond you, playing pieces of giants in the music world that have survived the test of time thanks to their compositions that are still being played today it's a great experience.

Sadly, I'll leave my days in the orchestra to follow my own music (And that means also leaving my cello, el sistema lent me the instrument, they didn't give it to me, sadly) because balancing that, my studies and my music is getting more complicated everytime

I met great and talented people, that had less time than me in this world and were really commited to be the good at what they do, people which I hope to find in my future as a musician.

I still remember the first time that I played my cello, it was overwhelming, after some time I started getting more confident with it until I reached a point which fear turned into pleasure. Nevertheless, I still feel there's a long way ahead for me as a cellist, there's a lot of things that I don't know and I must learn.

The truth is that learning an instrument is eternal, you'll never learn to play 100% your instrument and you can always improve a little bit everytime, and that's the beauty of it.

I hope that in a future I can afford to buy a cello (If the economic situation in my country improves) and I can still follow my career as a cellist, for now, I'm more interested that my guitar and voice bring music to the world.

Thanks for reading!