I still can’t wrap my brain around the fact that it’s December already. The beginning of October seems like just last week to me. I’ve been playing in the Oregon Symphony since 1995. Nineteen ninety-five. Sixteen years. How did all of that time go by so quickly? I almost feel like I’ve been on a transcontinental airplane flight all of that time, and my soul, which has been lagging behind me on an invisible tether, is only just now starting to catch up with my body.<\/p>\n
I was 26 when I joined the orchestra (just a week or so before my 27th birthday), and now I’m 43. Did I think I’d still be here back then? I remember in the interview portion of the finals of my audition (they used to do that for all candidates in auditions back then), James DePriest asked me where I saw myself in five years’ time. I don’t really recall what I said, other than that I was savvy enough to know that the answer “anywhere but here” was not the right one to say. I guess I figured that I’d earn tenure here and then try to move up the ladder to an orchestra with more prestige and better pay. And I did try. Came close a couple of times – heartbreakingly close in one case a couple of years ago.<\/p>\n
It’s interesting to think about what might have been once you get to a certain point in your life – and there’s literally no point too far back in one’s personal history that’s off limits, at least for me. I wonder if I should have taken one of those Marlboro Festival auditions that I was always too scared and (conveniently) unprepared to take each year, even though lots of people said I should have done so. I wonder if I should have taken the plunge with the Ethos Quartet and taken on professional management when the opportunity arose, even with the personnel issues we were having at the time. I wonder what would have happened if I’d been offered that position with the Mendelssohn Quartet that I auditioned for back in ’95. There are no answers for such musings, however. Only more questions, more permutations, more uncertainty.<\/p>\n
I find myself more and more convinced, however, that I’m not a ‘lifer’ in the orchestra arena. As much as I love my colleagues and the great music we make together, I feel very much that at some point, there will need to be a change. I don’t know what that change will entail. There’s a temptation to embrace change at certain intervals or round numbers. The violist and new music specialist Garth Knox said to me once that he liked to upend his professional life every seven years. He played in the Ensemble Intercontemporain, the Arditti Quartet, and then embarked on a solo career – each of seven years duration. On the other hand, there is the appeal of saying that twenty years and out is the way to go. It matches with the military retirement scheme (not altogether an inapt analogy) and the gold watch of corporate worlds past. But it, too is a line in the sand, and perhaps is too inflexible and unyielding. In the end, however, it remains up to me what to do and when to do it.<\/p>\n
So, today I put it out into the universe: what’s next? I’m ready to explore.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I still can’t wrap my brain around the fact that it’s December already. The beginning of October seems like just last week to me. I’ve been playing in the Oregon Symphony since 1995. Nineteen ninety-five. Sixteen years. How did all of that time go by so quickly? I almost feel like I’ve been on a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":303,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-orchestra-world"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa8kC-1QI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2249,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2009\/03\/25\/financial-woes-in-cleveland\/","url_meta":{"origin":7112,"position":0},"title":"financial woes in cleveland","author":"Charles Noble","date":"March 25, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Now, another Big Five orchestra is facing some serious belt-tightening, this time the Cleveland Orchestra (on the heels of the Philadelphia Orchestra): The Cleveland Orchestra said Tuesday it plans a series of \"broad and deep\" cuts in response to the financial crisis, another sign that not even great cultural institutions\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "recession"","block_context":{"text":"recession","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/recession\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":191,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2007\/02\/01\/colorado-symphony-signs-new-deal\/","url_meta":{"origin":7112,"position":1},"title":"colorado symphony signs new deal","author":"Charles Noble","date":"February 1, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"From the Rocky Mountain News: Colorado Symphony officials today announced the ratification of a three-year contract with the musicians of the orchestra. The deal marks the first multi-year agreement since a five-year contract expired in 2003; single-year extensions had been approved since then. The new contract, which runs through the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "the orchestra world"","block_context":{"text":"the orchestra world","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/the-orchestra-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":78,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2006\/09\/24\/smells-like-team-despirited\/","url_meta":{"origin":7112,"position":2},"title":"smells like team (de)spirit(ed)","author":"Charles Noble","date":"September 24, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"What does make an orchestra \"good\" or \"bad\" or \"mediocre\" or \"great\"? It seems like it should be a simple matter: better orchestras play with more precise and adaptable rhythm, pitch and dynamics than lesser orchestras do. But we've all been to a Big Five orchestra concert which was severely\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "the orchestra world"","block_context":{"text":"the orchestra world","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/the-orchestra-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":199,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2007\/02\/05\/concerts-with-perlman\/","url_meta":{"origin":7112,"position":3},"title":"Concerts with Perlman","author":"Charles Noble","date":"February 5, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"photo credit: sophie yao - the oregonian First of all, here is the nicely written review by James McQuillen of the Oregonian. I'd say McQuillen hit the nail pretty much on the head. It would have been nice to hear more of Perlman's playing - it really was the draw\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "the orchestra world"","block_context":{"text":"the orchestra world","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/the-orchestra-world\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":179,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2007\/01\/25\/the-future\/","url_meta":{"origin":7112,"position":4},"title":"the future","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 25, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Lately I've been picking through old clippings of mine as well as albums of photographs and the like. It is an interesting time, to be on the cusp of 40 as a classical musician. You are neither the new young hotshot nor the seasoned veteran. 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