Finally! I sit down to write my first blogpost…
I never saw myself as a writer and I still don’t, but riding around on my bikes in Cape Town, being the principal player of the Cape Town Philharmonic orchestra and lecturer at UCT every week is an adventure and there are always interesting moments so I thought I’d start writing them down. If not for others to enjoy I will have created a sort of diary for myself.
My blog will feature last week’s adventures and what’s on the schedule for next week and I will aim to post once a week at the end of the one and start of the next… (good intentions! )
So here we are, midweek… great start! 😉
Last week was another busy one for the orchestra. We played our last symphony concert of the Spring Season on Thursday evening … this is where I’m thinking:’ What did we play again’ (musicians have the worst memory!) …. think think think … oh right, Dvorak’s 8th Symphony and Saint Saens’ violin concerto with our own Avigail Bushakevitz who now lives with her family in Berlin. We had Bernhard Gueller back conducting us after we spend 2 weeks with a Belgian conductor who kept on talking Vlaams mixed with a word or two of Afrikaans to us and most of the orchestra had seriously no idea what he wanted, but we had 2 beautiful concerts with him so the language of music sorted that out.
On `Saturday we played one of my favourite concerts of the year: The Youth Music Festival. And this year my student Kyle Smith represented the double bass playing the Burlesque by Allan Stephenson (the one I played last year in the CPO Summer Season) so it was even more exciting than usual! I love this concert because every year we get to work with young talent (youngest being 10) and we see them grow over the years. I remember Avigail playing with us as a teenager and now she is a worldwide soloist.
On Sunday I took the Suzuki Katana out for a lovely ride to Franschhoek where I tried out a Suzuki Hayabusa at the Suzuki demo day. Yep..that’s one fast bike, but also seriously uncomfortable for me so I was glad to ride home on the Katana again! But at least I can now say I have ridden a Busa!
This week we focus on the communities in Cape Town and the CPO will be playing concerts in Artscape and Athlone with showy, entertaining pieces and making many smiles on faces young and old. My students are preparing for their upcoming exams and the Bass Jam lunch concert at UCT on 12 October in C7 at college.
Please check the calendar for upcoming concerts and events!
To be continued … 🙂
Roxane Steffen 