All-State Orchestra

This last weekend Susanna got to participate in the All-State Orchestra which performed at Abravanel Hall in Salt Lake City. She auditioned in the fall and submitted the recording online. Then a few weeks later she found out that she made it in. It was a big orchestra--48 violins and about 120 players in the whole orchestra. She was a first violin and was 9th stand.

They did a few regional rehearsals for a few weeks before but their first rehearsal all together was on Thursday afternoon. They practiced for about 4 hours. Then Friday they practiced all day and then again on Saturday for a couple of hours.

Their program was Adagio for Strings by Barber (I played this in college and it's really beautiful), Symphonic Dances from West Side Story (I think I played this but I'm not sure when), and "Red Dust" by a contemporary composer who was commissioned by the Utah Symphony to compose this piece about Utah. Their conductor was a young man, on the faculty at USC, who was very energetic. They did a good job and we enjoyed listening.

Here is Susanna standing with Eliza Smith, the daughter of a good friend of mine since our college days in the BYU music program.

I'm not sure if Susanna will be able to do this again. She's not sure if she will have room in her schedule for school orchestra and you have to be in school orchestra to audition. But I hope she will. I have good memories of All-State Orchestra from my own high school years and it was a good experience.

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