Violin Concert

So, a few weeks ago, there was this violin concert.

What that means is that the 3rd graders who are taking violin all give a concert, playing through a number of tunes they have learned so far. And their wonderful teacher has them al playing the same notes at the same time.

I never realized it until recently, but a lot of people can't tell if they're playing off pitch. A lot of people can't tell if they are singing off pitch. Some people can't even match a pitch, which is to say if I sing a note, they aren't able to sing it back. I mention this because the violin is a string instrument, and it is entirely possible to be playing a note that is an "in-between" note, and by that I mean a not that is not written on our musical scale. Something in-between the E and the F, for example. There's no note there on the piano, but it's still possible to live there, like a hidden Harry Potter house of musical clutter.

Anyway, the kids all played these songs together, and they were really good! And then some students signed up for solos. Nick signed up for one. I didn't ask him to, I didn't even know they could, but he did. It turned out that anyone who wanted to could sign up and play a solo, and usually they were songs the whole violin orchestra had just played as a group moments before. Fifteen kids played "Merrily We Roll Along" which is just another version of "Mary Had A Little Lamb" but was called something else because of copyright issues, although I didn't realize Mary felt that way.

Anyway, Nick had a solo, and it wasn't "Merrily We Roll Along". It was "Seminole Chant" from his Essential Book Of Violin.

Here it is:

It's cut off at the end because I wanted to clap right away. So what you don't see or hear is the teacher commenting to all assembled that "that was the Rock Star Version." He might have been referring to the fact that Nick was playing at twice the speed the whole class played it at. Or maybe the hair?