I spent 6 years playing clarinet in the Summer Pops Youth Orchestra (SPYO) before I fled East to attend University. Having played piano for as long as I can remember and being completely under the control of music, spending my summers in the orchestra was fucking brilliant. Every year newbie hopefuls would audition for the conductor and returning members re-auditioned for their position. By summer the selected would gather at a rehearsal hall and form a 100+ piece orchestra (in recent years the numbers have decreased dramatically). We weren't a strictly traditional orchestra (hence being called a pops orchestra) and we welcomed any kind of instrument. We would spend two intense weeks getting cohesive and learning pieces, we practiced together, in sectionals, and then as a group again every day. At lunch we would all troupe to the closest park and play 100 person soccer games with up to 5 soccer balls on a standard field. After these two weeks, we would play a couple of local concerts and then a selection of players are invited to go on tour. The only year I didn't get invited was my first, but I never missed one after that. Two busloads of kids would set out from Vancouver and travel around BC and Alberta playing 1-2 concerts a day. We all had assigned duties like Sound Crew, Set Up Crew, Luggage Crew etc., and the most prestigious, the Truck Crew of which I was a member. These summers were amazing, I honed my skills on my own instrument and learned how to play countless others. It was tradition for people to trade off instruments and teach each other how to play them. I often ended up playing bass clarinet, the full range of saxophones from soprano to baritone, trumpet, timpanis, etc., fucking fantastic. What's the point of all of this? Guess I just wanted to give a little background before getting to the point. I was of course, actually a clarinet player in the orchestra, and there were only ever a handful of us compared to the overwhelming numbers of say violins or trumpets. Our little row sat right in the middle of everything. We always felt ignored, we never got specific attention, help, compliments, or training. Nothing. It was like being a Westerner in Canada. At first we resented it, we felt like we were just as important as every other member of the orchestra. Soon I realized the benefits of flying under the radar. Besides the fact that we were rarely criticized for our playing (maybe because we were just that good!) the wisdom I passed on to each new member was the following: Every day of rehearsals, every concert, every day on tour, the conductor would select a group by instrument for clean up duty. Basically the chosen ones would sweep through any area we had been in and pick up garbage, you know, the whole leave-it-cleaner-than-when-we-got-there thing. In my six years with the orchestra the clarinet section never got picked, ever. Suckers.
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