The rehearsal and rehearsal dinner were last night. The church looks beautiful. Simple, but elegant. This morning, besides writing this post, I’m doing last-minute run-throughs on the piano of Debussy’s Clair de Lune and Liszt’s Liebestraum and Rachmaninoff’s Eighteenth Variation from “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini” and Reverie (Debussy again) and Albert Hay Malotte’s The Lord's Prayer and Bach-Gounod’s Ave Maria on which I am accompanying one of the violinists (who are also playing Dona Nobis Pacem and Bach’s Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring and Pachelbel’s Canon in D, all unaccompanied). This is going to be quite a wedding. There are trumpets in there, too, when Meredith, the bride, makes her entrance.
I also need to run through some of the dreamy, romantic music for the reception one more time: Stardust, All the Things You Are, The Way You Look Tonight, Love Is A Many-Splendored Thing, The Nearness of You, When I Fall In Love, If I Loved You, and while we have the italic font all warmed up, et cetera, et cetera, ad infinitum. I have to polish my black shoes to wear with the tuxedo (I don’t have patent leather), take the dog to his favorite doggie-dude-ranch (a 40-minute round trip) as we will be going out of town for three days early tomorrow morning, wash our clothes for the trip, shower, wash my hair (not much to do there), shave, and dress. The wedding is at 4:30 p.m. and the prelude music begins at 4:00 or thereabouts, so we have to leave home before 3:00 so that I can run through the piece with the violinist one more time.
For the rehearsal dinner, the groom’s parents picked one of the best restaurants in town. The building formerly housed a funeral home. I kid you not. We ate shrimp and grits (don’t laugh; it’s a southern main dish and it was scrumptious!) but the water smelled a little like formaldehyde (now you can laugh).
And I’m sitting here at the computer taking a fifteen-minute break from the piano. Mrs. Rhymeswithplague is working on her hugely intricate counted-cross-stitch that uses 53 colors. Fortunately, Jeannelle turned off comments on her blog today, so I can return to practicing the piano now with my “Must Reply” switch in the off position.
This has been One Day In The Life Of Rhymeswithplague (with apologies to Ivan Denisovich and also Aleksandr Solzhenitzyn), and it’s not over yet. In fact, it’s just beginning.
Well, my fingers are hardly what you would call rested, but I hear the ivories calling my name.
(Note to myself: Try to use fewer parenthetic expressions.)
Wow, I had no idea weddings nowadays were so much work! And so unintentionally funny. Trumpets when the bride enters... shrimp and grits in a funeral home... My graphic artist husband did the programs and invitations for a cowboy wedding once, what a hoot! Wasn't supposed to be, of course. All about lassoing the love of his life so they could travel the trail together... the alliteration alone was hilarious. Well, the music for this one sounds lovely at least!
ReplyDeleteI hope the wedding goes well, . . . and have a good trip afterward. Smokey sends slurps to Jethro.
ReplyDeleteI would love to hear you play. I love the piano and can play but not like you. I only play in my spare time and you know the old saying...practice makes perfect. I have to say I certainly never practiced enough to be perfect. I just want to be a concert pianist without having to do the work to get there. Ha!
ReplyDeleteYou should grace us with a video or audio recording.
Very enjoyable post! Oh......I do wish you could tape some of your piano playing and post it on your blog for us to hear!
ReplyDeleteBelieve it or not, my mom used to fix grits for us quite often. I loved it! With butter.....m-mm!
Hope Mr. & Mrs. Rhymsie had a wonderful timesie!! (Sorry, that just popped into my head, but the sentiment is authentic, none-the-less!)