Socially Awkward Silences

I would like to address the elephant in the room. You know, that big awkward silence you and I are experiencing right now? Actually, that particular silence is much larger than an elephant. I would prefer an elephant. An elephant would easily break the awkward silence in the room due to its large and rather blundering nature. Not to mention the trumpet it has built into it's nose. Speaking of trumpeting elephants, why do we relate trumpets to elephants and not the trombone? Probably because trumpets are loud and annoying. Like an elephant. Seriously, what is more irritating than an elephant? But I digress.


Because I am an amateur, most of the concerts I have played have required the band to be on stage before any audience members walk in. We use this stage time to warm up.Warming up is different for every section. 


The flutes will practice the least important parts of their music: trills. It is the goal of every flute player to be the center of attention even if they don't have the melody, which means that the trills have to be loud. Really loud.Trumpet players generally try to see who can play the loudest and highest. Why? Either because they want to destroy their lips before the concert or because they need yet another ego boost. The oboe(s) (preferably no "s") will attempt to tune for no apparent reason. The euphoniums make gurgling noises through their instrument because it's fun, and then look around arrogantly. The clarinets don't play their instruments. They do math problems on the their music stands. The tubas try to see how many shoes they can fit into the bell of the biggest tuba while someone plays it. The bassoons chat with each other in Wookiee...or maybe they're just trying to play their instruments. The percussion beat everything in sight as loud as they can. The horns practice off-beats without a metronome. Trombones spray each other with their spray bottles (those things aren't really for slide maintenance). I don't know what the saxes do. I try to ignore their existence. 

Basically, it gets REALLY loud in the auditorium or theater or whatever. 


Usually, when the audience begins trickling in, the band warm-up routine does not stop. In fact, it tends to get louder because the flutes want to hear themselves over the chatter of the crowd. Utter chaos begins, and the audience is happy to sit through the mess until the concert because parents will listen to anything. 


the band gets louder
                      and LOUDER
                             and louder
                         and LOUDER
                             and louder
                         and LOUDER

                            AND THEN SUDDENLY,

silence

A fish could drop and everyone would hear it.

The crowd looks up expectantly, but the conductor does not walk onto the stage. Upon examination of their respective timekeepers, the audience realizes that the show doesn't start for another 7 minutes. Yet the silence lingers and no one is brave enough to break it. 


This puts everyone in an awkward position. The audience is wondering when they can start chatting without appearing rude, and the musicians are hoping that SOMEBODY! LORD! ANYBODY! will begin to continue warming up. 


After about 30 seconds of the most excruciating awkward silence imaginable, a tuba lets out a large BLAT. This brings the grateful band back to it's warm up routine.  


Six minutes and thirty seconds later, the conductor walk onto the stage and starts the band. The concert is wonderful no matter how bad the band plays because everyone is remembering the awkward silence that preceded it. 


So maybe the silence only happens to really bad bands. It's a defense mechanism for a bad concert. It reminds the audience that they could be sitting through the most painful silence in the world if the band stops playing.


By now the reader has noticed that there has not been a conversation in this post yet. I don't want to disappoint, so here is what trombonists talk about during the 45,969,643,223,456,6fj,skfjgusj67ww9fsf4fs5r measures of rest they have at the beginning of every piece they play.


Trombone 1(T1): "Do you think I could fling this booger into the audience from here?"
Snarky Euphonium Player (SEP): "Do you think you could possibly be any more immature?"
Trombone 2(T2): "Dude. Try and hit my mom."
Trombone 3(T3): "No. Go for the sound guy."
T1: "But that seems like such a waste..." looks admiringly at the booger and finally eats it.
SEP: "Ewh."
T2: "Awesome!"
T3: "Was it good?"
T1: "Ehhh. Average."
Tenor sax turns around to remind the trombones that they enter in 2 measures. 
Trombones ignore him because it's fun to make saxes angry. 
Conductor doesn't notice that the trombones did not enter.
Euphonium glares at trombones.
T2: "You think you could find another one for the tenor sax?"
T1: Digs in nose. "Yep."

That concludes this post. I hope it was utterly horrifying.

A few announcements:
1. I got a twitter. SAWKtrombone is the name.
2. Musicians need a side hobby, so I'm testing one out. Model ship building. I don't know why I told you this.

-The Socially Awkward Trombone