Out of the frying pan and into the L2Orkistra

So tonight is the final l2ork rehearsal before our showcase tomorrow (at noon) and our sneak preview performance tomorrow night.

Word of mouth is that we’re apparently kind of a big deal.

When I first joined the laptop orchestra on a whim, I had no idea it would generate this much interest.  However, after an impromptu demonstration in my living room during a party, I alone have roped 15+ people into coming to our performance, including two professors (although secretly I think they just want to see the result of what I’ve been whining about having 4 hour rehearsals every night this week…on top of having homework sets, vector calculus exams, oral presentation, and computer music projects on which to work…let me tell you…I’ve gotten about 5 hours of sleep this week o_O;). In fact, everywhere I go, people tell me they’re coming to our performance on Friday.  It’s actually a little nerve-wracking, but I think it’s going to turn out awesome, so no worries.

L2Ork has been an interesting experience, that’s for sure.  It really is like swimming upstream…but in this case the current we’re up against is hundreds of years of musical tradition.  There’s a lot of skepticism about what we do, but if you think about it, all music has to fend for itself on the proving grounds before it becomes widely accepted.  When we started at the beginning of the semester I don’t think any of us knew into what direction we’d take it; in fact, that only seems like yesterday.  It’s actually kind of a weird feeling to simultaneously feel like you’ve just taken your first steps AND being well beyond the event horizon.

This is all very fun for me because I’m not a music student like a lot of the other L2Orkists (I study biology/entomology/math).  I do play piano, so it’s not like I have zero musical experience whatsoever, but I’ve never really performed as part of a real ensemble before.  I did some choir accompaniment in high school as well as a few “keyboard orchestra” performances for the piano program in high school…but most of my musical performance experience has been solo.

Also, apparently we’ve found our way onto Slashdot.  All my friends on IRC knew about this way before we found out (when I geekily chimed in, “My class is on Slashdot!”, I was told, “Welcome to a few hours ago.”)  Well then…I suppose there’s not much else to say but…..Hello, out there internets! ;)

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