Sigma Alpha Iota

8 Fall 2021 • sai-national.org Music Perfmance By Timothy Christie A Grand Pause (G.P.) is the mother of all rests; coordinated and intentional silence. All of the players in the ensemble cease making sound at the same time and wait. A Grand Pause can be brief, maybe just an eighth or quarter rest. Other times, the silence is much longer, even unmeasured. The expression of silence in musical notation can be as simple as this symbol //, what we musicians call "railroad tracks." Or it can be more imperious, perhaps even more ominous, with the stamp of those two letters, G.P. Good form during a G.P. in most ensembles means keeping one's head up, instrument at the ready; no slouching. The performance is far from over. Silence, it turns out, is among the most poignant of musical gestures. For example, silence defines music itself, framing the beginning and ending of a piece. Encountered in midstream, silence amplifies time— how long is this rest? Alas, it is unmetered. We are in suspense, alert, instruments up, ready to spring back into action when the Grand Pause concludes. Young musicians are taught to "play the rests." At first this simply means counting with purpose, accounting for silence as rhythmically as sound. Later it means something else. There is a universe inside the rest. If one can listen to the rest, experience the rest, live in the rest, sound takes on new meaning. We're in the thick of it, "playing the rest" in perfect ensemble with you. The music continues around us and in us, even in silence. What follows a Grand Pause? With great music the answer is always the same: something really good. It will be dramatic, graceful, devotional, humorous, thunderous and thrilling. And so, we rest, instruments at the ready, like you, eager to resolve the question of "what's next?" When the time comes, we will answer in unison. And it will be thrilling. —Timothy Christie, March 25, 2020 I wrote the essay above the day after I met with the board of the Walla Walla Chamber Music Festival (WWCMF), of which I am the Founder, Executive, and Artistic Director. When I founded the festival in 2007, my title meant that I set up the chairs and didn't get paid. Latterly, the title has come to mean an ever-expanding catalogue of administrative tasks and thankfully, a paycheck. Oh, and I also get to play great chamber music in wine country with a cast of extraordinary musicians from all over North America and beyond. On March 24, 2020, our meeting had only one actionable item, cancellation of the June 2020 festival due to the coronavirus pandemic. I didn't know it then, but the Grand Pause I described in my essay would last a total of 522 days from our final performance of the 2020 Winter festival to our return to the stage on June 22, 2021. How did we spend those 522 days? We played the rest. WWCMF was fortunate. When I wrote to the festival audience to inform them the festival had been cancelled, I assured them we would begin issuing ticket refunds soon. To my great surprise, half of our constituents told me to convert their purchases to donations. With deep appreciation, we sent thank you letters and tax receipts, and refunded the remaining half of sales. Concert halls around the world were closed, and musicians were out of work. However, the generosity and commitment of the WWCMF audience meant I could still hire our musicians and preserve the continuity of our annual festival experience. Like many musical organizations around the globe, we turned to the internet. We cut our teeth on low-production videos using smartphones and rudimentary editing. Our living rooms, bedrooms, and even kitchens served as the stage. That was fine to get us started, but the pandemic only got worse. In July 2020 I met with the board again. We preemptively cancelled the 2021 Winter festival, and approved only the most tentative plans for June 2021. Additionally, we suspended a search to fill a vacant staff position and closed our office in downtown Walla Walla to save rent. The Grand Pause would prove immense. My solution to help WWCMF "play the rests" was to put together a kit of video, audio, and lighting equipment that could be shipped around the country to our sequestered musicians. I called it our mobile recording studio. Consisting of 3 LED light towers, tripods, 3 GoPro cameras, a reasonably high-end audio recorder, and as many lithium-ion batteries as the law would allow, the mobile recording studio weighed 41 lbs. Each month from October 2020 to May 2021, the kit made its way around the country capturing performances by festival artists at every stop. When all was said and done, the kit traveled from Tacoma to New York, Chicago, Boulder, Columbus (GA), Ann Arbor, Charleston (SC) and finally back home to Walla Walla. I also included one of WWCMF's banners that adorn lampposts in downtown Walla Walla during the June festival. At every stop, musicians affixed a local sicker (think, "I ❤ NY!"). When the banners hang once more in downtown Walla Walla, there will be one in particular that helps tell the story of what we did together to play the rests during the Grand Pause of the COVID 19 The Grand Pause, A Chamber Music Festival Amid Global Pandemic CONTINUED ON PAGE 37

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