NAMM 2020

The time has come again where I drive myself to California for a full week to immerse myself in the music industry.
Each year I attend the NAMM show, I feel like I learn so much. I am grateful that my company allows me to attend each year.

I had a cute little AirBnB rented out in Long Beach area. I was like 15 minutes from Seal Beach. My AirBnB hosts were great, they had a guide on local spots to try. 

I drove to California early Wednesday morning and arrived to my airbnb by 4. 

On my way to Anaheim, I stopped by Long Beach Woodwinds to have them quickly take a look at my Clarinet that has been having some issues. Brian was helpful and gave me a few pointers on what I could do to improve my playing. He suggested that next time I'm in town, I bring both clarinets in and they could see if they could make the nicer one play the way I want it. I definitely recommend them for all woodwind/brasswind repairs in the Long Beach area! 

The first event I attended was the Women at NAMM event where I got to network with some amazing women entrepreneurs and see how SWIM (Smart Women In Music) has grown in the last year. 

 Thursday was the first day at NAMM, like always I walked around the convention center looking at the exhibits and booths. I started with all of the vendors we carry. This year the company did not attend the show, there were a couple of my colleagues there on other businesses. I got to hang out with them and get to know them better. I finished my mentorship with Becky from Pritchard Music in Maryland. She was an amazing mentor & I will continue communicating with her in the future with my career. She's been an inspiration to me as a music educator. I hope someday I can be like her. 

I attended several seminars and workshops for the sake of professional development. Some of my favorite ones were about social media and marketing. That night was the NAMM YP social gathering, I met some really cool young entrepreneurs and got to hang out with my NAMMily adn catch up. I made some new friends I've stayed in contact with and my favorite part of all of this is supporting their projects. 

On Friday, Kevin Lyman (founder of Warped Tour) gave a presentation I got to attend and he talked about IKIGAI and some pointers in running a festival. I got to play with some guitar synths and even met Lars Frederiksen from Rancid!  I learned so much about new products we would be carrying and even more about products we can order. It was definitely worthwhile. 

Saturday, I started the day with attending the Grand Rally for Music Education. Bobby McFerrin  & Gimme5 performed and it was a very unifying performance. They got the audience to interact through call & response rhythms. It was very touching. 

Every year, the Grand Rally for Music Education reminds me why I do what I do. In the ballroom, I am sitting with students, educators and advocates who believe in the power of music. 

I ended the day by going to Downtown Disney and watching Suburban Legends perform. Suburban Legends are one of my favorite third-wave ska bands from Orange County. 

Sunday was my last day in California. I went to Old Town Cafe at Seal Beach for breakfast. The service was splendid and the food was delicious. I had a waffle and hot chocolate. After spending most of the morning at the beach listening to the waves & music, I took a trip up to the Los Angeles observatory. Science is amazing. The observatory is basically a planetarium. There were exhibits on earth and outer space. 

 

When I'm In The Pit

It's been nearly 5 years since I've been in a pit orchestra. Over the course of these last 5 years, I've kept myself busy with other projects like studying at SLCC, playing with the Murray Concert Band and West Jordan City Jazz Band as well as a brief summer as SLCC's Summer Spirit Band's Drum Major-- my experience with music has not been dull.
For as few gigs I play, rehearsals take up a lot of time. I also go to a lot of concerts-- at least once a month. I LOVE MUSIC! When there's no events going on, I get bored and end up finding something else to keep me on my toes. The past couple years school had kept me too busy, but this year I had a free summer.

Pit Orchestra Rehearsal

Herriman Orchestra

The Search Begins:

I grew restless knowing I didn't have any upcoming projects over the summer. My band was on hiatus and I didn't know what was going on with anything else, I found myself with more time than I knew what to do with. For a while I had wanted to return to the theater aspect of performing arts. I had a lot of fun playing in West Side Story and Joseph & The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat in high school. I knew that it was time to find a pit orchestra that would take me. After doing some digging around my community, I came up empty on local theater companies with live orchestras.

One of my friends was playing guitar in a musical, and after the show one night, I got talking with the drummer. In the program her biography listed countless groups she played professionally with. These groups were all pit orchestras.We talked about my frustrations of a lack of local theater companies with live pits, she gave me some pointers and suggestions about where to go from here. She suggested a local company 20 minutes from my house, doing "Joseph & The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" over the summer. I could not be more ecstatic.

I reached out the Arts Council and was pointed in the right direction. It's a community orchestra, with volunteers who just want to play. Luckily, I fit the criteria and had the opportunity to join. 

Trial By Fire:

The Orchestra didn't need more woodwinds, but they did need guitarists. I somehow wound up in a situation where I had agreed to play guitar for them. Being aware that I needed to play guitar, I was in dire need for an upgraded rig. I bought a new Boss Katana 100 amp and a neat Fender Stratocaster to pair with my Taylor GS Mini. Knowing guitar is not my strongest instrument, I decided to take private lessons through a teacher I work with. He was very helpful and willing to explain concepts that were foreign to me. The second I got the music, I went through it and realized it was going to be more work than I thought. I would need to learn a whole new instrument and be able to play it proficiently in five months. Piece of cake, right?
My weekly lessons started before our weekly rehearsals, before I knew it, the full cast rehearsals had begun. In the blink of an eye I found myself at Tech Week. I started freaking out because I realized I didn't know the music. I was playing lead guitar and there were whole songs that I still could not play. I would get home from rehearsal in a panic thinking to myself "I can't do this," and "I should quit now." There were days where I spent three hours practicing and my fingers hurt. Some of the songs were melodic and I couldn't play them to speed, other songs had chords I wasn't familiar with.
My guitar teacher was very nice and encouraging. He told me I could do it, and I had been working hard. Even when I voiced my concerns with some of the orchestra members they told me that "some guitar is better than no guitar at all."
I could do this.

Playout

The shows came and went, and now I sit here one week after closing night thinking about how grateful I am for the opportunity to have played the show. I realize that I'm not sad it's over, because deep down I know that I will always have a home with the Herriman Orchestra whether that's as a guitarist or as a saxophonist.  It's wild to think that all my new friends met me as a guitarist.
I'm glad I did it.  All it took was a leap of faith.

I'm so grateful to have played a show I am familiar with, and love.
It made learning a new instrument a lot easier.