RTOOT’s winter 2009 concert was held at Reynolds Theatre on the Duke University campus. It was also billed as a fund-raiser for Toys for Tots, the program sponsored by the US Marines to collect and distribute toys to children who might not have any. A magnificent crowd of over 400 turned out to see the latest and greatest RTOOT extravaganza.
There are DVDs available of this concert -- just send us an email!
The program started out with the Duke fight song and concluded with a medley of Christmas songs, all rendered by the crowd, led by Florence Peacock and Philip van Leith de Jeude.
Also featured was the Suite No.1 or No. 2 (there was some debate) from Georg Fredric Handel’s Water Music. In the third movement, apparently the parts were switched because twice the orchestra began playing the most god-awful noise one could imagine. Then violist Genie Haley noted that (for some mysterious reason) she was playing from the french horn part. The horns had the bassoon parts and the bassoons had the flute parts and the first violins had the trombone parts and -- well, you get the idea. After a great flurry of exchanging parts, the concert continued and Handel never sounded so great.
Victor Herbert’s delightful “March of the Toys” from Babes in Toyland was next up, as conducted by assistant conductor Michael Lyle. This complemented quite well the enormous pile of toys collected in the lobby.
Final work on the first half of the program was a suite from the musical Oklahoma! This was a rather long work, including all the favorite tunes from the musical: “Surrey with the Fringe on Top”, “Pore Jud is Daid”, “ Oh What a Beautiful Morning”, “Kansas City”, and of course “Oklahoma”.
After intermission, the RTOOT strings appeared in an abbreviated version of American in Paris. French taxicab horns were not available and so the percussion section made do with Michael Czeisberger’s old bicycle horn.
Strings continued in the performance of Tchaikovsky’s “Valse” from the Serenade for Strings. It is hoped that some day the orchestra members will have the skill to master another movement of this classic piece.
Comic relief was provided by the brass section in Johann Strauss’ Blue Danube Waltz: during the “Grand Pause” the brass treated the audience to a rousing bronx cheer.
The concert concluded with an audience singalong of Christmas songs such as Deck the Halls and Jolly Old St. Nicholas. The lyrics of the final song, “What Band is This” were created by members of the orchestra and sung to the tune of “Greensleeves”.
Soon thereafter, a great number of people were observed leaving Reynolds Theater and removing the earplugs that had been generously provided by RTOOT.