About the concert

I meant to take pictures, but things are always so crazy and busy that I didn't dare take out my iPhone for fear that I would put it down and forget about it. Earlier in the day, I left my clarinet in a market when I bought water - I all truthfulness, if given the choice, I'd give up my passport first!! (it's cheaper to replace!) I got my clarinet backs fee minutes later but it was a heart stopper!!

The concert started at 9pm - quite late by American standards, but apprently common for French. We had to wait for the representative from the American consulate to arrive and he was a bit late, so we actually started closer to 915 at night.

The concert started with a ridiculous number of long speeches - mostly in French which meant that most of us on stage could not understand. It was easily closer to 10pm before the actual music began. The group played well. My French friend, Manon, played a clarinet solo (Rossini theme and variations, for my friends who know music). It was good. We had an intermission and then played again.

At the end of the concert, it came time to give gifts - Blue Lake honors all who help with hosting students by bestowing gifts of mugs, plaques and plates. This meant more speeches. We then played our last piece. The audience stood and clapped in unison - this basically means "one more, one more!"... So we played an encore (Stars and Stripes Forever) and they stood and clapped AGAIN, so we played a second encore. It was MIDNIGHT!!

After, the stage had to be cleaned, music collected and instruments put away. This involves getting all instruments, equipment and luggage into the trailer that the bus pulls behind it.

We also had to load boxes and boxes of food for the kids to eat on the bus - they would eat both breakfast and dinner while on the road.

We all said good bye and the bus left at around 1am.
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