It’s Christmas Time in the ‘Burgh…

via Steelers.com

…and I’m in Colorado, visiting some of the grandkids. There will be posts, but I’m going to be looking around for some outside assistance. The Steelers apparently anticipated this need, because they posted a great video. I’m sorry I can’t embed it—you’ll have to click here.

This is a don’t-miss! Yes, it is the “Pittsburgh Symphony.” (Actually it is a quartet plus a flute player.) I don’t know about the others, but cellist Anne Martindale Williams, who is the principal cello for the Symphony (top of the depth chart : ) is a huge Steelers fan. Back before I was into the Steelers I attended a program in town which had been scheduled for months on a Sunday afternoon in January. It just happened to coincide with a Steelers playoff game. Anne came out all in black, took her chair, and got ready to play. She then whipped out a Terrible Towel, ostentatiously did a little “cleaning”, (a mere excuse for making sure everyone saw what it was) and then draped it casually over one edge of her cello.

The video isn’t a straight-up performance—it is clips of some of the pieces. The first one featured none other than Cameron Heyward on bass, as you see above. (He is getting some quick coaching from the actual bass player.)

I’m guessing he had some lessons about 15 years ago, enough to remember how to hold the bass and the bow, but not much more. He was not a success. It was a bit like St. Peter—he was sinking, yes, but at least he got out of the boat in the first place. Apparently no one else wanted to give it a try.

At one point the first violinist asked for some volunteers, and Tomlin made it clear there would be some. They played percussion, with varying success. It isn’t as easy as it looks.

Anyhow, it’s lots of fun. Enjoy!

 

4 comments

  • I highly recommend another video that is on Steelers.com. Let me say at the outset that Rebecca might find the content offensive in that it can only be described as a desecration of music. However, if you can get beyond that, then check out the Steelers Christmas Carol video, with special attention to the linebackers and James Harrison leading them in Santa Claus is Coming to Town. Harrison doing a great Deebo imitation. He and the linebackers perform with a hilarious sense of menace. When Deebo says you better not pout, you better not cry, he means it.

    Like

  • cold_old_steelers_fan

    I have sat outside many music circles where the musicians varied in quality from truly awful to concert quality classically trained and I have to say the greatest failures often involved people who thought they could, without asking before hand, add their special touch when it comes to percussion. They seemed to not get that they had neither a sense of rhythm nor appropriateness. An improperly tuned instrument or voice seems to be easier to find and correct (or expunge as the case may be) for some reason.

    Liked by 1 person

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out / Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out / Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out / Change )

Google+ photo

You are commenting using your Google+ account. Log Out / Change )

Connecting to %s