Fond du Lac, Wisconsin  U.S.A.

“My first participatory event was playing trombone in the pit band when Theresa Emery directed (the music for) ‘Oliver.’  That was fine, but then the next year John Newman asked me to direct the pit band for ‘Annie.’  And I remember the terrifying experience the first night we had rehearsal because since Theresa directed from the end of the pit, I started to do that as well.  And the first night I couldn’t hear anything from on stage.  You had 15 musicians blowing at you through that concrete pit, and anybody on stage you were trying to lip-read, and I don’t know how Theresa was able to do that.  And so finally John Silah came in to save (me) by finding a thing to put in the top of the stage above the pit that had about a thirty inch square hole for the director to stand up in and direct from the center.  And so we used it for the next several years.  It worked out very well, but I don’t know how I would have survived like Theresa Emery did, unless there were some great monitors there.  But my first night as an orchestra director was very depressing."