I am Musician Clark. I play flute and saxophone and have been in training
for nearly two years.
Monday
Monday morning and one with a difference. Although there are the usual post weekend blues it is made slightly more bearable knowing that long weekend starts on Friday. In fact long weekend is an understatement; as we've got 5 days off. As usual there was a PT session. I'm injured so didn't join in with the planned PT but reports back were that it was exhausting. We quickly got back into our practice routine as most of the school were having assessments this week. The flute class were back into normal warm ups while Musn Hall was swapping her flute for a violin. After many battles with it, some won, some lost, things seem to be looking up for her. Hope you get used to the scratchy sound for a while! A very small Concert Band was let out towards the end of the day to play for the Archbishop of Canterbury at St Ann's Church on the Naval Base. We do get some VIP gigs! The day finished with us preparing for rounds.
Tuesday
Tuesday and we were all up at the crack of dawn (well not exactly) to make our beds and clean for our inspection. Our flute professor comes in on a Tuesday for our lesson and she helped us iron out any major problems ready for our assessments the following day. I spent the rest of the day playing my saxophone trying to find a piece to play in my term 5 exams. After what seemed like a never ending day the flute class was let out. The School of Music had been given the evening off orchestra to go and see James Galway play at the Guildhall. There were mixed reports about the evening but it was enjoyed and has shown us what we need to work on in our playing.
Wednesday
The morning started with Parade Band. The rest of the day was a normal routine and I finished the morning with my flute assessment which could have gone better… and could have gone a lot worse. There was a sigh of relief when lunchtime came. It is amazing how much half a day away from the school can do for us, even if it is taken up with RT.
Thursday
Thursday and another PT session. Today was a run to Southsea and a circuit
on the common. We had the CDT (Compulsory Drug Team) in today which disrupted
the morning's practice. After we had all lost any sense of practice we launched
into the afternoon routine. Cpl Williams from Portsmouth Band was doing a conducting
diploma and was being examined. We all tried our best for him. We carried on
till the end of the day and had a Concert Band rehearsal that evening. There
was a lot of new music in the packs for the concert and the evening was spent
getting us used to the music. Musn Imm went through the Artie Shaw Clarinet
Concerto and played it really well. Tonight was also Musn Allen's first rehearsal
on alto sax. Glad to see you've come to join us now Clare. The evening saw most
of Training Company hit the town to celebrate going on long weekend.
However before going home we had an hour of Parade Band. I'm surprised how straight
the lines were considering how much everyone was suffering from the night before.
We spent the next hour cleaning and then getting our leave passes ready for
the weekend.