This headline is a palindrome! Why?
Last night we had the first rehearsal of the chamber orchestra that I was invited to join. We played Haydn's Symphony No. 47 in G major. The Minuet and Trio are written "al Roverso", meaning that the minuet is played through once forwards, and then played backwards. The Trio is played the same way, once through forward and then played in reverse. Hence the name, "the Palindrome". If you think sight reading is hard, try sight reading from right to left (although our conductor might have argued that explaining to us what we were supposed to do was harder)!
The first rehearsal was fun! Our conductor wants to keep the group small. We still need a few more players, but he wants 6 first violins, 6 seconds, 4 violas, 4 cellos, 2 basses, 2 oboes, and 2 french horns - 26 for those of you who are counting.
3 comments:
That sounds like fun, and a great exercise in concentration. I had never heard of that symphony before.
I love palindromes. There's one that uses "May" and "Yamaha" but I don't remember it.
"Dennis sinned."
How interesting about the "al Roverso" music.
the hardest part about reading right to left was trying to play the dynamics from right to left. I didn't have much trouble with the notes but I really wanted to play the dynamics from left to right. funny what your brain tries to get you to do!
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