I had something kind of cool happen yesterday, but it's a bit of a tale to get to the punchline. I have programmed an Oratorio for December 21 at the church I music direct for. We had the choral octavios, but not the orchestral parts, so I called Sheet Music Service here in PDX and was told the orchestration was $150 (!!--usually these things are about $60). Anyhoo, I cleared that I had that much in my music account and placed the order, waited three weeks, they finally called, and I went in with my little church check and picked up the music. I was on my way out of the store with the packet under my arm when the saleslady said, "Oh wait! I need to print you an invoice--you have a balance due!" "Balance due?" I asked in shock. "That score is $250," she replied. I told her I had been quoted $150, which was bad enough, and there was no way I was going to pay $250. I walked back, set the score down and literally ripped the church check off of her clipboard, thanked them and left.
I then decided maybe I'd just get the accompaniment CD, went to the publisher's site and was shocked to see that it was $80! $80 for a CD, can you believe it? So I alerted the church orchestra and office that I would simply program an orchestral piece and have just piano accompaniment for the Oratorio.
So I went in to the music library last night to start sorting through orchestral scores. There's this huge bookcase on wheels in there full of stuff that's just been thrown in on shelves for years and years and I went through everything and sorted it by instrumentation, etc. I was about to leave and a little voice said "look behind the bookshelves," so I lugged this huge piece of furniture out away from the wall and, lo and behold, there were stacks of music behind there that had obviously been there for years, all covered in dust and in various states of disarray.
And what should be in the pile? You guessed it--the orchestral parts and conductor's score for the Oratorio.
Was that the longest story ever?
