Faking it...

It's taken many years of practice, but I've become the master at faking it....

Honestly - I really thought I was good at faking until tonight's orchestra rehearsal. For some odd reason they decided to seat me up at the front, beside the concertmaster. This really means nothing in terms of my actual playing ability (which is pretty awful), but meant that I'm under even more scrutiny.

You'd think that under this added pressure I would put more effort into practicing. Obviously it doesn't - and as a result, I'm probably only able to play about 60% of the music. Even with that, I'm sure most of those notes are off by at least a tone.

In the last few weeks of rehearsals, I've gotten extremely good at following the concertmaster and imitating his movements. As a result, I look like I know what I'm doing. And with over 10 other players in my section, I can usually play quietly enough that my wrong notes remain quite hidden.

That is until tonight when my worst nightmare struck. The conductor in a purely sadistic, evil gesture, decided that we would play one by one, a particularly difficult passage in front of the entire orchestra.

...I'm still scarred by the experience.

I may even pick up my violin this week and practice.