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True blue
Orchestra is loyal to the classics
Robin McKee, associate principal flutist for the San Francisco Symphony. "It's always exciting to do these (Keeping Score) shows, although having a robotic camera zooming up in your face does add a new level of stress when you're playing."Courtesy
By JAMES D. WATTS JR. World Scene Writer
Published: 10/13/2009 2:22 AM
Last Modified: 10/13/2009 8:51 AM
When Robin McKee knew she was going to appear on television, her first thought was about nail polish.
McKee, a Tulsa native, has been a member of the San Francisco Symphony for 26 years and now is the orchestra's associate principal flute. And for the past several years, she has decorated her fingernails with a particularly vibrant shade of blue polish.
"You know, when you get a little older, you start doing little things here and there that maybe are a little unexpected," McKee said, laughing. "And I've been doing my nails this way for quite some time.
"But when the orchestra was preparing to do the next program in the 'Keeping Score' series on Charles Ives, and I knew that I would going to be on camera during the performances, I thought seriously about losing the blue nail polish."
However, McKee was encouraged to stay true to the blue by the show's director.
"He was pretty adamant that I didn't change," McKee said.
"It seems that when these programs are shown in schools, one of the things that kids seem to latch onto is the fact that the lady playing the flute has got these bright blue fingernails."
And if that is what it takes to get youngsters interested in classical music, then so be it.
Actually, getting everyone interested in the beauty, the complexity, the history, the personality and the joy of listening to classical music is the purpose of "Keeping Score," the multi-media project of the San Francisco Symphony and its music director Michael Tilson Thomas.
The first series aired on public television stations in 2004, and McKee was one of the orchestra members featured in interviews in the first episode, which detailed the preparations that go into a classical concert — in that instance, the Fourth Symphony by Tchaikovsky.
The new season — which OETA, the state's public television network, will be airing at 1 a.m. Fridays — devotes each of its three segments to a specific work.
The first episode is about Berlioz's "Symphonie Fantastique," in which Tilson Thomas describes how Berlioz's music was at once a love letter to an actress with whom he was infatuated, and a chronicle of the despair of being rejected by her.
Much better — because they deal with subjects of more depth — are the subsequent programs, on Charles Ives' "A Symphony: New England Holidays" (usually known as the "Holiday Symphony") and Dmitri Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5.
McKee grew up in Tulsa, graduating from Rogers High School in 1972 and performing with the Tulsa Youth Symphony.
"Ron Wheeler was a huge influence in my life," McKee said, speaking of the longtime director of the TYS. "I would look forward all week to those rehearsals of the Youth Symphony."
McKee is seen prominently during the program on Ives — her husband, principal flute Tim Day, also is seen on camera a good deal — in part because one of the robotic cameras used to film the episodes glides through the orchestra on a track that is very close to where she sits.
"It's always exciting to do these shows, although having a robotic camera zooming up in your face does add a new level of stress when you're playing," McKee said.
"And then there are the boom cameras that come over the top of the orchestra. The first time the shadow of that camera passed over me, it was really strange — it was like this pterodactyl-like creature was flying around."
While Tilson Thomas travels the world to film segments for the series, for the orchestra it usually means four days of filming, rehearsals and live performances, "which means we have to wear the same clothes for four days," McKee said, laughing.
And while the shows are designed to be educational for the audiences, McKee said the process also ends up being educational for the musicians, as well.
"A lot of the material that Michael (Tilson Thomas) comes up with in his research gets passed along to us in rehearsals," she said.
"If he discovers something new, that gives him a different insight into the composer or the music or the time period, he'll share it with us.
"Some times one of the older members of the orchestra might say, kind of as a joke, 'Tell us a story, maestro.'
"But in reality, those stories give all of us insight into what we're doing. Most musicians spend all their time studying how to play the notes, to keep our performing chops up to speed. These stories we hear help us to make those notes we play more than just notes."
KEEPING SCORE
When: 1 a.m. Friday Oct. 16, 23 and 30
Channel: OETA (KOED channel 11 in
Tulsa)
James D. Watts Jr. 581-8478
james.watts@tulsaworld.com
By JAMES D. WATTS JR. World Scene Writer
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