I think I’m going to have to change the title of this blog!

Well, it’s been over a year since I posted. Things have changed dramatically. Concerning the title of this blog, there’s been some good news. A new full-time professional orchestra – the Tulsa Symphony Orchestra (http://www.tulsasymphony.org/) – has been organized. We’ve planned a season of six concerts, we’re partnering with other Tulsa arts organizations, we’re raising money, and we’re gearing up to do a massive mailing announcing our premier season. In short – we have a real orchestra in Tulsa! At last!

Best news – I’m working full time for TSO! I’ve been at my new job for about six weeks now. I was approached about doing grantwriting back in March or so. At the time, I put this off, since the upcoming months were a crucial time for grantwriting at my then-employer. Well, things started getting difficult with my supervisor at the Housing Authority. I concluded my supervisor may have been laying the groundwork to push me out. She was setting me up for failure by an excessive workload, no assistance, failing to respond to requests for information, deadlines continually being moved up, nitpicking work to death, and increasingly hostile (to the point of being downright nasty) e-mails – one message going so far as to threaten a write-up. I knew I wasn’t incompetent – as a matter of fact, my previous supervisor had given me consistently favorable performance appraisals. Nevertheless, I also saw the writing on the wall – Robin wanted to get rid of me and put in someone of her own choosing. There was an opportunity for me to move on – Dr. Frank Letcher, the retired neurosurgeon who founded TSO had expressed interest in bringing me on board. Therefore, I decided to “get while the getting was good,” as they say.

More on my ex-boss later – in another post! Suffice it to say that things got even more interesting after I left…

What’s it like working for a symphony orchestra in its infancy? Pretty interesting! There are the inevitable bumps in the road that go along with any start-ups, but the successes are outweighing the negatives. As of today, we’ve accompanied Tulsa Ballet Theater in a highly successful run of Carmina Burana (to the Carl Orff secular oratorio, choreographed by TBT’s own Ma Cong) and Serenade (George Balanchine’s first American ballet, to the wonderful and sadly under-performed Tchaikovsky Serenade for Strings). Jim Watts’ review in the Tulsa World included kudos for the orchestra. Our conductor, Carmen DeLeone (music director for the Cincinnati Ballet) gave high praise for the orchestra. Nevertheless, the heartfelt cheers from the audience as we took our bows after each performance said it best – as well as the comments from parishioners following the Saturday night performance.

Tickets are going very fast, too. We’ve sold in excess of 700 tickets – and this was before any formal marketing campaign got underway! At times, our phone lines have been overloaded with people wanting to buy tickets. Numerous times, after I’ve answered the phone “Tulsa Symphony Orchestra” I’ve heard responses along the lines of “It’s so good to hear that!”
Tulsans are hungry for a professional symphony orchestra. To use an old cliché, the stars are in alignment. It won’t be easy – those things that are of high quality and are truly worth having never come easily – but it will happen. It is happening. And we will not be stopped.

As far as other matters – I’ve been doing some traveling lately! In late August, I went on an Alaska Inner Passage cruise with my mother, and spent two days post-cruise in Seattle. More on the cruise later -- I hope to post pictures as well. And there’s more travel to come! Next summer the Trinity Choir is slated to do a 12-day tour to England. We’ll be singing Evensong and Eucharist at a number of cathedrals, including Ely, Lincoln and York (I think). I’ve never been to England before, so to say I’m looking forward to this trip would be the understatement of the century!

Well, I’m going to have to make a personal discipline of making regular entries to my blog. I’ve lately seen the blog, AKMA’s Random Thoughts, http://akma.disseminary.org/ of Rev. A. K. M. Adam, professor of New Testament at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary and an assisting priest at the wonderful St. Luke’s Parish in Evanston, IL (http://www.stlukesevanston.org/) I’ve also been enjoying the morning meditations on the Daily Office lectionary posted by Rev. Lowell Grisham, the outstanding rector of St. Paul’s, Fayetteville, AR. Fr. Grisham’s meditations can be found at http://www.stpaulsfay.org/id132.html.

I commend both blogs to you – spiritual sustenance offered by two of the best priests (IMHO) in the Episcopal Church today!

Now, I’ve got to think of a new title for my own blog…