Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums EVENTS! Piano Concerts, Recitals, Competitions, and Workshops Live Gig with Lea Salonga

I'm primarily a music producer, and my playing happens 98% of the time in my own studio, or as a hired player on rhythm or orchestra sessions in the Indianapolis area.

I got a call recently to play piano with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra on a "Pops" series concert featuring Lea Salonga. I took the gig, but was pretty freaked out about doing it - I almost never do live gigs, some of the music was rather difficult, and I'm definitely NOT used to playing time later than the conductor is indicating, as do most orchestras, to varying degrees! It really messed with my head delaying my playing perhaps 50-100 milliseconds in relation to the visual direction from conductor Jack Everly. I'm glad I did it, but it was incredibly challenging!

Way to go getting it done. I've done all kinds of gigs that stretched me, this sounds like a good one.

What exactly is a "Pops" series concert? Is that exclude classical as I'm wondering what the "pops" stands for?

Congrats on a job well done to by the way!

"Pops" is short for popular, which typically may include some light classical, or none at all. Think 'Boston Pops'. In this case it was all Broadway tunes.