# What was the Most Rewarding Experience You've had in Music?



## Rodney Money (Sep 9, 2015)

What was the most rewarding experience you've had concerning music?
~Rod


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## EastWest Lurker (Sep 9, 2015)

In 1970, I was in the Boston Conservatory of Music chorus and with the Boston Conservatory orchestra we performed the Brahms Requiem in a beautiful old church. Our conductor, the late Rouben Gregorian (who taught me more about the spirit of music than anyone) said to me afterwards with his Armenian accent, "My boy, in the second movement I looked up and I saw the expression in your face and I was inspired."

I have been in the music business now for over 40 years and it is still the compliment I treasure in my heart most.


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## Rodney Money (Sep 9, 2015)

EastWest Lurker said:


> In 1970, I was in the Boston Conservatory of Music chorus and with the Boston Conservatory orchestra we performed the Brahms Requiem in a beautiful old church. Our conductor, the late Rouben Gregorian (who taught me more about the spirit of music than anyone) said to me afterwards with his Armenian accent, "My boy, in the second movement I looked up and I saw the expression in your face and I was inspired."
> 
> I have been in the music business now for over 40 years and it is still the compliment I treasure in my heart most.


Beautiful story! Thank you for sharing.


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## Dean (Sep 9, 2015)

Myself (and the whole film crew) waived our fees and composed the score for a feature documentary about a holocaust survivor,(of Bergen Belsen Nazi camp),his name is Tomi Reichental he now lives in Ireland(where I live).I got to spend time with him and his surviving family,..my father met him after a premiere and wept as they shook hands,..our documentary picked up an award and has now led to a former SS guard,(who appeared in our film),being formerly investigated and hopefully prosecuted for murder.Now we're preparing to make a feature documentary about the investigation and all that unfolded since as more and more witnesses and survivors come forward seeking some sort of closure,..rewarding beyond my wildest imagination. D


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## Russell Moran (Sep 9, 2015)

Rodney Money said:


> What was the most rewarding experience you've had concerning music?
> ~Rod


The 50+ years that I've spent studying and playing the guitar. The rest is icing on the cake. Rz


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## John Judd (Sep 9, 2015)

I had a 14 year weekly solo jazz guitar gig that ended last year. Seriously, who has a gig for 14 years? I did.

Back in 2001, a man and his wife started showing up every week to listen. As you may know, most normal people abhor jazz, but this couple loved it. They were always very kind to me and I would play their song every single week, which went on for years. 

Fast forward to 2013: they stopped showing up and life continued.

Mid 2014 the man shows up, but alone this time. He approached me and I saw in his eyes that I knew why he was alone. His wife had died of cancer very quickly.

I stumbled and said something to the effect of 'Well, I am glad to see you are eating quality food and taking care of yourself...'. 

His paraphrased response: 'Are you kidding me? The food here is [email protected]#$ing awful. I came to hear you play our song because it reminds me of the best times in my life.' 

So many times music is just wallpaper, but in this instance it totally wasn't. It reminds me to always put heart into the music, because you never know what it means to someone.


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## AlexandreSafi (Sep 9, 2015)

"Playing" it, in all its forms, 
but really the true realization that _Music is enough for a lifetime, _whenever I asked & needed her most, there "She" always was... Feels like that most rewarding feeling happens everyday though, for me at least!
-A.s.-


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## KEnK (Sep 9, 2015)

John Judd said:


> a man and his wife started showing up every week to listen


Wow- Being a fellow jazz guitarist I can relate to that.
While not my "best musical experience" I had a similar thing.
I was playing Classical guitar for a while in a restaurant, and an elderly couple would always come.
I would talk to them during the breaks, they really loved what I was doing 
in spite of the fact that I thought my abilities as a Classical player were somewhat limited.
She asked me once to play a Shubert piece for her.
I looked at the score but didn't have the technique to approach it at all.

I guess one of my most rewarding experiences was from playing in my old rock band in Europe.
(We never got any notice in our home town but were highly regarded there.)
One gig in Poland I noticed the kids were singing along-
even though most of them spoke little to no English.

We recently did a reunion tour over there.
I was humbled and touched every night
by people telling me how much the music meant to them over the years.
One guy told me he got married to one of our songs.


So John- Were you playing solo? or?

k


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## Ned Bouhalassa (Sep 9, 2015)

*original edited as I misunderstood the question*

Funny enough, I think mine would be not strictly music, but sound-related. The many years in my past life that I spent studying/teaching/composing electroacoustic music changed drastically (for the better) my hearing/understanding of sound, and therefore music-making, for the rest of my life.


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## Rctec (Sep 9, 2015)

Every Day!
Hearing Pete Haycock play 'So Many Roads' on the 'FM Live' album...
...seeing Arturo Santoval blowing the roof off Ronnie Scott's club in London and deciding there and then that I should just give up - I'll never be a musician as good as him, and not listening to my own advice and years later being able to play with him on a regular basis...
Seeing Jaquelin DuPre do the Elgar
Listening to Ennio Morricone
Discovering "Switched on Bach" and the Moog,
Kraftwerk
Leaving the Sony Stage after having the orchestra blow me away with their art...
...and tomorrow's session with some of the greatest drummers in the world!


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## Nick Batzdorf (Sep 9, 2015)

I like the question!

So far I can point to two.

1. Playing percussion in the 2-man orchestra for Play With Fire, a Dale Wasserman play at the Westwood Playhouse (now Gefen Playhouse). I was 20 years old, the music was by the great Roger Kellaway, lots of great actors in the play... I was walking on air for six weeks.

2. Writing the score for Midsummer Night's Dream and performing it with fabulous musicians at the John Anson Ford Theater (and subsequent venues). Shakespeare Festival LA, I think it was 1992. Great experience.


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## dgburns (Sep 9, 2015)

Not as grandiose ,but mine is watching my grandmaman playing Chopin on her piano when I was too young to fully appreciate what was really going on.I guess she was the true champion in the family,and I don't have a single recording of any of it as none have survived.


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## windshore (Sep 9, 2015)

Funny because I feel like I should point to experiences working with superstar artists, or big important projects but I think the most profound (important) musical experience I ever had was listening to the Chicago Symphony Brass at a 1976 bicentennial concert performing Aaron Copland's "Overture for the Common Man". I was a kid but I felt myself melt into my seat and somehow transported... 

I think it's a big reason I became a professional musician, even though I don't play a brass instrument. It was perfect!


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## trumpoz (Sep 9, 2015)

There are two for me that I can't split
1) Seeing Wynton Marsalis at the Edinborough Jazz Festival. I was sitting 6 feet from the stage and the band played everything from a New Orleans Street March to present day fusions. Everything sounded so fresh, new and completely effortless. Simply inspiring. 
2) As a 16 year-old performing at Carnegie Hall.


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## Pasticcio (Sep 9, 2015)

Rctec said:


> Listening to Ennio Morricone



His western scores, Cinema Paradiso & The Mission is what got me serious jumping into the world of film music so I guess I'll have to second that.


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## thebob (Sep 10, 2015)

Like many, the sensitive experience itself for sure ! 

And like most of us, many stories pop in my mind. 

On the rather cold, objective side of things, that might be when, in my late teenagehood, after I had the chance to meet my biggest idol of that time, I received en e-mail from him saying "Hey, I listened to your CD, great solo on track 6, do you wanna be my bass player ?" 

But in my heart, my greatest reward will be in a couple of months. I will seat with my father and our friends and I'll be thinking : wow, we don't play often anymore, but despite of our differences in ages, tastes, life and geographical situation, we have been managing to do that band for 20 years now (out of 34 in my case) !!
We never aimed at anything, the only question we ever asked each other as a band was : when do we meet each other next time ? and my reward is to realize that this human connectivity through music is what I care the most about.


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## chimuelo (Sep 10, 2015)

I had the time of my life with 2 stacked twins in Germany years ago.
Since then its been downhill....


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## Jaap (Sep 11, 2015)

For me it was when I was at the conservatory. I wrote a piece for 8 cellos and I really wanted that piece performed. I managed to get it programmed in one of the schools concert evenings (and after bribing the players with lots of beer to perform it).
I was conducting the piece myself and around 3/4 of the piece I saw and heard those 8 players playing with such passion and they where really into the piece. Sweating and working hard to give everything. When it was finished and the crowd was clapping I could see so much relief and believe in what they have done. That was just amazing, that feeling that they believed in my music and gave everything in their musical capabilities to get a great performance.


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## wst3 (Sep 11, 2015)

great question... hands down the most rewarding experience was the year I spent as the volunteer jazz band director at the local high school. Watching those kids grow was just amazing. There were certainly moments when I doubted my sanity, but when they played their concerts it was worth far more than I could have imagined. Beyond that being able to make - and share - music is a pretty remarkable gift!


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## nutotech (Sep 15, 2015)

chimuelo said:


> I had the time of my life with 2 stacked twins in Germany years ago.
> Since then its been downhill....


+++1 LOL!


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