Adrenaline Rush: Performing for Several Hundred

This weekend I conducted the world premiere of my concert suite J-ok'el: Legend of La Llorona with the Golden State Pops Orchestra. It was a thrilling, gratifying, and tiring day.

I was a little bit jittery going on stage, but rather than being nervous, it was mostly from the excitement and energy of being in front of a live audience of several hundred. After accepting the applause and giving a brief intro to my music, I stood in front of the 60 or so musicians on stage and could just feel the electricity in the air. Once I brought my baton down for the first note, it all melted away and I simply had fun bringing my music to life for an attentive audience. The orchestra's performance was superb, they followed my every move, and the only real flaw in the performance was when I accidentally whacked the music stand with my baton. One my friends in the audience mentioned to me afterwards how loud that was....oops.

The orchestra in costume for the Halloween themed concert. Can you spot the banana?

Afterwards, I was busy meeting people who had so many wonderful compliments for me, and signing CDs. One guy, Bill Wrobel, who runs a website called filmscorerundowns.net, emailed me the next day to tell me that my music was "one of the surprise highlights of the concert."

I realized that I don't get to connect with live audiences and meet new fans in person much. Most of my work is done at home in the studio, so I'm hoping for more opportunities in the near future to conduct and present my work to the public.

Also, check out some of these recent interviews that I did:

Scoring in Hollywood (Oct. 3, 2008)

http://edmoy.blogspot.com/2008/10/scoring-in-hollywood.html Interview on Wake UP! Explore your Passion (Oct. 8, 2008 - live podcast) - Interview about how I overcame obstacles and became a film composer (and do what I love in life).

http://ryanray.com/blog/?p=217