Preparing Preparations Until You're Prepared to Death

Imagine with me that you have 2.5 hours of orchestrations and you have to mix and master EVERY SINGLE INSTRUMENT for the entire orchestra for those 2.5 hours...with sampled instruments (prerecorded instruments that have played every note in every variation and can be automated by attack, technique, etc.), and you do all this because you don't have $100,000 to throw at a live orchestra to record you tracks. (Which was enough about fifteen years ago.)

Now imagine you do this for DAYS AND DAYS AND DAYS...and there is still more to do. 

Now imagine you do this for MONTHS. And while you're at it, you've made enough changes to the music that you are redoing the entire score.

Oh, and the scoring software you've used for two decades is being SUNSETTED and you have to learn a NEW software.

Welcome to my life in 2024.

So beyond all that torture, we were contacting theaters, finding a venue (physical tours, pricing, learning amenities), and preparing for auditions.

This wasn't some "go hire your neighbor" kind of deal -- unless that neighbor was a highly decorated performer. (No, we didn't hire any of our neighbors, but I'll tell you more about that in the next post!) 

We worked with an amazing artist nine months in advance to design and print invitations.


(Want his name? I'll give it to you.)

Keep in mind, all this was happening around sending two adult kids out into the world, homeschooling little ones, teaching classes, and scheduling every single second of daylight.

Some seasons of life are like that, eh? But don't worry. It gets crazier. Want to know what happened next? 

Join me next time.

Editing: the Never Ending Vortex

 And suddenly 15 years fly by... 

Welcome to the future! Or rather, let me step you back a couple years and share what has happened on this incredible journey.

Things got quiet around here while raising kids, homeschooling, having more kids, and surviving. Suddenly, it was ten years later.

Without warning, I found myself

    • Establishing an educational drama program (from the ground up)
    • Graduating some kids
    • Being a professional editor
    • Teaching writing and music composition classes
And then it happened. Remember how this show was inspired by a dream? That same level of inspiration struck and we knew it was time to go forward again.

We
  • Revamped the show (pun intended)
  • We hosted a family Reading to test out the script
  • Then made more edits
  • I spent 4 to 6 MONTHS creating minus tracks and music learning videos for the score (every singing part for 2.5 hours worth of music)
  • We cast a local reading with friends which included learning/teaching all the parts
  • We performed this reading
  • Then made more edits

And lest you should think all that happened overnight, I've just outlined 2 years of our lives...where I was working full time on the show. Plus still homeschooling our kids. And teaching classes.

But we survived. All to work toward the PROFESSIONAL STAGED READING of Immortal the Musical. Whew! I'll tell you about that next time.