'This Isn't Milli Vanilli': Obama Inauguration Music Was Pre-Recorded [memories of ChiCom Olympics]

FoxNews.com ^ | January 22, 2009

[ETL]

WASHINGTON -- Whether you loved or hated the classical music played at President Barack Obama's inauguration, what you heard was a recording made two days earlier unless you were sitting within earshot of the celebrated performers.

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma, violinist Itzhak Perlman, pianist Gabriella Montero and clarinetist Anthony McGill made the decision a day before Tuesday's inauguration after a sound check to use a previously recorded audio tape for the broadcast of the ceremonies.

[randita]

I would also bet that the instruments in use were just cheap off brands purchased from Wal-Mart or Target and not their regular instruments.

Not so. I know this firsthand. US Marine Band brass players play their regular instruments, but with plastic mouthpieces in cold weather. Clarinetists play good quality resin or plastic instruments instead of their wooden ones because the wood might crack.

In no case are they cheap, "Wal-Mart" instruments.

Also, the only music that was pre-recorded was the John Williams piece. The rest of the band music was live.

The President's Own Marine Band is the premiere band in the U.S. It is a full time band. Most of the musicians in the band have advanced music degrees from conservatories such as Eastman, Juilliard, Curtis, Cincinnati, etc. It's a highly competitive and coveted position.

[randita]

The brass player I know who is currently in the President’s Own (which played on Tues.) used their regular instrument, but with a plastic mouthpiece. Wooden instruments such as clarinets are replaced with a good quality man made material.

[ClaudiusI]

I always imagine Barack Obama's inauguration set to that dark, forboding trombone music from that Outer Limit's episode "The Hundred Days of The Dragon".
(an episode which has suspiciously disappeared from Netflix's instant play library, I should note...)

[KC_Conspirator]

Just a bit of the fakery and chicanery that was the Obama campaign and will be with the new administration.

[ETL]

that Outer Limit's episode "The Hundred Days of The Dragon".

It all does sound a bit like science fiction. I keep thinking I'll wake up some morning and realize that it was all just a bad dream, perhaps an effect of watching too many Twilight Zone marathons.

To Serve Man
Writer: Rod Serling, based on the story by Damon Knight
Director: Richard L. Bare

Apparently benign alien emissaries show mankind how to end the misery of war, plague and famine. The Kanamits, nine-foot tall aliens, arrive on Earth with one lofty goal: To Serve Man. They end war, they end famine. They make the military wonder: what's the catch?

CAST: Richard Kiel, Hardie Albright, Robert Tafur, Lloyd Bochner, Lomax Study, Theodore Marcuse, Susan Cummings, Nelson Olmstead.

Watch it, or any other TZ episode, online for free at:
(see season 3, page 1. there are 3 seasons in all, each seasons page has 2 pages of listings)
http://www.cbs.com/classics/the_twilight_zone/
________________________________________________________

[PurpleMan]

Right-O

Ya think these guys would take out priceless Strads (Pearlman) or Davidovs (Ma) into 20 degree weather?

A non-story flamed by people searching for a legitimate issue (of which there are many out there!)

[HIDEK6]

Yeah, I see this as a non-story. It was a pragmatic thing due to the cold weather.

Yes, it was certainly too much to expect that the government would plan for cold weather for a JANUARY 20th! event.

They should have surrounded the musicians with some sort of windbreak and cover and then fired up the space heaters.

[HIDEK6]

Not so.

Yo-Yo played a graphite cello that day.

[ETL]

flamed by people searching for a legitimate issue

Where the heck have you been? I've posted a TON of information on Obama and his radical associations and politics, a good deal of it many people here didn't know, and some more than a few still don't quite get. You can find a 'small' sample of this on my FR About page.

http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/

[PurpleMan]

Whoa, cowboy.

Was a-refering-a to the other people posting stuff.

[randita]

I was referring to the Marine Band brass and woodwind instrumentalists - not the string players.

[Hot Tabasco]

I was refering only to the cello and the violin owned by Yo-Yo Ma and Perlman. If they weren’t actually going to play then I can’t seem them subjecting their concert instruments to that extreme cold conditions...

[randita]

Got it - true.