If you know me, or if you follow me on facebook or twitter, or even if you check out this blog every once in a while, you probably know that last week I somehow ended up on national TV.

You can read the longer explanation of how I got there, but I’ll give you the Cliff’s Notes. Some friends of mine started this orchestra and choir, they made a YouTube video, it went viral, we played on the Today Show, we were invited to join America’s Got Talent mid-season and then we ended up playing at Radio City Music Hall last Tuesday night. Here’s our final performance on America’s Got Talent:

It was really, on the whole, an amazing experience.Few classical musicians, aside from the superstars, ever get to feel what being part of a real popular music production feels like, and it’s pretty mind-blowing.

So, starting 4 or 5 days before the show, we’d show up at Radio City each morning. We never really found out what time we were called until around midnight the evening before, but that’s kind of how AGT rolls. So we get to Radio City, and then usually we would wait in a large room with any other contestants and groups who were called at around the same time. Some days we’d wait for 30 minutes, and some days for 4 hours….there was a lot of waiting.

In between the waiting, we’d go off to do different things. On the first day we had our rehearsal in one of Radio City’s studios. (side note, this is a good time to mention that we were being filmed all of the time - filmed walking around, filmed opening our instrument cases, filmed waiting, etc. This is called b-roll.) We ran through our arrangement a bunch of times, and then spent a little time working with Graham, the music director of the show.

The highlight for sure was the first time we actually got to walk into the hall and onto the stage. This is a beautiful venue – holds about 6000 people – and AGT’s production team is really the best. There were more lights and effects than you could count.

Surrounding the stage were these large arches, each with rows of LED lights and the centerpiece was a huge LED screen in the back of the stage that projected all kinds of things from the NYC skyline to simulated sound waves while we performed.

One day, we had a session they called “camera blocking”. This is exactly what it sounds like – the camera crew had to figure out where they were going to move and the producers had to decide which angles they were going to use and when. There were a ton of stationary cameras around the hall (including a huge camera of an even bigger tripod off stage left) but the guys running around with the cameras on their backs were my favorites. Each one had at least two handlers – one guy to coil and uncoil cable as he moved around and another to guide the cameraman and make sure he didn’t bump into anything.

It was really astounding to watch them work. Their movements were so coordinated and they executed it perfectly every time. All this rehearsal really paid off in the end I think – the stage looked unbelievable.

Check out those lights on the instruments! (not to mention Arianne’s lightsaber/baton)

In the end, we didn’t end up advancing through to the next round of the competition. This was both disappointing and relieving at the same time. Like I said, this was all a lot of fun, and I think we were all sad to go, but it was a crazy week. I’m not sure how many members of our 50-person group were going to be able to stay in NY for another couple of weeks….so, perhaps it was all for the best.

We did get to meet a bunch of the other competitors in our week, and some of them are crazy talented and doing really interesting things. Some favorites of mine:

• Taylor Williamson – a stand-up comic who is hilarious and is going to be in the semifinals
• Cami Bradley – a singer/pianist, also in the semifinals
• Aerial Ice – an unbelievable ice skating act who skated on synthetic ice. Huh? Somehow did not make it through this round.
• The Robotix – a pretty great very young classic rock band. The drummer, in particular, was really fun to watch.

Here’s a few more shots of the action, including my little mallet setup.

And here’s the whole group, in all of our glory:

Finally, a special shout out to Arianne and Colin. We met on one of our first days as new grad students at Yale and have been friends ever since. They are both ridiculously talented musicians and I’m so proud of what they accomplished here. It’s not anyone that could bring an orchestra and choir to national TV! Please do check out their other activities: Arianne Abela & Colin Britt.