This is another very creative project that happened because we were going to do a show with Emmett Chapman at my music school, where Bob Culbertson and I taught the Chapman Stick.

The Great Stick Orchestra was Bob Culbertson’s idea. He was working with several students and decided that he would teach them each a part and get them to play together in one big Stick orchestra. It’s a a novel idea because the Stick as used by one person is a full orchestra by itself, but in this case we had a very large group of Stick musicians playing together simultaneously. All of the Stick players in the Great Stick Orchestra were either students of Bob’s or mine; we taught them these different orchestrated parts and held rehearsals to make sure everyone had their parts right. We wanted to spring this one on Emmett when he came down and I’m sure it was a great surprise for him.

This was great because it gave all of the Stick students – who of course were excited whenever Emmett was around – to be involved in a performance setting; in my music school there’s a picture of the participants of this great event that’s been up on the wall in the waiting room now for many, many years – I always find it fun to see people looking at it as they’re hanging out in the waiting room of the school.

These were all such wonderful creative times with this brand-new instrument.

Keep singing!