The Tragedy of Ensemble

It's the tragedy of ensemble that we have to do it TOGETHER. -- Robert Page

For years, I sang with Robert Page in the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh. Bob used the quote above whenever a song turned into a train wreck in rehersal.

It's a great quote. Applicable in a lot of other circumstances.

Take group dynamics, for example. Group dynamics suck. I had the misfortune this week of attending a meeting that made me want to crawl out of my skin. The supreme irony of the situation is that it was a meeting for the office social committee.

What always amazes me about such moments is how the many issues are at play in addition to the one being discussed. Instead of a trainwreck of notes, it was a trainwreck of issues.