I played the triangle for the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra once.
The Liverpool Philharmonic had generously offered it as a prize in a charity auction. It was certainly generous, but in hindsight possibly foolish, as I was musically inept and hadn’t touched a musical instrument in over 20 years, when my guitar teacher told me to stick to sport where there was at least some hope. To my knowledge they have never done this since, despite or because of my performance.
I had and took the opportunity: one concert for which I had one rehearsal. The rehearsal went so badly that on the night of the concert one of the percussion team was required to sit between my legs and wave his hand every time I needed to strike the triangle.
It was conducted by the legendary Carl Davis in front of a full house and I have to say it was one of the most highly pressurised situations I have found myself in. The triangle might be the smallest instrument in an orchestra, but play it at the wrong time people notice!
Far more interesting than my small contribution was the experience of sitting at the heart of an orchestra and a seeing mix and variety of people and instruments produce come together to produce an inspiring performance.
What top class orchestras do better than most organisations is:
The other observation, and how different is this to many leaders you know, is that having achieved the above (which is fundamentally good management practice) the leader – the conductor – can be the quietest person on stage. Their only role to release the passion, creativity and desire of their team to take their performance to the next level.
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