Upper Arlington High School Orchestras

On one of my visits to the Ala Moana Shopping Center last month, I stopped to listen to the Upper Arlington High School (Ohio) orchestras. Their intonation was good, they watched the conductor assiduously, and half the string players had decent vibrato.

After the second orchestra took the stage, I asked one parent (she was wearing one of the UAHS aloha shirts) whether there was any difference between the two. She said that both were equally talented, which is something I would say if I were in her place. It turned out that the first was a full orchestra with brass and woodwinds, while the second was all strings. For my money, the latter seemed more skilled but I'm biased because my instrument was the violin.

Both orchestras ended with a patriotic medley bookended by the usual standards America the Beautiful and the Star-Spangled Banner. When I was a kid (hey boomer), everyone stood when the national anthem was played, but on this day no one budged from the chairs. To be fair, most of the seated were elderly, and some looked like they could be foreign visitors. Nevertheless, in today's America accepted cultural understandings are exceedingly rare, as are excellent public high school orchestras.