Wedding at the Riverside

Yesterday was Prism's second gig in a week, and it was a great one! 

We played for a wedding at the Riverside Hotel in Boise, Idaho.  This wedding was held on the Sandstone Terrace, a lovely, breezy patio alongside some convention rooms at the hotel.  One of the brides has Japanese ancestry, so the wedding included elegant Asian elements.  The ceremony took place in front of the two double doors in the picture, and they created a backdrop of red paper fans, red hanging paper lanterns, and streamers of folded paper cranes.  The brides both wore Asian inspired clothing with matching red woven fabric, and the young ring bearers wore kimonos.

The couple also included some Japanese music in the ceremony.  They requested that one of us play a melody called Sakura while the attendants entered, so Nell was able to find the piece and did a beautiful solo rendition of it.  We don't have a recording of her playing it, but here is an idea of what it sounds like.  It's a simple, melancholy sort of song, but it sounded just perfect.

The rest of the ceremony focused on great wedding classics, plus lots of sacred worship music.  OneJesu, Joy of Man's Desiring by JS Bach, and the second entered to Canon in D by Johan  Pachelbel.  During the ceremony, friends of the couple read inspirational prayers, and a worship team with singers and a guitarist performed several hymns.  You can see the first two pages of their wedding program to the right; the couple included the sheet music to the hymns so that the guests could join in.  What a great idea!  Dave couldn't resist and especially enjoyed singing along to the hymns.

bride entered to

After the ceremony, the couple exited to Hornpipe (from The Water Music) by GF Handel, and everyone adjourned to a reception room to mingle before dinner was served in a nearby convention room.  We got to join the guests there and help provide a jolly atmosphere until dinner was ready.  We played lots of uplifting favorites like You Raise Me Up by JB Graham and Rolf Lovland, Top of the World sung by The Carpenters, and Makin' Whoopee by Donalson. We got a request to play some Beatles, so we played Hello Goodbye (sadly, we have no recording of it yet) and When I'm 64. 

What a great way to spend a Friday evening!

Art Sip 2016

It's been a while since we've updated you on what's happening in Prism Quartet land!

Good thing we've got a couple of fun gigs to talk about.  :)

Last night, Prism performed for the third year in a row at Art Sip, an event sponsored by the Meridian Arts Commission.  (Check out their Facebook page or their website for more detailed information, events, etc.)

This event is a fund-raiser to help raise money for support of arts programs in Meridian, Idaho.  The Meridian Arts Commission supports arts education, awareness, and participation by providing grants to people who need it.  At this event, people enjoyed: delicious catered food (our favorite were the chicken kebabs), wine from two different local wineries, performances from talented children and adults who are members of a local theater company, classic old-style pies (like bumbleberry and shoofly), a local artist exhibiting her work and creating a painting throughout the evening, a chalk art competition, and a silent auction of great arts-related items (wine, homemade foods, paintings, gift baskets, handmade pottery, etc.).

Prism loves this event and the Meridian Arts Commission.  To help support the organization, we donated a certificate for a one hour quartet performance.  We are looking forward to this fun opportunity to provide music for someone's upcoming event.

For our musical choices, we did a lot of our modern favorites with a few baroque/classical pieces for variety.  Here are some of the selections we played last night (click the blue text to hear clips of us playing selections of those pieces):

• Makin' Whoopee by Donalson
• Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 by JS Bach, Movement 3
• Habanera from "Carmen" by Georges Bizet
• Close to You sung by The Carpenters
• Orinoco Flow by Enya
• You Raise Me Up by JB Graham and Rolf Lovland
• Londonderry Air (a traditional Irish song) 

Thanks to the Meridian Arts Commission for planning such a fun event!

Black Tie fun!

Last night, Prism got to perform at NNU's Black Tie event at the Rose Room in downtown Boise.  It was a beautiful, noisy, crowded, fun event.  The Rose Room was packed from front to back with stylishly decorated tables and place settings, flowers and lit candles, and bottles upon bottles of Martinelli's sparkling cider.  Over about an hour and a half, almost 400 stylishly coiffed coeds enjoyed a catered meal and chatted while we provided the music.  Then, they were picked up by limousines out front and delivered to The Powerhouse, where they continued their evening with dancing.

NNU asked us to provide a mixture of upbeat music with classical influences.  Here are some selections (and new recorded clips!) of the pieces we performed last night: 

Somewhere (in D)
After the Battle of Aughrim
Amazing Grace
Concerto in A minor for Two Violins (arranged for quartet, of course)
Besame Mucho
Love Me Tender
The Irish Washerwoman - Swallowtail Jig
Londonderry Air
Suite from The Fairy Queen (movements 1, 2, 3, and 4)
Christmas Concerto (movements 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6)
Trumpet Tune and Trumpet Voluntary
Passacaile
Habanera
Tango 1


The Tango earned us some rousing cheers.  When you are considering music for your event, keep in mind that tangos are always a great hit! :)

Sorry for the hiatus

Well, it's been a while since our last post.  We've weathered another winter, played some more weddings and Christmas gigs, and now we're preparing to play for an NNU black tie event at the Rose Room in downtown Boise.


We're happy to spice up the doldrums of February with a little music!  We also hope to record a few more song snippets to put on our repertoire page soon.  But for now, we leave you with a silly comic to brighten your day.

From: http://thecomicssection.blogspot.com/2010/09/rhymes-with-orange-i-knew-them-when.html

Photography from the past

We are often photographed at weddings.

However, since we only get to experience the event for an hour or two, we don't often get to see the professional photos that were taken. But, to our great excitement, today we got to see some great photos from two events... from years ago!

Firstly, the Crosby and Seidl families joined during a Saturday morning ceremony at the Shakespeare Festival amphitheater in 2013.  We provided the music for the prelude, ceremony, and for some of the reception afterward.  Here is our blog post about it.

Now, we get to enjoy seeing the happiness in all those photos on the Stephen Smith Wedding Photography website.  We were (or specifically, April was) featured in one photo (from
http://stevesmithweddings.com/blog/tag/prism-quartet/):

Secondly, you may remember our blog post about our gig performing for a 1920s themed party. 

Though the photographer gifted us with some photos, Bliss Events (who organized and catered the event) had some more gorgeous photos posted on their blog entry about the party here.

There too, they posted a photo of us, plus some of the gorgeous scenery from the host's garden (from
https://blisseventsboise.wordpress.com/2013/02/):

Even years later, it gives us a thrill to see little reminders of the fun we had at past events.

Art Sip - Take 2

Three days ago, Prism got to perform at the second annual Art Sip event hosted by the Meridian Arts Commission.

Here is the Art Sip's description, from the Meridian Chamber of Commerce website:

 ArtSip
In the Garden at Something Special Antiques
134 E State St, Meridian
Thursday, July 9th
6:00 - 9:00 PM

MAF presents our second annual fundraiser, ArtSip, featuring wine, food, music and artists. We will have an early bird drawing for advanced ticket sales, along with a raffle item, silent auction, two wineries to enjoy, local food, live music, chalk art competition and much more. Funds raised at last year's event helped in part with sponsoring Meridian's Concerts on Broadway and provide grants to Treasure Valley Youth Theatre and Meridian Symphony's Young Musician's Competition.

What is the Meridian Arts Foundation?
Established in 2012, the Meridian Arts Foundation is an established nonprofit (501(c) organization dedicated to recognizing, encouraging and supporting the arts and artists of Meridian. The purpose of MAF is to pursue creative ways to work with and partner with the business and private communities in support of a thriving arts community in Meridian.

How You Can Help
We are looking for local businesses, arts groups, patrons and wineries to help support our dedication to Meridian's art community and developing plans for a Performing Art Center in Meridian."

We were happy to play again at this event.  The weather calmed from its current 110 degree temperatures, it was a breezy and pleasant, and between performing we also got to taste the catered foods, view the silent auction art pieces, and enjoy the short plays performed by actors from The Boise Little Theater.  It was a great evening of the arts - hopefully you can join us for it next year!

Mix and Mingle

All of us in Prism are either members or have been members of the Meridian Symphony Orchestra in the past.  As such, we all are strong supporters of that organization.  So, when they asked us if we could perform during an event following a Meridian Symphony concert, of course we said yes! 

So, on April 25th, after the orchestra concert that evening, we got to play more music for an MSO

event called the Mix and Mingle.  For this event, musicians and patrons of MSO got to, well, mix and mingle!  Donated items were sold in a silent auction (proceeds went toward supporting MSO), Kona Grill provided fresh catered food to all guests, and there were a few short speeches giving thanks to the many hard-working people who make Meridian Symphony Orchestra's rehearsals and concerts run smoothly.  (I had the sushi.  It was delicious.)

For us, it was a delightful evening.  First of all, we got to play on a raised stage covered with tiles which were lit from underneath.  (You can see the raised white stage on the photo to the left.)  The venue used to be a high-end clothing store, so it was a very stylish place to play that made for great event space.

We also got to cherry-pick our favorite pieces for our playlist, so we included mostly modern and fun pieces.  Visitors had just heard an entire concert of classics, why not present some different genres?  So, we played songs like Makin' Whoopee, Aquarius, When You Wish Upon a Star, Star of the County Down, and The Irish Washerwoman/Swallowtail Jig.  It was a great evening of music!