Chapter Fourteen
On the day of the recording session to which I had been invited, the train could not go fast enough.
Don Costa was scheduled to record a full orchestra with top studio musicians, including Charlie Macey and Al Gorgoni on guitar and Buddy Saltzman on drums. When I arrived eight minutes before the session was scheduled to begin, most of the musicians were already in the studio. Making my way through the hallway to the control room, I passed a musician on a pay phone confirming the location of his next gig. Two others were standing near the coffee machine complaining about the producer of a session on which they had worked the previous day. Inside the studio, players were variously drinking coffee, chatting with the musician in the next chair, or eating a familiar New York breakfast sandwich: scrambled egg on an onion roll. While some instrumentalists were warming up or tuning up, others wouldn’t even bother to pick up their instrument until they heard “A-one!” Pronounced “uh-one,” that command tells English-speaking musicians that a countoff is beginning: “A-one! A-two! A-one-two-three-four….” If you ever need to quickly get the attention of a roomful of American musicians, “A-one!” will do it every time. Warning: do not use this command frivolously.
Don was in the control room when I entered. As soon as he saw me he stood up, greeted me, and introduced me to the engineers. Then he escorted me into the studio and presented me to the orchestra. Surely Don Costa had better things to do than delay a session to introduce a teenager to his colleagues, but he clearly enjoyed being a genial host in what was unquestionably his domain. When at last he stepped in front of the podium and picked up his baton, every musician came to attention with his or her instrument poised to play. I watched from a folding chair on the sidelines as Don began to go over the arrangement.
Fifteen minutes later they were still rehearsing when Don had to leave the studio for a few moments. Not wanting to see the orchestra lose momentum, I stepped up to the podium and picked up the baton. I don’t know what made me think I could conduct an orchestra. I knew how to read music, but I had never read a score or performed the physical movements of conducting. Still, I had heard the orchestra run through the score several times, and I believed I knew the arrangement well enough to be able to move my arms in something approximating what I’d seen Don do. I lifted the baton, the players lifted their instruments, I counted off—“A-one! A-two! A-one-two-three-four”—and I was leading the orchestra.
If Don was flabbergasted when he returned and saw me at the podium, he never said a word. He let the players finish the song, helped me down, took the baton, resumed the rehearsal, and, after a final play-through, began recording. Watching and listening from my folding chair, I was oblivious to everything but the fact that I had just conducted an orchestra.