After spending the weekend in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, I find myself wondering if we want to try an en masse retreat next spring/summer, some sort of pre-CMW. The "cottage" we stayed in has a great room easily large enough for a string quartet. I'm making inquiries about the house on that property, which could be large enough for several families to share.
What would such a vacation be like? I can imagine string ensembles, if we bring the right people, but we may not have access to a piano. I think we could read recorder or flute ensemble music pretty much anywhere. I'm not sure whether the property is sufficiently sound-proof to politely manage brass ensembles.
What are some things we would need? Repertoire is the show-stopper we face here or anywhere, specifically having a good match between players and parts. Nice chairs and music stands would help.
What extra-curricular activities would we want to plan? I have some info on cruises, including whale-watching. There's a state park nearby perfect for Laser/Sunfish sailing, and we watched people kite-boarding. (Looks awesome!) The boardwalk and beach are a very short walk away, and it was nice to have our bikes along.
Who and what instruments (beyond the current members of this weblog team) should we try hard to include? (e.g. I'd like to make sure Jeremy is there for recorder sessions, Ellen for violin/viola, Anastasia as an additional cello)
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Great idea! A 4-day weekend, perhaps?
With the prospect of a small group attending, a single room for music-making might be sufficient, assuming everyone could be comfortably seated. At any rate, if not many more than those participating in this blog were play together, we'd probably want to make one group rather than splitting up.
Could Geri and Ekkehardt be persuaded to take along a harpsichord?
It would be easy enough to institute a "bring your own stand/chair" policy. Those of us with extra chairs can easily share, but it takes the issue away from the organizer (asking "how do we provide X number of chairs for the group") and assigns it to the attending family units.
Speaking of which, it would please me greatly to have this retreat as stress-free as possible. CMW is notably accompanied by a strenuous workload for the organizers. Could this weekend be organized in such a way as to distribute tasks and lighten responsibilities? For instance, if we ate together it might be appropriate to have small groups responsible for 1-2 meals each. For most meals, they wouldn't worry about there not being enough room in the kitchen to help wash dishes or feel guilty about not preparing the meal.
And scheduling could benefit from the same philosophy. Say, "Here are the mealtimes," "This is the morning we're going whale watching (or whatever)," "Here are some times we're definitely making music" and let the retreat essentially organize itself. Does someone want to do X with group Y? Great, make it happen: there's plenty of time available. Do some wish spend more time with Bach and others on the waves? Easily done: there are times we'll want you so we can make up our octet/sextet/frisbee golf team, but otherwise the beach is right outside, the puzzles/games are in the room over there and the instruments are in the main hall.
I guess what I'm saying is that for a retreat I'd like more of the philosophy of the CMW pre-session than of CMW itself. :-) Recently, Jamie and I attended a family retreat at a large house in Pigeon Forge, and for the 20+ attending, a minimalistic approach to scheduling worked wonderfully over the 3-day weekend. It allowed for spontaneity and variety, and in a diverse group no one was feeling left out for long periods.
One of the things we affirmed over that weekend was that having one's own room is helpful when spending that much time together with a group. From that perspective the house you mention looks great, although I do worry a little about the ratio of bathrooms to guests.
How do my musings fit with your original idea? How many of us are potentially on board? It would be nice to even decide on dates as soon as the spring schedule for the NEYE is out in order to accomodate Anastasia as well as obtain proper reservations.
Anyway, I'm gung ho about the idea. Let's talk more about it!
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