It was a long week...

Monday morning rehearsal, 10-2. Tuesday rehearsal 10-4... then concert 7-9. Wednesday rehearsal 10-2. Thursday... rehearsal and concert.. Friday rehearsal and concert... Saturday rehearsal and concert.

Now, those of you (like Krissy) who have participated in rock 'n roll revival know how much work it is to put on the same concert several nights in a row. Those four concerts in five days were all different with no overlapping material.

But, now I have from Sunday through Thursday off... and a VIBRAPHONE! I get to borrow it until further notice... at least a couple of months.

"The vibraphone, sometimes called the vibraharp or simply the vibes, is a musical instrument in the percussion family. It is similar in appearance to the xylophone, although the vibraphone uses metal bars instead of the wooden bars on the xylophone. The vibraphone is commonly played with cord or yarn mallets.Below each bar is a resonator, a resonant metal tube, with a metal disc of a slightly smaller diameter located at the top. The discs in each tube are connected via a rod which can be made to rotate with an electric motor. When the motor is on and a note is struck, the notes acquire a tremolo sound as the resonators are covered and uncovered by the rotating discs. The player can vary the speed of the tremolo. At slower speeds, the effect sounds more like a "wah-wah-wah." At faster speeds, the tremolo is more pronounced. With the motor switched off the vibraphone has a mellow, bell-like sound.

While the instrument's name comes from "vibrato", this is actually a misnomer, since the effect is actually tremolo, not vibrato (vibrato being a modulation in pitch, not amplitude). In any case, the tremolo sound is now perceived as dated, and many modern vibraphonists eschew the effect altogether.

The vibraphone also has a sustain pedal similar to that used on a piano. When the pedal is up, the bars are all damped and the sound of each bar is quite short; with the pedal down, they will sound for several seconds, so frequent rapid pedalling is common when playing a vibraphone.
The vibraphone was invented in the United States in 1921. It has a long history as a jazz instrument. However, the vibraphone has since been used in many other musical idioms, including popular music."

Thank you wikipedia...