Fugitive from the music police

I've just returned home from the first rehearsal (for this term) of what is frequently described as the "much-loved community orchestra". I won't mention its actual name, as demand for places is high and I would like to keep getting back in. Anyway, fresh from our triumphant (apart from the encore) summer concert in June, and refreshed after three months larging it up in the Scottish sunshine (ahem), I took my clarinet, and my aching body, out for an evening of fun and frolic.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered that we will be reviving our greatest hit, 'Finlandia' by Jean Sibelius. This was the first piece we ever worked on, in the very first meeting in November 2007 ('we' meaning the orchestra; names and faces may have changed, but the orchestra is heading for its 4th birthday), and featured in our first concert in December 2008. I still can't play certain passages of it, particularly the trills, but it's probably the tune I've come closest to playing all the way through, and I've gone downhill ever since. No, I'm not being modest. I've got away with it for too long.

At the start of every term, I promise myself that I will practice and I never do. At the start of summer, I promise myself that I'll get lessons and I never do. As much as I enjoy "playing" in an orchestra (and fulfilling a lifelong ambition in the process), I've not done it justice and I've not progressed as much as I had hoped or as others expect I should have. I wonder how I'll feel after this next concert (mine and the orchestra's sixth). So far, we've got 'Finlandia', a movement from Schubert's 'Unfinished' symphony and two movements from Tchaikovsky's 4th, with a promise of more to come. Bring it on, as long as it's not YPG or Colas Breugnon!

In other news:

• Scotland win a game of football (but get a penalty and miss it)
• Congratulations to PJ Harvey on winning the Mercury Music Prize
• My throat infection still refuses to go away