Birthday Fanfare

Hi all,

By now you're all probably familiar with John Axon as a Reviewer and cool guy. I've had the priviledge of knowing him in person too where I'm pleased to report he maintains the coolness and most of the Reviewerness (Although he is less purple). What you may not know about John is that he is also an extremely accomplished pianist — one whose performances are far more technically brilliant and musically articulate than his modesty would allow him to express to you.

Luckily enough, I recently managed to attend a rehearsal where John performed a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday", arranged for piano and orchestra+choir, in honour of a mutual friend of ours. Coincidentally, his birthday and hers fall on the same date (today) and so I like to think that the performance celebrates both of them. Knowing my love of recording things, I made sure that there would be a record of the event for posterity — and I felt as if it would be prudent of me to share it with you too, so that this talent might be better appreciated by all his peers here on YC.

So without further ado, I give you the Birthday Fanfare, performed by the Mississauga Symphony Youth Orchestra and Choir accompanying John Axon on piano:

Birthday Fanfare

Enjoy, and please wish John a very happy birthday if you encounter him! :happy:

lol at the tuning. lol at the clapping and shushing.

Man, my piano skills are incredible! Time for a second listen!

The Mississauga Symphony Youth Orchestra kicks donkey! Btw, I like the reverb on that last hit before the piano returns; it sounds like the fadeout of a gong crash, but I never heard the gong get struck initially. How'd you do that? Something where the track is turned all the way down but you can hear the reverb of the note because there's a prefader reverb insert?

Third listen.

I'm surprised you didn't take a video of this rehearsal :D. Very lovely! Love the full orchestration. Love how the orchestral part doesn't feature the Happy Birthday melody at all but it still jives with the piece.

Thank you, Marius! In your own words, YOU make socks for people just so that you can rock them off.

Happy Birthday, Hillary!

-John

thats pretty good , john is a very talented composer , i didnt know that john plays the piano ! anyway that must have been a great experience to play with a real orchestra! keep it up:D

heh, nice. what an impact real instruments have! too bad its so short, how old are those players by the way, they are not half bad!

Amazing . The orchestra was real-... it's over... wut...-ly cool. Only wished it was a tad bit longer.

It was the end of our rehearsal and I desperately wanted the orchestra to play the birthday arrangement. You should have heard us play Rachmaninoff's 3rd. You recorded that part, right Marius?

Peace on Earth,

-John

Errrrrr....I was kinda late getting in, so....no. :unsure:

Rats! That was the best part! :sadtears:

-John

Folks, as much as it pains me to end what is truly among the most hilarious hi-jinks I've ever pulled on the site, I have to reveal to you the truth.

John Axon, first of all, had nothing whatsoever to do with this.

The utterly lame piano playing you hear is me making fun of the fact that John Axon's piano skills actually are, in reality, quite impressive. Apparently my mockery was not good enough.

Furthermore, the Mississauga Symphony Youth Orchestra & Choir has never played any of my work and certainly didn't play this — what you're hearing is entirely sampled and produced and performed by yours truly as a light-hearted public stunt to make fun of my friend for his birthday. I expected everyone to join in the mockery.

Instead you all seemed to fall for it, which on the one hand is flattering and on the other is just hilarious. So here's to a successfully deployed birthday hoax! :evil:

You fiend! How dare you pull such an elaborately planned and equally well-executed hoax on the innocent public! For shame, Marius! For shame.

...:P

-John

We all got owned.

Huh, almost fell for it.Then again I'm new so I haven't had the pleasure of listening to Axon's music... yet

Just went through your stuff. Yeah, you're awesome, John!

Thanks, Redajin! As you can tell from Marius' track, but my piano playing is second to none! :P

-John