Every time I’ve been involved in musical theater, it’s been as one of two things: as an actor or as a musician. The boundaries between these aspects of a production have always been defined. At Aurora Arts Theatre for instance, the band has a designated spot for performing while the cast has practically the entire building at its disposal.
For one night though, I had to blur the lines. A singular “West Side Story” performance wherein I, one of the actors, traded in my costumes for a set of drumsticks and performed alongside the musicians as a drummer to a paying audience and for a wonderful cast.
How did I get here? It goes back to last year, before “West Side” had even begun performing. I was talking to the band director while I had some down time, which is when I found out that the resident drummer would not be present for some nights. Though I was already enlisted to be on stage, a lightbulb went off in the back of my head: what if I stepped in while the regular drummer wasn’t here?
I brought this idea up to the band director, and they seemed receptive. I knew it was a far-fetched idea, but still, what if I could step in? With this idea in the back if my head, I started intently listening to the score and working it out on my drum set at my apartment.
While I was hammering out the score for my own entertainment, the band director had been gathering blessings in order for me to fill in on drums. I was bringing the idea to our dance captains, the cast members who were in charge of completing the choreography while we were nearing the end of rehearsals.
There was silence on the matter for quite some time. While our first few performances were going on, I had forgotten the idea of performing while our usual drummer was out, but that doesn’t mean my ear for the instrument was gone while I was onstage.
As the performances kept going, I noticed something: a cue. In “Tonight (Quintet),” there’s a certain number of times the band plays before the actors start singing. With this in mind, I had returned to my drum set. There were cues and parts of songs that were calling my name. Even if I never played drums for the final performance, I wanted to work on the music regardless.
This went on for two weeks until we were nearing the days our drummer wouldn’t be present. Then the idea for finding drummers came up yet again. I was starting to get my hopes up, but that was until we had a response to a call for drummers.
We had our new drummer in place, and we went on with performing as usual. We got through one show with the drummer, and I’m back to talking with the band director as usual. I’m now hearing that we are back to square one: no drummer for tomorrow’s performance, though now we have no responses. How do we perform the show without a drummer? There were multiple ideas.
One of them was to have the strings player put together some digital drums on a keyboard. As a result of this condition, one of the songs, “Cool,” was now at risk of being on the chopping block. I relayed this to the cast, and suddenly it was a topic at a post-show meal shared between a number of my fellow cast members.
I had mentioned the idea of potentially playing drums in passing, and now they seemed receptive. With one day to find a drummer to pick up all of “West Side Story,” and me having learned the score on my own time for the past month and then some, my prospects of getting on the kit seemed higher than they had ever been.
The cast members at the meal are all seemingly agreeing to one thing: getting me on drums, at the very least to save the song “Cool.” I wasn’t opposed to the idea, I never was. That being said, it wasn’t my decision for my being there. We wouldn’t find our resolution to the missing drummer until the next performance began.
I found out the resolution a little earlier than others. While on my way to Aurora, the band director gave me a call. I was given the greenlight to be the drummer for that performance. All those months of work were going to pay off in a single night.
I got into the theater and started hammering away on the songs, trying to refresh all the work I had put into learning the score. I wasn’t the only one surprised by my being on the kit either; actor after actor came in after me and many of them noticed me. There were multiple reactions to it.
I was more worried about getting the show right, and so for two hours I devoted myself to nothing but the drums and learning to work at the band’s speed and finding my cues in the live setting. It took all of my concentration but I did the best I could.
When it came time to perform, I started to worry. The first few songs were a bit finicky by my standard, but by the third song I had finally found the band’s speed and met them where they played. I still had hiccups, but ultimately there was nothing major to worry about anymore.
By the time the show was done and over with, I heard some of the cast members thanking me in particular as they walked off for a meet-and-greet with the audience. I really appreciated anything I had heard, since in my eyes I was merely here as an emergency pick. Yes I was sure of what I was doing, but that didn’t mean I was absolutely certain I would be playing drums for the one performance.
I enjoyed being on another side of the “West Side Story” coin, even if it was just for a single performance. I’m glad I got to help the cast using what few resources I could provide. This production has brought out new parts of my acting, and now new parts of my musical ability as well. That alone is worth everything to me, and I’m so grateful for having had the chance to perform on drums for this wonderful show.
