Probably in the beginning there is some informal email, where someone you knows invites you to join a project, like a concert somewhere (in this case Florence). You think to yourself 'alright, sounds cool', accept and start preparing yourself; something that you have done thousands of times before. Of course, on the way you will find out how difficult it can be to coordinate people for rehearsals etc, but still when you arrive there things go as usual. Just maybe that you don't really know when and where you go or where you will stay, but someone will tell you in time so no reason to bother. Quite suddenly you find yourself in a hotel, putting down your things and some strange thought crosses your mind 'actually, how come that I am here in this foreign place for playing a concert? i did everything as always but things somehow changed to a different track'. And only from there you realise that the whole thing was planned that way, that you doing something you would not have thought possible but that you are still the same and actually quite capable of living up to the expectations. From that point, everything continues as before - it's the same ritual every time, everywhere. Tune, adjust yourself, rehearse, relax, tune again, and there we go.
Just around this routine there are millions of details, things that simply happen when one meets new people, and some of them are nearly hilariously funny :) For example the guides of the church in which we played told us: 'no, it's closed for the public now, you are not allowed to enter! but if you want, there is a concert this evening, you can come back then.' When we explained that we actually were the musicians, they first gave us a quite puzzled look but then showed a lot of understanding and let us pass. However, things continued like that when we had a look at the instruments or were depositing our stuff as at first there was noone to show us around :) Also the coordination during the concert was a bit spontaneous, but luckily only the formalities were affected by this. In the end it turned out that exactly one link had been missing: the lady coordinating between San Lorenzo and the external music institutes had not appeared this evening.
In the end all that chaos did not matter: it was a real pleasure to play in this beautiful and huge church, whose dimensions gave great possibilities to experiment with sound whilst still providing a somehow homely atmosphere.
In the evening all this seemed so different already, somehow unreal. But still I could fall asleep with the happy and grateful feeling that on my first solo trip everything had gone well.


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