Kevin Switalski warming up in front of his travel trunk.
By Marisela Sager
As the task of packing for another tour is upon me, I thought I might share some of it: perhaps interesting for you and therapeutic for me.
The orchestra has wardrobe and instrument trunks that travel with us everywhere we tour. In them we pack our concert necessities: instruments, backup instruments, our concert black, sewing kit, lint roller (when you wear so much black…), etc. The orchestra will travel with approximately 92 trunks on this tour. We pack them up here in Cleveland and they appear again (thanks to our amazing stage managers and operations staff ) in Edinburgh.
Somehow before every tour the chore of packing sneaks up on me. Getting organized seems to be the hardest part.
Step 1: Do laundry!
When packing for a 2-3 week trip across multiple climates, you want to have all your options available.
Step 2: Go shopping for anything that’s missing
Usually this includes an attempt at finding the illusive stylish but comfortable walking shoe.
Marisela and Searan
Step 3: Air out the trunk and spray with Febreze
This step needs no further explanation!
Step 4: Be kind to your trunk mate
Wardrobe trunks are shared between two people. My trunk mate is the beautiful, talented, and charming Saeran St. Christopher…now I can check step 4 off my list.
Step 5: Pack it all in, knowing that you’re probably forgetting something!
~Marisela Sager, flute