Good Afternoon!
Sorry again for not posting last night once I got back from the preview... I turned my laptop on as soon as I got back, but, then somehow, I found myself asleep on the couch with the TV on sometime around 1:30AM, so I just made my way to the bedroom...
DR Danise - As for dealing with keyboards/pianos and page turns, well...
I'll start with page turns... Page turns, in my line of business - and other DRs will attest to this too - are a fact of life. They just have to be dealt with. Hopefully, if the copyist/typesetter has done their job right, the page turns come at "convenient" times when a few notes can be dropped in the left or right hand of the accompaniment without too much musical interruption. But there are times when you just have to hope for the best and grab that page corner, and get it turned over ASAP! *For most classical concerts - recitals, chamber music, etc. - having a page turner is more or less of a tradition (and one that has inspired a few short stories, novellas, and movies). However, my vocal coach in college always insisted on "learning" how to make the page turns on my own. The only thing "worse" than having no page-turner, is having a bad one. -Trust me on this one!! I used to be the "on-call" page turner for the chamber music series at my school. I loved the opportunity to get that close - literally - to the artists. And they were usually more than happy to offer me a free coaching or two in return.
As for keyboards... Well, you have patch changes - either done by a foot pedal and/or a button switch on the keyboard. You may have to deal with a "click track" via a set of "cans" (headphones) over your ears. You may be watching your conductor "live" just a few feet from you, or you may be watching him/her via a small monitor mounted in front of you. Etc., etc., etc... In short, there are a lot of "thingies" one may have to deal with while playing a show today. In fact, finding a good "show keyboard player" is truly different from just finding a "good pianist". Some of the musico-technological skills can truly only be learned on the job. It's usually a lot more than reading notes and following the conductor nowadays.
*And I've come across a few keyboard books/orchestra parts where there have been some truly impossible page turns. -When I played BEAUTY & THE BEAST, there were a few like this. Sometimes you'll find a notation like: "Leave out these notes, if needed, for page turn." It happens sometimes.
As for WHAT IF? - I'm just playing an "old-fashioned" piano. No bells and whistles and electronics to deal with. Page turns, yes, but no headphones or extra pedals.