What do you do when your college orchestra has played its last concert of the school year, but rehearsals are still scheduled until the end of the semester? If you're the director, you have your orchestra play potential pieces for next year or pieces that student conductors direct. If you're a student, you play some pieces you might never play again, while feeling relaxed because the pressure of the semester is largely off. What you don't do, according to my former college orchestra director, is call in sick. One year, near the end of the semester, the director posted a note on the music department bulletin board, "To the eight people who called in sick to Tuesday's rehearsal: Make sure you are in perfect health on May (such-and-such) for our last rehearsal of the semester."
If common courtesy toward the music, the director, and the rest of the orchestra wasn't enough of an incentive, there was another reason to show up: One unexcused absence in a semester lowered a student's orchestra grade to a D. Two unexcused absences resulted in an F.
As I recall, there was perfect attendance at that semester's last rehearsal.
