The Blow of Fate
When the Los Angeles Philharmonic invited UCLA's Philharmonia to perform as part of its Mahler Grooves Festival at Walt Disney Concert Hall in early March, the group's contribution to the program was Mahler's Sixth Symphony — 90 minutes of all-encompassing music, four movements, and one of the most iconic moments in the evening's repertoire.
In the fourth movement of Mahler's Sixth, fate arrives in the form of a literal hammer blow. Maddie Bottenberg was the one holding the hammer.
"It was my first time playing at Disney Hall," said Bottenberg, who was serving as principal percussionist for the Philharmonia that quarter. "And I got to play the most iconic part."
That fateful hammer — a massive mallet struck against a wooden box — lands like a thunderclap, and in Mahler's own telling, it represents the blow of fate that fells a hero. For Bottenberg, it also was the kind of moment that makes six years of practice feel exactly worth it.
Dani Santana was in the orchestra that night too, playing contrabassoon — the largest and lowest instrument in the woodwind family — and remembers trying to fill the hall with as much sound as she could.
"It's a tough symphony," she said. "But the payoff was just really incredible."
She had family in the audience, and the performance gave her a chance to reflect on how far she'd come — from a kid in Torrance who picked up the clarinet in fourth grade, switched to bassoon at eleven and never looked back.
"You make a choice when you're eleven, and it defines your whole life," she said, laughing.
Bottenberg, meanwhile, arrived at The Herb Alpert School of Music from Redlands, California, completed her undergraduate degree and returned for her master's. She spent four years in UCLA's marching band, then became the drumline teaching assistant, a position that supported her graduate studies track. With help from percussion professor Greg Goodall, she was accepted into LAFCI, a program that places musicians in professional recording studios to learn the craft of soundtrack work firsthand. She also coaches percussion at a local middle school and finds that watching young players discover the instrument she loves reminds her why she chose it.
Her long-term goals run from finding work as a studio musician to Broadway pit orchestras to, eventually, a major orchestra position, knowing that there might be a gig right away, or a long waiting game for any of it. She'll continue to work on her craft either way.
Santana graduates with double degree in music performance and music education. She spent her senior year student teaching at John Adams Middle School in Santa Monica while completing her performance coursework. The two worlds illuminate each other. Working with young musicians has reminded her what it feels like to encounter music without the accumulated weight of mastery.
Dani Santana and the UCLA Philharmonia pose for a group selfie at Disney Hall / Courtesy artist
"It's hard to remember what it feels like to be a beginning musician," she said. The light bulb moments — when a twelve-year-old suddenly gets it — are what she is staying in the field for.
Both Santana and Bottenberg said they have wrestled with imposter syndrome in a program full of extraordinary musicians. Both have learned to trust their instincts as their training develops their innate talent.
"I'm not looking to be like someone else," Santana said. "I'm just trying to be who I am."
And that includes carrying the memory of a special shared experience with fellow UCLA musicians in one of the most influential arts spaces in the city. When the hammer came down in the fourth movement at Disney Hall, Santana said everything clicked.
“You really felt, this is what we’ve been working for,” she said. “It was just so cool.”
