Archives for December 2003

“The first night we went to hear Parsifal. I still see my paralyzed mother there, looking and listening. In the Prinzregententheater the orchestra pit is invisible, especially designed by Wagner himself. On the stage there moved some high-bosomed women and obese men, enacting some sort of unreal slow-motion tragedy. From the bowels of the theater came the wailing sounds of a music whose humid sensuousness and subjectivism is intended to indicate ‘religion,’ or something which the artist believed to be religion. It was a strenuous and embarrassing experience. The only bright spot was the interval with sandwich rolls and beer.”

Karl Stern, The Pillar of Fire

My mailbox continues to silt up with good stuff, which I’ll dole out drib by drab. First is a reader’s response to my posting on the growing irrelevance of regional orchestras:

To me, the chief benefit of having a third-tier regional orchestra (aside
from the employment it provides to classical musicians, which, admittedly,
is a poor reason for anything) lies in the children. True, an adult
familiar with the classical repertoire would be better off listening to a
Beethoven symphony on a CD or DVD rather than spending an evening at some
small-town auditorium, but children are a different story.

I spent my first 11 years in a small town in Belarus, and my very first
concert was hearing the Soviet equivalent of a third-tier orchestra. I
don’t remember what was played and I certainly was in no position to gauge
the quality of the playing. But the experience was permanently etched in my
memory. This was my first introduction not to the music so much, but to the
concert experience. It was the grandness, the pomposity of the occasion
that I found so fascinating. The music was almost beside the point. It was
that evening when my love for concerts (which later evolved into the love of
music itself) began.

Later, we moved to New York and I attended various music schools, including
the old High School of Performing Arts. Three of my four children now study
music at one of the schools I attended. When I though it was time to take
my oldest to a symphony concert, it didn’t matter to me so much whether it
was the Chicago Symphony playing at Carnegie or some Bergen County orchestra
playing in Englewood. I wanted him to develop a love for the spectacle of a
symphony concert.

My concern is that if regional orchestras disappear, the already shrinking
audience base for classical music would, within a generation, disappear with
them.

I’ve gotten a lot of smart letters defending regional orchestras (more of which will turn up here in days to come), but this is the first one that seemed to me to move the argument in a significantly different direction. I really did underestimate the power of sheer spectacle, didn’t I?

As I read this letter, I recalled the first time I ever heard a symphony orchestra in person. It was the St. Louis Symphony (a second-tier ensemble of high quality, to be sure), performing Vaughan Williams’ Sea Symphony with a local university choir. I can’t remember a thing about the music or the way it was performed, but I can still close my eyes and see all those musicians up on stage. Granted, I was already in high school when I saw that concert, by which time I was already well on the way to becoming a performing musician. Looking back, I’d say the most important orchestral “experience” I had during my formative years was watching Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts on TV. Still, I’m inclined to go along with what my correspondent says about how seeing a symphony orchestra in person–be it good or fair or merely adequate–might well help set a young listener on the right path.

That’s me! Please don’t forget that my most recent book, The Skeptic: A Life of H.L. Mencken, is now out in trade paperback–and still available in hardcover. If you like “About Last Night,” you’ll like The Skeptic, and so will your friends. Don’t take my word for it, though: instead, take a look at some of the reviews.

I blog for the joy of it but write to pay the rent (as well as to buy the occasional lithograph). You can support both causes by giving The Skeptic for Christmas, or buying a copy for yourself if you don’t already own one.

To purchase the paperback, click here.

To purchase the hardcover edition, click here.

Forgive me for being a nuisance, but a boy must peddle his book. We return you now to our regularly scheduled blog.

I reviewed John Kani’s Nothing but the Truth
and the Builders Association’s Alladeen in today’s Wall Street Journal. About the first I had mixed feelings:

For playgoers who prefer politics to art, apartheid was a godsend. It inspired countless scripts that were black and white in every sense–you never had to ask who the bad guys were–and whose authors always threw in a last-act sermon to clear up any lingering doubts. Now that the good guys have won, though, it stands to reason that South Africa’s playwrights should finally have started working in shades of gray, and Lincoln Center Theater has proved the point by importing the Johannesburg production of John Kani’s “Nothing but the Truth,” an uneven but interesting new play that runs through Jan. 18 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater….

“Nothing but the Truth” is a kitchen-sink drama (literally–Sarah Roberts made sure to include one in her ultra-naturalistic set) whose characters are all citizens of Clich

This week’s New York Observer reveals almost more than I wanted to know about Mr. Personality:

We can help ID him only partly: Although Mr. TMFTML was gallant enough to speak to The Observer by phone, he would not disclose his name. This much can be ascertained: His nom de guerre is taken from the Leonard Cohen song “Hallelujah.” He is 31. He lives in Manhattan. He is married. His occupation–which he refers to only as “corporate”–remains cloaked in mystery. He was born in New York City, and has lived here ever since. He does not travel in “media circles,” a phrase he would no doubt gag over, but he admits to having once met Dale Peck, who “made fun of” his clothing.

Sounds like a lot of disinformation to me. Except for maybe the Dale Peck part.

It seems that Tony Kushner, whose Caroline, or Change I panned in last Friday’s Wall Street Journal, thinks I’m a “right-wing nut.” Serves me right for daring to dislike his show. I’m surprised he didn’t call me a McCarthyite while he was at it. No doubt it slipped his mind.

P.S. For a gay dissent on Kushner, go here.

“Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter-faction, the vegans, are a persistant irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food.”

Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential

A reader sent me a link to “Bridging the Gap: Innovations to Save Our Orchestras,” a study by the Knight Foundation that preaches the virtues of “nontraditional and enhanced concert experiences” that “seek to reach new and younger audiences by integrating programmatic themes, other art forms and other modes of communication to present classical music in alternative formats.” You can–and should–read the whole thing here.

I’m interested in the attempts of various regional orchestras mentioned in the study to find new ways to attract younger listeners–and even more interested in the data showing that these techniques seem to be working. At the same time, I also noted with a different sort of interest these observations:

To date, there is mixed evidence about whether these concerts would lead their ticket buyers to more standard orchestral fare, including classics or pops concerts….The findings are consistent with evidence from the Audience Insight study, which suggest that “increasing attendance–or at least staving off a decline in attendance–may require a loosening of the definitional boundaries around