Karaganda Symphony
One bus stop past the Miner’s Palace and we’re there. We enter the hall as the buzzer sounds. Alana looks great in purple and black. I’m wearing my David Niven sweater and boots with a two week beard. It rained today.
The building is tacky, yes, but not like a high school. Like a high school auditorium trying to be Benaroya, perhaps. The floor makes the woodworker in me cringe… the chairs slope forward. One breaks.
As the music starts, I remember that I’d forgotten how sweet a symphony sounds live. The way the sound fills your ears to the point where I don’t care my butt’s asleep. I like watching the violin players smush their bowties. There’s one cello player whose cheek twitches every time the tempo changes.
First is an overture of some sort by Mozart. Then, some Mozart with a lot of flute. The flute player is a tiny, tiny man. Kerri would like him in his tinyness, even though he wasn’t rock-star skinny. Seriously, his flute was half as tall as he was. I liked it until the flute was the only thing playing.
Intermission.
A student (I think) of Noah or maybe Andrea chatted with us on our way back to our seats. It is cold in here. I’m expecting piano, since this part is supposed to be Rachmaninoff. No dice. The brass section is beefed up, however, and the bass cleft in general gets a shot in the arm with a half-dozen extra cellos, another bass and some timpani. Some lady talked for a long time in russian and all I got was that the piece had something to do with the seasons.
Once the music got underway, I was struck by how the conductor moved. At times it was like watching a marionette as its strings broke, at other times it was more of a swaying and waving action and still at other times he was pointing, pointing, pointing with his little conductor's stick like an angry professor. The tuba player looked like he was having a conversation with the last trombone guy between their parts. On the cymbals and drums were two guys who looked like they mght still be in high school. When they stood up they always looked very nervous, leaning forward in anticipation of their, one, climactic, crash!
I like the symphony. I really like the symphony for $2.
I also went to church today, ate four somsas (2 cmyasa, 2 cirom) and took a nap. Now I'm blogging instead of planning lessons.
The building is tacky, yes, but not like a high school. Like a high school auditorium trying to be Benaroya, perhaps. The floor makes the woodworker in me cringe… the chairs slope forward. One breaks.
As the music starts, I remember that I’d forgotten how sweet a symphony sounds live. The way the sound fills your ears to the point where I don’t care my butt’s asleep. I like watching the violin players smush their bowties. There’s one cello player whose cheek twitches every time the tempo changes.
First is an overture of some sort by Mozart. Then, some Mozart with a lot of flute. The flute player is a tiny, tiny man. Kerri would like him in his tinyness, even though he wasn’t rock-star skinny. Seriously, his flute was half as tall as he was. I liked it until the flute was the only thing playing.
Intermission.
A student (I think) of Noah or maybe Andrea chatted with us on our way back to our seats. It is cold in here. I’m expecting piano, since this part is supposed to be Rachmaninoff. No dice. The brass section is beefed up, however, and the bass cleft in general gets a shot in the arm with a half-dozen extra cellos, another bass and some timpani. Some lady talked for a long time in russian and all I got was that the piece had something to do with the seasons.
Once the music got underway, I was struck by how the conductor moved. At times it was like watching a marionette as its strings broke, at other times it was more of a swaying and waving action and still at other times he was pointing, pointing, pointing with his little conductor's stick like an angry professor. The tuba player looked like he was having a conversation with the last trombone guy between their parts. On the cymbals and drums were two guys who looked like they mght still be in high school. When they stood up they always looked very nervous, leaning forward in anticipation of their, one, climactic, crash!
I like the symphony. I really like the symphony for $2.
I also went to church today, ate four somsas (2 cmyasa, 2 cirom) and took a nap. Now I'm blogging instead of planning lessons.
posted by nach at 11:11 PM
1 Comments:
if only I had something witty and clever to say back to you. thanks for your blogs of quality family entertainment.
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