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| Concert Notes | |
| July 27, 2002 | It was Gershwin tonight. Yesterday, the whole CYMO group (Alex, Jason, Pat, Eric, Jessica, Natasha, Daniel, Emily, Elinor, and me) went together and sat in W, the second to last row in the entire Bowl. Tonight, I got moved off 1st prom to main gate because they were short on people. Even so, there were only four of us taking tickets. Main gate is so hectic; it's crazy! You just stand there for 3 hours straight, tearing tickets frantically. All the time, giving that automatic smile and saying,"Hello," "Good Evening," "Hi," "How are you tonight?" "Enjoy the show," etc... Then afterwards, you get to count all the tickets you tore. Luckily, since I get off at nine, the lady in charge helped me out. I tore about 2000 tickets. And my box got knocked over three times, by these fat people that can't get through the turnstiles. Stupid people; they don't even notice that they've knocked a whole box-ful of tickets onto the ground and there's a girl in a white shirt on her hands and knees trying to pick them up and apologize at the same time while a whole line of patrons are impatiently waiting to get in. It sucks, because then my whole nicely organized box is in disarray, but I can't stop to arrange it because I have to keep on tearing tickets. Mommy, Daddy, Jennifer, and Zack came today. They sat in section D and I joined them after I clocked out. Gershwin is cool! Kevin Cole, the pianist, is so good. Rhapsody in Blue is awesome. And An American in Paris sounds really great, too. I don't really like Audra McDonald; the songs she sang were mediocre, and even though her voice is good, I don't like her style much. After the concert, Mommy wanted to stay and wait for Alex and drive back with him. So I took her down to Wardrobe and I got my stuff. I'm soooooooo STUPID!! See, Alex always leaves his keys and wallet in my bag, but I totally forgot. The car my parents drove was stacked in Odin, so we had to wait quite a while. Alex called my dad's cell at 11:41, but it wasn't on. At 11:41, we were still in Hollywood. If we had known, we could have dropped off the keys right then. Unfortunately, we didn't find out until we got home, because Alex called there too. We walked in the house, turned around, walked right back out, got back in the car, and drove straight back to Hollywood. Alex and Mommy had to wait for about forty minutes. It was ok though because we all thought it was kind of funny. |
| July 30, 2002 | James Galway is good!! Daniel, one of our fellow ushers, got to meet him! See, before the concert, Mrs. Galway asked a favor of Daniel. He got her a ticket from the House Manager's Office. Later, after James Galway performed, he and his wife came down first prom. When Mrs. Galway saw Daniel, she said to her husband, "This is my friend Daniel," and Galway patted him and on the shoulder and stuff. That is the awesomeest thing! I want to meet James Galway! The flute concerto he played was interesting, a bit weird at times. It was quite good considering that it was written only ten years ago by William Bolcom especially for Galway. There was a lot of flutter tongueing and the movements were all in different styles, but overall it was ok. I liked his encore pieces. He played two Irish songs and his introduction was funny. He said, "The next two pieces I'm going to perform are by the two most popular Irish composers: Traditional and Anonymous." One of them was Danny Boy. He also played Flight of the Bumble Bee and a very famous Bach piece. Galway is a sir, too. The LA Phil also played a Dvorak symphony. It sounded good, but it wasn't anything too special. The conductor today had a funny accent and he liked to talk before each piece, but his English wasn't too good and he sounded like he didn't know what to say. It was kind of funny that before the Dvorak, he said that this piece requires no explanation than went on to explain why it required no explanation. I was amused. Tonight was a good concert!! |
| August 1, 2002 | First day of August! Same concert as Tuesday. Mr. Landes, Mr. Farr, and Mr. Forbes were here today. It was funny, because Alex and I were talking during the usher meeting and Ellice told us to share. Then when they walked in, all the ushers started clapping and we waved at them. A bunch of my buddies came today; we requested eight tickets. Jennifer and her mom, my flute teacher and her husband, Nancy, her sister, and a friend, and mommy. Everybody was very impressed by James Galway. He's sooo good! Landes is looking for a flute coach for music camp and he asked me to ask my teacher. I told Landes that she was going to be here today and that I would introduce her at intermission. When I told my teacher, she refused to go meet him because she said her English wasn't good enough, but then Landes came to find us. She doesn't want to do it, but Landes insists that she should think about it and call him. I actually got to hear the Irish songs today. Yay! I missed them yesterday because I had to clock out. We were a bit earlier and so I ran off near the end of the concerto and literally sprinted back to hear the encores. I like James Galway! Oh, and I found out that the conductor that talks funny is actually Miguel Harth Bedoya! |
| August 1, 2002 | Tonight's concert was so awesome!! The first half was all LA Phil, but they only played three pieces. Among them was Carnival Overture: they played better than CYMO but they were a bit messy in the parts we were, too, just not as messy. :-) The second half featured a dance/acrobatic troupe called Cirque Eloize. The music they choreographed for their program was all really famous and sounded great! And the stuff that group does is beyond cool. There was this part when they have these strips of cloth hanging from the rafters. A guy climbed up and did flips like those Olympic gymnasts. He also wrapped the cloth around himself so he could hang with one foot or one hand; then he would unwrap the cloth and he would freefall until the wrapping of the cloth (which he did earlier) caught him again. Imagine if he wrapped himself up wrong, and the cloth didn't catch him. The crazy thing is that they don't wear any harnesses or have any safety nets. There was also this guy who rolled around in a huge wheel (kind of like those hamster wheels.) He could tilt it until it was almost flat on the ground and then bring it alway back up to vertical again. There was a pair where the guy held the girl up on his hands (her hands where on his hands and she would be doing a handstand) and then he would flip her so that her feet were on his hands. It looked really scary because the guy's arms were shaking and I thought he would miss when he flipped her and drop her (but he didn't of course.) Then there was this guy who could do handstands like mad. There were these poles and he would do one handed handstands on progressively higher poles. Finally, he was on a pole about eight feet tall, doing a one handed handstand. The last guy was on a swinging cloth. It was similar to the other cloth guys except that the bottom made a seat type thing and he sit there and swing over the audience. He would flip and hang by his feet and swing, and when he did that, his head looked like it would graze the floor of the stage. The program was choreographed superbly. The music they chose were all very well known pieces: Barber Adagio, Cappricio Espagnol, Danse Arabe (from the Nutcracker,) Rachmaninoff's Vocalise, Danse Macabre, Berceuse and Finale from Firebird, and Bacchanale by Saint Saens. Tonight's concert was great! And I talked to one of the dancers afterwards when they were taking off their makeup in the bathroom. They are based in Montreal and a lot of them are French speakers. Martin Chalifour is good; he had a lot of solos today. AWESOME, GREAT, INTERESTING, FUN TO WATCH concert tonight! |
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