New York: Day 5: The Music of the Subway

Today was not my most well-planned day... the good news is that there is plenty of things to do on the next trip. My flight back to Cleveland is at a weird time that, combined with the fact that nothing opened before 11 today meant that I didn't really do anything.

A car is picking me up from the hotel headed for La Guardia at 1:30... I had wanted to visit the Whitney Museum of American Art but my rapidly declining cold-weather endurance combined with the fact that at best I would have 90 minutes in the museum before needing to return to the hotel and check out I decided to make that a "next trip" visit.

I started this morning by riding the 1 Train from Times Square/42nd up to the Bronx and back. While riding I closed my eyes and heard a symphony: A punctuated pizzicato rhythm starts in the bases and is echoed by the first, violins then the violas. The cellos repeat the line, which is echoed by the second violins -- circling the rider from left to right. Percussion lets out a thump, followed by a thump while a lone flutist plays three notes of different lengths; a second flute joins the first somewhere between the second and third notes creating a harmonic relationship. This structure repeats while a horn sounds, and sounds again. A sustained note, then ends.

The strings build, from the violins up to create a fervent excitement of accelerating tempo. A sustained note is played by the bases, while the other strings slow to a stop, and return to the pizzicato from earlier. A sharp note comes from the woodwinds, and percussion signals the thump-stop of the train. A din is heard from the mixed voices outside the car, a descending chord his heard to warn of the impending departure and the symphony repeats, building then falling, and either repeating or ending as the rider continues or exits.

That's what I heard in the subway.

Lincoln

New York: Day 4, Part 2: Chicago Symphony Orchestra - Carnegie Hall

Ravel: Le Trombeau de Couperin (1914)

Dalbavie: Flute Concerto (2006)Bartok: Bluebird's Castle, Op. 11
Pierre Boulez, conductor.

On my way to Carnegie Hall I spotted the creation you see on your to the right from across the Q express tracks at Times Square/42nd St. station (the uncropped version can be found at Flickr for the full context)... perhaps I've been spending too much time looking at Contemporary Art or perhaps it's a testament to the quantity of public art throughout the MTA system but my first take was to try and figure out the artist's intent... first guess was a figure lounging while reading a book, then a reclining figure playing a bowed instrument of some kind with the music in front of him... and when I finally realized it was graffiti I had to take a picture.

Until this evening the Cleveland Orchestra was truly the only orchestra I had heard*. Upon learning that, a talented young violinist I met through Match.com told me that I would be disappointed with anyone else I would hear. During the preshow lecture, I noticed the Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage seemed particularly acoustically live and boomy as compared to Severance Hall, which, in retrospect is fairly dead acoustically**. My seat was not in the best location, visually or acoustically, but it was serviceable.

I was not disappointed -- the concert was thoroughly enjoyable, but I felt like something was missing. There is something intangible, indescribable, a...je ne sais qouis that makes listening to the Cleveland Orchestra -- at Severance or Blossom completely different than what I listened to tonight. Near the end of the Bartok piece I realized that when I'm listening to TCO I feel like I'm listening to an integrated whole that envelops me in the music. Tonight, on the other hand, I felt detached and it almost seemed as if every section existed in it's own universe that while contributing to the whole ignored the constituent parts. It's hard for me to come up for a good description for what I felt.

There were a few moments, particularly in the Ravel and Bartok pieces where the reverberant nature of the hall was instantaneously distracting -- I'd hear a note from a flute or a horn and milliseconds later hear that same note from "behind" me.

It was interesting to watch Mr. Boulez conduct; of all of the conductors I've observed I think he was the most understated, rarely moving his hands more than a few inches, never moving on the podium, and every movement was fluid; I didn't notice a single sharp/aggressive gesture..

I think Ravel's Le Tombeau de Couperin was my favorite from the evening, particularly the first and fourth movements (Prelude and Rigaudon). Dalbavie was in attendance for the performance of his Flute Concerto which was not bad, though I didn't particularly take anything away from it.

I turns out that despite my giving the Metropolitan Opera a pass, I was still destined to hear opera while I was in New York City. While Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle will not ascend my favorite's list, The piece had several interesting moments and the performance benefited from several features that made it immensely more enjoyable:

• The use of an electronic display for surtitles, and that display was at a reasonable height above the orchestra (perhaps 15' above the stage), allowing both the orchestra and the titles to be in view at the the same time. One of my chief complaints with Opera Cleveland is that they position the title board at the top of the proscenium arch, making it impossible to both watch the action on stage and follow the story at the same time.
• A printed text and translation for the entire opera in both Hungarian and English. While I primarily used the surtitles, this booklet made it easier to gauge the progress of the work and review any dialog I missed.
• The singers were not amplified, and mixed well with the orchestra. I could easily "tune out" either group depending on my listening preference at any given moment.

Finally, I thought it was interesting how many times the words "Cleveland Orchestra" appeared in the program: The schedule insert for the 'Great American Orchestras I' series (February 5, 2011); Mr. Dalbavie's biography [page 33]; Mr. Boulez's biography [Page 38i]; Mr. Aimard's biography [Page 38j]; and Ms. DeYoung's biography [Page 38m]

Lincoln

*- I don't consider the two "pops" orchestras I've heard (Long Beach and Cleveland Pops) or student orchestras (the Cleveland Institute of Music) in the same orbit

New York: Day 4, Part 1: Moving Downtown

Today was a very lazy day for me... for some reason my ankles were making their discomfort known and that combined with the brutally cold temperatures (a high of 20 according to the newscast I'm viewing while I type this) generally discouraged me from doing much. But that's not to say I did nothing:

Changing Hotels. The three night stay I booked at the Waldorf was finished and it was time to move to my hotel for the last night of my stay: The Hilton Times Square. Thanks to an extremely accommodating desk staff, for a about 3 hours this morning I was technically checked in to two hotels simultaneously.

I have a total of three bags including my laptop. I decided to do two trips: The first trip I carried my laptop and overnight bag (now the swag bag) onto the 6 train, then the 42nd street shuttle to the Hilton. I took MTA back to the Waldorf but decided to hail a cab for my roll aboard (I didn't feel like throwing it over a turnstile and based on the headways I encountered on the first trip I didn't really want to waste any more of the morning).

I had watched other tourists try to hail a cab without much luck and was expecting some difficulty for my first time. Such was not the case. Literally, I got to the curb on Lexington, had my arm out for no more than 2 seconds before a cab was in front of me.

Based on what I've seen so far, I actually much prefer this property-- it's much more my style, the location is far more convenient (Both the Hilton and Waldorf are within about a 3 minute walk of a subway station... but Times Square/42nd has more lines and generally goes more of the places I want to go without needing to transfer). In addition there is a huge amount of contemporary art around the property... including a collection of Tom Otterness's very cute sculptures-with-a-story*

The service is also much more "we're being hospitable because we want to be hospitable" than "we're being hospitable, damn it, because you expect us to"

The Empire State Building. Tourist trap, pure an simple. At $20 it's overpriced and they try to get you to buy extras at every turn. Decent view, but I have pretty much the same view from my hotel room window. Add a security detail that's more aggressive than any airport I've transited** It's not something I ever need to do again.

Lunch. My violin teacher suggested -- actually the only suggestion I got -- eating at Veselka in Manhattan's East Village. Fantastic atmosphere, and amazingly crowded at 2pm. The place is a mix of Ukranian and American Diner; based on my aforementioned picky eating tendencies once I fought my way to an empty bar stool I stuck to the diner side of the menu with Mac & Cheese and a side of fries.

The Rest Of The Afternoon. I sat quietly and relaxed. Until the time came to head to Carnegie Hall, the subject of the next post.

More Photos over at Flickr

Lincoln

*- Mr. Otterness' work The Gates can be found at the Cleveland Public Library. A photo of one of the little people is the centerpiece of my living room's south wall. If I could afford one of the sculptures, I would love to have the real thing.
** - The buttons on my jeans set off the metal detector. Seriously. Then the gaurd made pull up my pant legs to double check.

New York: Day 3, Part 2: Next To Normal

So my original plan for this evening was to see a show then do the Empire State Building by night. It's just too cold and I'm just too tired to do that tonight... Anyway...

While browsing the TKTS board Next To Normal was the only show I had heard next to nothing about but the premise sounded interesting. In short, it's about a bipolar mother who sees her dead son, and a generally dysfunctional family.

The show received a nearly unanimous standing ovation (at least on the orchestra level), the first I've seen in any New York show [even Phantom only received a few scattered standees]. While enjoyable-with-a-message, the show seemed a bit uneven as far as energy, pacing, and volume go; given the content of the show I'm willing to write that off as intentional.

The program lacks any synopsis, list of musical numbers, or similar information (in fact, the lone hint that one is given about the structure of the production is There Will Be One 15 Minute Intermission) so while I can say I enjoyed most of the music, without having samples to listen to I can't tell you what specific pieces they were.

The casting was a bit suspicious: I could not believe that Gabe (Kyle Dean Massey) was young enough to be Dan's (J. Robert Spencer) son, although in Act II, I noticed a hint of gray hair which at least made it easier to tell who was who. Likewise, I sensed absolutely no chemistry between Natalie (Jennifer Damiano) and Henry (Adam Chanler-Berat).

Overall, though, well worth the evening.

Lincoln

New York: Day 3, Part 1: Ce n'est pas un blog.

So I looked at getting tickets for The Metropolitan Opera either tonight or tomorrow afternoon's matinee. I decided against it because... well... I have psychological issues that prevent me spending $375 on a single seat for a single event. (Not to mention that while I'd love to try out "Met Titles", I'm not that big of a foreign-language opera fan).

Anyway... the morning started with me trying to visit The High Line, a former elevated railway downtown that's been converted to park space. I've read about it and seen it on TV so I figured I'd check it out in person. It happens to be very easy to find but impossible to find access to, though with the firigid temperatures -- I lost feeling in my ears. I didn't know you had feeling in your ears. -- I wasn't exactly motivated to spend a lot of time outdoors. After buying the most god-awful looking cap-thingy to help keep my ears a little bit warmer, I took a somewhat circuitous route to

The TDF/TKTS booth at South St. Seaport, that involved going back uptown to Grand Central then downtown... largely so I could warm up a bit. Thanks to a wrong turn, I wound up at the World Trade Center site before finding the TKTS booth where I got a ticket for tonight's performance of Next To Normal... read more about that in Part 2. You know the whole ticket-handling-fee racket is getting out of control when your receipt actually lists a "Fee Fee" of $2.50...

That business taken care of I headed for The Museum of Modern Art. While I found relatively little that truly caught my eye at The Metropolitan Museum of Art yesterday, there was comparatively little that didn't catch my eye at MoMA, though I will admit that my fascination was directed more at the photos, lithios, and 3D objects than paintings.

Last but not least for Part 1 I wound up at The Guggenheim Museum. I knew that I was in for a museum unlike any other when immediately after (not-)paying I walked into a very passionate/sensual peice of performance art between a man and woman (fully clothed, however). The true suprise was yet to come.

You often hear about art "challenging" you or "engaging" you, but I've never come upon such a literal challenge. It turns out that today was the opening for Tino Seghal's This Progress, an artist and installation I had never heard of. Upon walking up the Gugenheim's famous ramp, I was met by an attractive young woman who invited me to observe a piece of performance art. She asked the meaning of progress, and while we walked up the ramp challenged me to define it and relate it, expand it. (This is precisely the kind of conversation that I'd love to have over dinner and why being single is slowly killing me). She then handed me off to a gentleman and the process repeated, more or less, as it did two or three more times until reaching the top of the ramp. (Seriously, everything outside of the conversations disappeared into a blur, I was simultaneously trying to carry on a conversation while trying to process what I was experiencing.

After arriving at the top of the ramp the last person and I parted ways and I was left to look at the traditional art on display, of which there is not much at the moment--what is on the walls is fantastic to look at, but there simply isn't much gallery space open at the moment. Mr. Seghal's "piece"? "installation"? "exhibit"? Made the visit very well worthwhile.

It can be, and has been, said that everyone experiences art in their own way... With this piece that could never be truer. A much more comprehensive writeup can be found at The New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/17/magazine/17seghal-t.html

Lincoln
(It's funny to note that I had chosen the "Ce n'est pas un blog" title on my way back to the hotel and before I stumbled across this article in the New York Observer titled "Ceci n'est pas Performance Art"... I guess I wasn't the only one who had that reaction to interacting with the piece.)

Lincoln In New York: Day 2: Lincoln Does Lincoln Center

My morning didn't exactly get off to the best start when I looked out the hotel room window and saw plenty of snowflakes flying. I then proceeded to search the hotel for the Starbucks that is suposedly somewhere on premise (and that I have three free "breakfast" vouchers for) before giving up.

Transportation.
I then hopped on the 6 train at 51st & Lex -- conveniently adjacent to the hotel with no exact destination in mind. Of all of the various lines I rode today, the 6 train was certainly the most technologically advanced. Unlike BART (and as it turns out the 1, C, N, and S trains-- though none of those were anywhere near as bad as BART), PA announcements were clearly intelligible, though I kept expecting to hear "Pardner" after the "Please stand clear of the closing door" announcements -- sounded very much like a Disney ride.

I'm amazed at how incredibly efficient New York City Transit is... my longest wait for a train was maybe 5 minutes, and my 6/S/1 and 1/S/6 routings to and from Lincoln Center were painless, though it did take some elbowing to fit on. (I will say that both Gand Central and 42nd/Times Square could use some better signage regarding locating the S train).

So anyway I took the 6 train to City Hall, wandered around in the still-falling snow for all of about 5 minutes and found my way to the N train to 5th Av/59th St. From there I walked through Central Park, until I arrived at...

The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
For as gigantic a collection as they have, I was supprised by how relatively little art really caught my eye. I also found the layout a little confusing -- though this is not unique to The Met. One of the things I love about the "new" Cleveland Museum of Art is that it's fairly easy to make your way through galleries such that you see every gallery once without backtracking (for example, in a clockwise fashion).

The Atrium on the American Wing gave me a glimpse of what can be expected when (if?) the Cleveland Museum's renovation/expansion is complete... it seems like an exciting space.

I had a hotdog on the steps of the Met, and when finished continued walking North until I arrived at

The Cooper-Hewitt Museum of Design
Industrial Design (along with Human Factors) is one of the areas of art/design that I really dig. Unfortunately, most of the Museum is closed for renovation/expansion but the special exhibition [and the fact that they offer privileges for CMA members] made it worth the visit. The museum had a cool twist on the audio tour -- using iPod Touches loaded with video, slide shows, and interviews instead of the standard monotone stuff.

One of the designers featured in the exhibition is Milton Glaset. Mr. Glaset is a man who's work I've admired without ever knowing the man (among others the "I {heart} New York" design was his creation. In his interview he made some points that really resonated (The quote may not be exact, but it should be close enough):

If you like Mozart and I like Mozart, we already have something in common and are less likely to want to hill each other. Art is about keeping us from killing each other.

and, even more so,

A great thing about being in the arts is that the possibility for learning never disappears. You have to admit that you've never learned everything.

Another of the honorees featured in the exhibit was the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis which you may recall I visited just a few months ago.

Central Park
After leaving Cooper-Hewitt I walked to the north end of Central Park, hung a left, got to Central Park Left, and hopped on the C train headed downtown...somehow (don't push me for details) I would up on the 1 train and at

Lincoln Center (the first time).
I wandered around a bit, found some of the Juliard School buildings, and the theatre where the New York City Ballet was performing. Picked up my ticket from Will Call, then hopped back on the 1 train, and the short ride to Columbus Circle.

Lunch and Carnegie Hall
From Columbus Circle I made my way to Carnegie Hall where I purchased tickets for a the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's Saturday Evening Performance and then on to Burger Joint, a well hidden, very casual, um, burger joint, in the lobby of Le Parker Meridian. After lunch I needed to be off my feet for a little while, so I came back to the hotel and got ready for

New York City Ballet's performance of Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty
At Lincoln Center. Took the 6 train from 51st/Lex to Grand Central, S from Grand Central to 42nd/times square, and 1 from Times Square to 66th/Lincoln Center. It really couldn't have been easier. Driving from my house to any of the theaters in Cleveland is more stressful and probably takes as long if not longer.

I was in the front row of the First Tier, just about 10' off center. I really don't think there were many seats with a better view. The theater was much more intimate than the seating chart made it appear and I was far enough back to see "everything" without being so far back as to not be able to see detail.

I've said it before and will say it again... I'm not qualified to comment on ballet. All I can say is that there was nothing that I thought distracted from an enjoyable experience. The dancing was well executed, the orchestra was a pleasure to listen to, etc., etc.

So then I did the 1 train to the S train to the 6 train and am back here at the hotel for the night. There are more pictures over at Flickr.

Tomorrow I'm tempted to try to get into the Met Opera to see their show, if for no other reason than to see how their surtitling system works... but I'm also tempted to try to see another show on Broadway. Ugh. Decisions, decisions. It will probably come down to if any of the shows TKTS has catch my fancy.

Lincoln

Lincoln In New York: Day 1: Phantom of the Opera

So the "work" part of this trip [if you can call two days of BSing, cocktails, and bowling work] was officially over at 3:45 this afternoon. By 5:30 I was in Manhattan and checked in to my room. At the Waldorf=Astoria.

Now the room itself isn't too much more spectacular than any given room at any other hotel; comparably it's certainly smaller than I'm used to but by no means claustrophobic. Although now that I'm typing this and have looked at some of the pictures I took, I'm realizing that the level of craftsmanship and detail is infinitely higher than I'm used to. Despite being in quite possibly the noisiest city in the world, the room is stunningly quiet -- I've not heard one bit of noise from the hallway and only the occasional horn honk outside.

After checking in and hanging my clothes [an ounce of prevention is worth 45 minutes of me trying to iron out a wrinkle in vain] I went for a little walk to get myself oriented. After correcting for three wrong turns and going solely from memory I made my way to the TKTS booth in Times Square.

I still had a really bad taste in my mouth from Playhouse Square's Chicago and I needed to cleanse my palette. A perfect cleansing is exactly what I got. While I still need to see Les Mis, I am now not the only musical theatre fan in America who has not seen Phantom of the Opera. A lot of people seem to get very excited about Phantom and I've never really gotten it.

I wasn't terribly familiar with the music but what I had heard I was kind of lukewarm to. It goes without saying that it was a completely different experience live and somewhere around the dramatic swell in Think of Me during the first scene I realized that this was going to be a great show. While not my favorite musical (Spring Awakening still holds that role, and for sentimental reasons Jersey Boys and The Who's Tommy are tied for second), Phantom was a solid and enjoyable show.

Where with Chicago most songs started tolerable but ended "painfully annoying", Phantom I enjoyed most songs from the beginning and those that I didn't immediately like I wound up liking to some degree as the song progressed. I did feel that the first act was much stronger than the second, but that is the case with most theater... and matching the first act would have been tough to pull off. Something about the music kept me wondering when I was going to hear Sondheim's Pretty Women from Sweeney Todd (in this video clip starting at about 6:20 if you don't know what I'm talking about). The music was very operatic and I was pleasantly surprised by how well the cast pulled it off.

Here's a box office tip for you: Any time a ticket seller tells you that a seat is "a little to the left" or "just off center" translate that to "you couldn't be any more to the left while still having a seat in the theater" -- and that was true of my seat, BB 11, second row, last occupied seat... here's my preshow view (BB 12 and 13 exist but it doesn't appear that 12 or 13 in any of the first several rows was sold)... it was actually a very good seat. Most of the action was either center or in that corner downstage right and there's very little where I felt like I might be missing something.

While I was essentially seated directly in front of a speaker and heard more amplified sound than natural sound after my recent experiences with poorly balanced sound (Chicago and Wicked to be precise) the audio was pleasantly unobtrusive.

I love when the band/orchestra plays out, and I watched the entire playout for Phantom from the edge of the pit. Not only did it sound fantastic it was a unique perspective: Being literally above the musicians allowed for a much better view of their playing and because the conductor's portion of the pit extends further into the house for the first time ever I could see the conductor's facial expressions and body language which adds a dynamic to the interaction between musician and conductor. (To digress: I wonder if the Cleveland Orchestra has ever thought of putting audience members behind the orchestra on the choir risers? I'm not sure you'd get the best sound, but it would be an immerseive experience!)

Ok, so it's time for me to go to bed so I can get up nice and early for tomorrow's adventures :)

For as hard as a time as I've given Playhouse Square recently the Jump Back Ball is coming up and I learned about a deal via 27 Dresses in Cleveland...I'm acutally more tempted than not to go this year but I'm not convinced it's for me.

Lincoln