10-13-2019, 08:49 AM
(This post was last modified: 01-31-2020, 11:44 PM by Drunk Monk.)
Season opener. We had hoped for new seats on house right but were disappointed to find that they gave us our old seats behind soundboard, next to the family with the annoying teen who squirms in his squeaky chair and plays with his phone constantly. We moved to the floor after the intermission and hope to change our seats before the next show in Nov.
Mothership was a premiere performance of a composition written for the YouTube Orchestra (Tilson Thomas' project) that had 'edm' elements meaning the composer sat in droppin the base from his macbook. Glow sticks were handed out to the audience in honor of this as well as for GLOW, MAH's annual celebration of light for wannabe/ex-hippies&burners. It was dumb. The macbook had artsy samples, like sounds from NASA and such, but it offended my ears to hear electronic fart-bombs dominating the exquisite tones of a live orchestra. Mind you, I respect and endorse the experiment, but it failed.
I would love to hear an orchestral arrangement of actual EDM songs.
Tchaikovsky's Firebird. A solid rendition of a very complicated piece. Lots of funky breaks and some major bombast, the kind of symphonic booms that I so love. It's a funny piece. I often think I hear echoes of Holst in it, but I hear echoes of Holst in so many things, even compositions that precede him. Enjoyable. One of those bass drop booms actually made me jump a bit. Totally outshined the opening piece.
Beethoven's 5th piano concerto - wow. This is why we drop so much cash that we don't have on the SC symphony. Guest pianist Jon Nakamatsu was brilliant. Such a complex sophisticated piece and Jon works entirely from memory. From the floor, I could see his fingering (when that blonde bobbed woman in front of me leaned her head the right way) from about 40 ft and it was amazing. Such a master of his instrument.
This was Ludwig Van's final piano piece. He had lost so much of his hearing by then that he was unable to perform it. It's just staggering that he could compose this when deaf, like those painters who still worked when they were partially blind. Were there any chefs who cooked after they lost their sense of smell/taste? What a mind LVB must have had. What a tragedy to think of him going deaf. He couldn't even hear this piece after he finished it. So inspiring. Art at its highest.
After 3 standing ovations, Nakamatsu sat down for an encore piece. Again, breathtaking. Bravo.
Mothership was a premiere performance of a composition written for the YouTube Orchestra (Tilson Thomas' project) that had 'edm' elements meaning the composer sat in droppin the base from his macbook. Glow sticks were handed out to the audience in honor of this as well as for GLOW, MAH's annual celebration of light for wannabe/ex-hippies&burners. It was dumb. The macbook had artsy samples, like sounds from NASA and such, but it offended my ears to hear electronic fart-bombs dominating the exquisite tones of a live orchestra. Mind you, I respect and endorse the experiment, but it failed.
I would love to hear an orchestral arrangement of actual EDM songs.
Tchaikovsky's Firebird. A solid rendition of a very complicated piece. Lots of funky breaks and some major bombast, the kind of symphonic booms that I so love. It's a funny piece. I often think I hear echoes of Holst in it, but I hear echoes of Holst in so many things, even compositions that precede him. Enjoyable. One of those bass drop booms actually made me jump a bit. Totally outshined the opening piece.
Beethoven's 5th piano concerto - wow. This is why we drop so much cash that we don't have on the SC symphony. Guest pianist Jon Nakamatsu was brilliant. Such a complex sophisticated piece and Jon works entirely from memory. From the floor, I could see his fingering (when that blonde bobbed woman in front of me leaned her head the right way) from about 40 ft and it was amazing. Such a master of his instrument.
This was Ludwig Van's final piano piece. He had lost so much of his hearing by then that he was unable to perform it. It's just staggering that he could compose this when deaf, like those painters who still worked when they were partially blind. Were there any chefs who cooked after they lost their sense of smell/taste? What a mind LVB must have had. What a tragedy to think of him going deaf. He couldn't even hear this piece after he finished it. So inspiring. Art at its highest.
After 3 standing ovations, Nakamatsu sat down for an encore piece. Again, breathtaking. Bravo.
Shadow boxing the apocalypse