My apologies to Professor Drabik for being delinquent in posting until this time.
This was my second time seeing an orchestra perform at Carnegie Hall. The first time I attended such a concert I was 12 years old. I went as a favor to my dad, who was going to see one of his students perform. To a 12 year old, the idea of seeing classical music live may not be overly thrilling, but I was really surprised at how much I enjoyed the performance.
So, six years later, I again find myself, once again seeing a classical performance. I found the most captivating piece in this concert to be “The Tempest.” I feel every movement was perfectly executed by the orchestra. I think the contrast within the piece itself between the movements also contributed to my profound enjoyment of it. I will definitely be open to attending more concerts of this nature in the future.
We have not discussed this poem in last week’s seminar, so I thought I might try to describe one to the best of my ability. Also, this poem matches the timing I am posting this at.
“Dawn” uses a gloomy tone to explain events and feelings of New Yorkers. People feel like there is no hope, paradise, or love in the mornings. They are very sleepy and feel like if they had an enormous struggle to wake up. The poem seems to ask the question: why would any one want to wake up?
It is very confusing and more gloomy than necessary. I have noticed that almost everyone in the subway was sleepy, but I believe that the city is pretty clean in the mornings. For example, the public bathrooms have been cleaned and no one has used them yet.
Going to Carnegie Hall on Thursday night was a fun experience.
The place itself was amazing. It is so grand and regal. That definitely left an image that’s hard to forget. Like the place, the performance was unforgettable too.
Although I am not a fan of classical music, I really enjoyed what was played that night. It was really captivating and I was energized with every performance. I was confused at how some of us were sleeping… (Not naming any names haha.)
I think the most memorable thing from that night wasn’t the music, but the instruments themselves. As the way the violins moved as they were played, it looked almost like a synchronized dance. It was just surreal.
This was definitely one of the more relaxing performances we have been on. Our past visits to performances required us to listen as well as watch what was happening on stage, and understand the plots, and the artist’s intent but for this performance, I was able to just close my eyes and listen. There were less boundaries in this performance, since the music predominately appealed to our ears, I felt more freedom to sit back, relax, close my eyes. The funny thing about this performance was that I felt more engaged with what was happening on stage even though I wasn’t watching. My heart rate would increase and I would feel nervous and tense when the music escalated to match the plot’s climax, and the story I was creating in my head that went along with the music would also change accordingly. When I did open my eyes, I loved watching the first violinist’s movements, she really had a stage presence among the many musicians surrounding her. Maybe it was her seating position on stage or the way she used her whole body to play the violin, it was just captivating. Not only her, but every musician seemed to show a bit of their own personality and style of playing in the way they moved to the music. I really appreciate how music can affect your mood, and the different senses that it indirectly affects. Relating this back to Fall for Dance, when many responses (myself included) were about music and how it made the listeners feel, I could feel the uneasiness of the situation in Tchaikovsky’s The Tempest and jumping on the bandwagon, this piece was easily my favorite from Thursday’s performance.
This was my second time going to an orchestra, the first time I went was back in Korea. This was when I was very little, and I ended up leaving the orchestra with my brother early to play outside. It was way too boring for me to just sit there and listen. However, this time, it was different. I listened and watched all the movements on the stage. The movement of the conductor, the movement through the music, and the movement of the singers were all interesting. The music went from soft to hard and the transition was very smooth as well.
Carnegie Hall definitely looks amazing from the outside as well as in the inside. I passed by Carnegie Hall several time and always wondered what the inside would look like, and it did not disappoint me. Although the seats were uncomfortable, it was a great experience and would love to visit again.
The performance we saw on Thursday was incredibly memorable and engaging.
First off: Carnegie Hall. Amazing! The building was beautiful, the interior was beautiful and the hall gave off an intense vibe of culture. It was simply a joy to be there and moreso to see a performance there. As soon as I saw the hall, I could not help but snap a picture.
Onto the performance: all of the pieces were fairly great. They were all perfectly complemented by the mesmerizing conducting of Pablo Heras-Casado, who gave a whole other level of energy to the performance. That was the moment I realized how truly integral a good conductor is to a good performance. One piece in particular etched itself into my mind: Mendelssohn’s “Die erste Walpurgisnacht” (The First Walpurgis Night). The narrative involved with this piece made me look forward to it even before the show had started. When the orchestra played it and the singers sang with their powerful voices, I was absolutely mesmerized. The innate story of the piece also appealed to me deeply: an oppressed group winning out against the majority. The ending of the piece was also, by far, my favorite part of the entire night.
Afterwards, an evening spent at the diner with the rest of the class made for an extremely memorable night.
For me, listening to the wonderfully spectacular classical music was only 90% of the performance. The other 10% came from actually looking at the musicians play their instruments. While looking at the orchestra as a whole, one cannot help but notice how animated it is. You have the violin player gracefully moving her bow to and fro. You have the cello player tapping his feet to keep the rhythm. You have the percussionist, every now and then, getting out of his chair, reaching for his cymbals and preparing for his grand moment. Each and every musician in the orchestra was animated in some manner. I wondered to myself why this was. I questioned it in my mind. Surely, they have played these pieces numerous times. I doubt that it has the same awe-inspiring effect as it does to the audience.
Then it hit me! It all came down to one word: Passion. To these musicians, playing Tchaikovsky’s The Tempest or Purcell’s Suite from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” is something much more than a simple gig at Carnegie Hall. To them, it is a part of their passion. Playing a crisp, clean note, rising and falling perfectly to crescendos and decrescendos, and ignoring the disturbance of syncopation is part of who they are. Playing the piece of music perfectly is their goal for that night. Perfection, in fact, is their goal in life. Their passion takes control of them, both mentally and physically. A musician, truly engulfed by his or her passion, cannot help but physically feel the music. One notices the swaying to the pace of the music, and the sharp leans and head turns as the music makes sudden changes. You can only imagine that the musicians are seconds away from jumping out of their chairs with excitement! Even the conductor himself, who is in charge of guiding these talented musicians, is under the influence of his own passion. You cannot help but notice him bump and two-step to the music, or should I say his and the orchestra’s music.
I was anticipating that this night would be a great night. It definitely was. Like Pun, this is my first time stepping into the Carnegie Hall. I couldn’t stop looking around at the architecture of the place. The architecture was simple, everything was very smooth and rounded, and surprisingly I didn’t see a fancy chandelier hanging down from the middle of the hall. This all adds up and concurs with the fact that Carnegie Hall has one of best acoustics of any halls. It was probably one of the nicest halls I’ve seen as well. Even with seats up in the balcony everything sounded very crystal clear 🙂
On to the pieces: I think all the performances were executed very well, though I personally preferred the first half of the performance prior to the intermission.
Henry Purcell’s Suite from A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Appetizer! What a great way to start! The pieces were very hip and flow very nicely for me. It reminds me of the Bach Invention pieces. In those pieces, the right hand would usually play a part, and the left hand would play the same part after the right hand stopped while the right hand accompanied, and so on. It has a back and forth feel, and thats how I felt when I heard the Purcell piece. I especially like these two, i-I and ii-VII. Here is the full suite for the orchestra:
And here is ii-VII:
Tchaikovsky’s The Tempest, Op. 18: This piece was probably the main course! Tchaikovsky was extremely talented in creating this piece, and it was executed very well by our conductor Pablo Heras-Casado! I especially enjoyed the sudden soft and loudness of the piece, which makes me feel very calm one minute, while alert the next! I was especially attention to the violinist, who’s bow was flickering at the speed of light at one point in the piece. This piece reminded me another piece that I enjoy hearing as well, Robert W. Smith’s The Divine Comedy: I. Inferno. This piece is based on Dante’s Inferno, and creates a auditory stimuli through how Dante perceived hell was like. Here is a performance of the piece (this is played by a band, not an orchestra):
Luigi Dallapiccola’s Piccola Musica Notturna: I don’t really have much to say. The piece was executed fine, but I didn’t feel that this piece was as rich as the others, especially the first 2.
Felix Mendelssohn’s Die Erste Walpurgisnacht, Op. 60: I don’t know how I feel about this piece. The sing along part was definitely a plus, plus the ending was probably the best part about this piece. I guess this piece was the long and fulfilling dessert the finished the course of dinner!
Ahh, how can we forget, crazy man in front of the hall.
Just when we thought the night was over, a random man, presumably drunk, approached us and started talking to me. No fear, the guy just was trying to make new friends, gave me a fist pound, and talk about the cops of Connecticut, some cause and affect, and murmured some other stuff. Thanks for the reassurance guys LOL
And then, diner after diner, time for some diner food! 😀
I share the awe that many of my classmates experienced after listening to Tchaikovsky’s “The Tempest.” This was certainly my favorite performance from the four that we saw at Carnegie Hall because it was very engaging since the piece seemed to tell a story, yet at the same time this performance was calm and pleasant. I was utterly surprised at how well the piece portrayed a serene and yet, an eerie atmosphere at the sea. It seemed as if we were in fact hearing the sea rather than an orchestra. Further, the piece perfectly flowed through an occurrence of events in Shakespeare’s play.
Tchaikovsky is a VIRTUOSO in his contributions to classical music. However, our conductor Pablo Heras-Casado also deserves many compliments because he was spectacular in the manner which he led the orchestra in playing Tchaikovsky’s work. The music and the instruments lived along side with him. He lived with every note played through his body motioning, it seemed as if channeled the music through his body.
P.S. By the way, this is what was happening in the piece:
“Starting with the sea, the uninhabited island, the mighty and forbidding figure of the magician Prospero, then switching to the graceful and womanly Miranda, rather like the primordial Eve, she has never laid eyes on any breed of man (besides Prospero), until struck by the tempest she is flung ashore with the handsome youth Ferdinand; they fall in love with each other, and I think at this point in the first half of the overture there should be a wonderful and poetic motif, as Miranda gradually becomes more animated and leaves behind her childhood innocence to become a young woman in love. In the second half of the overture her and Ferdinand’s passion should already be in full sail, as they embrace the fires of love… the middle section of the overture would be grouped into three main sections: the half-beast Caliban, the enchanted spirit Ariel, and his chorus of elves. The overture ought to end by depicting Prospero’s renunciation of his magic powers, the blessing of the young couple’s union, and the return to the mainland.”
I never really listen to classical music or orchestral performances on my own, but this was a very enjoyable experience. This was certainly my favorite performance that we have seen for this class. The music was so relaxing that I could just sit back and let it happen. At other performances, I have always tried to analyze what is going on and what it could all mean, but with this performance I just sat back and enjoyed it. I think part of the reason why is that I knew I would not be able to really critique the music, but also because its was just a very relaxing performance. My favorite piece from the night was Tchaikovsky’s piece from The Tempest, as it was very engaging. The atmosphere at Carnegie Hall was also fantastic, as the building was amazing and despite having balcony seats, the stage was clear and the music was easy to hear. This is definitely a performance I would want to repeat.
Perhaps both at the same time, as intended by Pirandello: tragedy (the story of the messy family drama Six Characters are trying to relate) and comedy (the story of a rehearsal unexpectedly interrupted by those 6Ch.).
The play (not the play-within-the play, but the Six Characters in Search of an Author strikes me as extraordinarily clear-headed & logical, in fact even cool in its detached observations of us, humans – in life not very apt at logic and often not aware of our weaknesses & emotional tangles.
And perhaps our confusions here (yes, in plural – as evidenced by your numerous, great posts: rich in observations, right in the impulse to question!), vis-a-vis this play, are not due to the complexity of the play itself, but exactly to our human uncertainties and paradoxes.
Late thoughts on Six Characters in Search of an Author
First things first, thank you so very much Professor Drabik for the press tickets! They were absolutely amazing and the play was confoundingly great. My apologies for not bringing up my thoughts about the play during class, but here they are.
The play was pretty brilliantly produced. The way they used the lighting, the shadows, and the stage in order to alter the way we saw certain things and make us view things the way they wanted us to. It was all just so brilliantly planned and acted out. There were a couple of things that I was wondering about after the play:
1) Who exactly was the woman sewing at the beginning, and what was her purpose in the play? Could she be the author (although unlikely, just kind of a random thought)? – I only recall seeing her at the beginning, at the end, and when she brought out the bird with the cage.
2) Why was the name of the little girl (Rosetta) mentioned once and only once, while every other time she was just referred to as the child?
3) The director said at one point that the characters themselves were the authors or something along those lines. Could the six characters be the authors themselves?
During class many people were debating the idea of whether it was fiction or reality. In my opinion, there was no doubt it was fiction. During the scene where they were behind the curtain and both the actors and the characters were yelling “Reality!, Fiction!”, but afterwards only the actors appeared up front, dazed and confused. I think that this meant the actors were so “into their roles” during rehearsal, for lack of a better term, that they essentially brought to life these six characters and their story. Of course the experience is real, but that still doesn’t make the fiction a reality. The six characters and their story are still just words on a page.
This was my first time ever setting foot in Carnegie Hall. I’ve only actually seen the outside of Carnegie Hall a total of two times; the first on the way to Fall for Dance, and this was the second. I played in my high school orchestra as the 1st chair Violin myself, and I know the feeling of walking out on stage by yourself and hearing the audience applaud you. It’s exhilarating, but it also puts a huge amount of pressure upon your shoulders.
The inside of the hall is quite beautiful and it’s such an amazing privilege, and what a luxury, to be able to just sit inside and do nothing but listen and enjoy. My favorite piece was the one by Luigi Dallapiccola with the full orchestra. I’m not sure how to quite explain it, but I just really enjoy the sound of a complete orchestra. There are certain parts in the music that sound as if different sections of the orchestra are having a conversation with one another. One section plays a couple of lines and another answers back, sometimes mimicking, sometimes in response, sometimes almost in retaliation as if they were in a friendly competition. Those are the parts of the music that I enjoy the most, whether it’s listening to it as the audience, or playing it in an orchestra.
Although this play was really enjoyable, I was utterly confused throughout the whole event. My confusion didn’t really deter me from watching it, but rather kept me on my toes. It would have made it so much easier to follow the play if the subtitles didn’t distract from watching the actual play, but glancing at the subtitles once or twice for a scene was enough to figure out the overall situation. The story itself did remind me of Inception, as Erica mentioned in her post. Like the movie “Inception”, “Six Characters in Search of an Author” had many layers of reality. There was a layer in which we exist as an audience that was watching a fictional play containing characters who are brought to life by professionally trained actors. Pirandello plays with this layer of reality by tugging at our emotions and while I was watching the play I unknowingly began to believe the story’s verisimilitude. Then the layers after this start to get all fuzzy. This is when it begins to confuse me, I don’t know whether or not to believe the characters are the creation of an author’s imagination that have come to living, or if the whole event was fictional in the layer of reality which the actors’ and actresses’ existed. But the last layer is the reality of the characters. I don’t doubt that they were living and breathing and have complex lives as the author of their story intended, but whether they actually existed in any reality besides their own is the question we are all asking. This was a thoroughly enjoyable play that got us all talking about so many aspects of theater, writing, life, so even though I was extremely confused, I enjoy this confusion because it sparked a really great conversation in class.
I can only vaguely remember the play The Tempest (I read it at least 5 years ago, and my memory is really bad), but I do think that it was a very interesting choice to place the piece with Goethe poem. Both have themes of magic, spirit, conspiracy, etc.
It’s been a long time since I went to an orchestral performance at Carnegie Hall, and I’ve never been to a classical concert. Thursday was the first, and the best.
Purcell’s suite was great for falling asleep to…
Tchaikovsky’s piece on The Tempest impressed me in its depiction of the storm. I haven’t read The Tempest and therefore cannot go into details, but the magnitude of the storm and the calmness of its eye are great.
Dallapiccola’s piece made some sense as a depiction of a deserted summer night.
Mendelssohn’s Die erste Walpurgisnacht orchestrates a poem of a Christianized people who still follow parts of their old religion. It had this interesting stanza:
Dieses dumpfen Pffafenchristen,
Lasst uns keck sie überlisten!
Mit dem Teufel, den sie fabeln,
Wollen wir sie selbst erschrecken.
These stupid Christians
let us boldly outsmart them!
With the very devil they invent
We’ll terrify them.
This helps uncover a major flaw in the “Christianizing” of the old days: the people were never changed in their hearts. Instead they were forced into a new mold in which they continue to do what they used to.
The best part of that concert was hearing the trombones.
I found it hard to sit still when I was watching this concert. In fact, I usually feel impulsive when I listen to fast paced music. That’s why I like to do something else while I listen to it. Commonly, I walk or run when I listen to energetic music, but I also like to listen to music that goes along with with something I watch, like a movie or music video. Since there was little for me to do, I decide to take a few notes during the performance.
I felt a shortage of space in my seat, but I notice a huge space in front of me in Carnegie hall. So even though it is a large building, the audience cannot access a lot of the extra space. I believe it was unfair that people who pay so much money for the performances have so little room, while the people working get to stand in the wide aisles. I think it would be better if all the chairs were removed to allow people to stand and watch the concert. In general, the building seemed poorly adapted to people’s comfort, but offered good acoustics because I could hear the music loud and clear.
The music in Carnegie hall varied from quiet and slow to loud and fast. The slow music made me feel bored because there was little energy in the music and nothing interesting in the performance to watch. However, I really enjoyed the fast paced and energetic music because I like to feel energized by music. Also, the prominent thing to watch was the conductor’s movements and orchestra’s playing, so when they played an energetic song, everyone looked like they were really focused and active. The conductor would give such grand motions that it seemed he would fly away. He would stand on his toes and hold his arms as high as possible. He seemed to possess enough energy to play all the instruments on his own to make that awesome music. What’s an orchestra without a conductor?
Most of you have not posted anything about this concert yet. Unlike the other performances where full attention was necessary, I could listen to this while taking look at how the audience is feeling. It seems some of my peers were focused on the concert, while several felt a little bored. (I was doing this at the intervals I felt bored so I guess that is what I should expect.) I noticed one delighted face, however, and that was the professor. No surprise she chose to come to this performance. It is good to share with others experiences you like.
The biggest question that everyone has been asking after this play is “What is real versus what is fiction?” Honestly, I’m not quite sure how to answer that. If I were to guess the intentions of the author, I would say that the events that transpired were real in the context of the play. The boy did shoot himself. The girl did drown. No one was really ever the same since. The characters may have known their stories, but I believe that they became a reality once the stories were actually told.
However, I really think that we are asking ourselves the wrong question. Instead of wondering what is reality and what is fiction, I strongly believe that we should be asking ourselves to define the difference between the two. What makes something real versus made up?
The way that I see it is that characters on a stage are brought to life. They are living and breathing with complex thoughts and hopes and dreams and a story, just like anyone else in the world. The only real difference between them and us is that they can only be brought to life through an actor while we don’t need any of those crutches to live out our own stories.
The question that I would most like to pose is just because something is a work of fiction, why can’t it also be real?
I’ve never necessarily been one for classical music as I’ve always felt that it didn’t speak to me in the same way as the styles of music that I tend to listen to. However, I did my best to enter tonight’s performance with an open mind. In doing so, I wound up paying a lot closer attention to detail than I would of if I just sat back and enjoyed the music.
The first thing I noticed was that we got really, really great seats. I know, in the traditional sense, they probably weren’t the best in the hall. To me, though, an orchestra is best viewed from as high up as possible. One of the best parts for me was watching how in sync all of the musicians were with each other. It was amazing to see how they each made the same movements at the same times to come together so seamlessly. Much like almost all of the other performances we’ve been to this semester, I was consistently astounded by the way that humans can work and fit together so easily, and incorporating instruments as they do so.
I was also exceptionally interested in the conductor. I know, theoretically, that a conductor’s job is to keep the tempo of the orchestra and to guide the musicians into the next piece of the song. I’ve never been able to wrap my mind around exactly that works. He spoke one language with his body movements while the musicians spoke an entirely different one with their instruments. Somehow it all came together.
Finally, I think after tonight’s performance I’ve come to understand and appreciate the beauty of classical music – especially as performed by such a large group of people. While I’ve always been used to concerts and performances that are more social in nature (a play where everyone laughs at the same scenes, or a concert where the entire crowd knows the lyrics), this performance was much more individualized. Everyone has a completely unique experience from those around him or her. However, the music is ultimately the largest presence in the room. When it all comes together, as human beings collaborate to produce something on such a large scale, music has the ability to overpower you.
The steel globe is located in Manhattan, Columbus Circle at the intersection of 8th avenue, Broadway, Central Park South and Central Park West in front of the Trump International Hotel. The globe was built in 1997, during the revamping of the Trump Tower and sometimes called the Monument to the World, Its structure shows the world made up of steel and it is at least 30 feet wide and is held by one huge chromium column. The Globe is surrounded by three rings orbiting it. In front of the globe, there are large crowds trying to take the subway and get to their destination.
The Unisphere, located at Flushing Meadows, inspired the Globe. Because of that, it is a symbol of global interdependence and community. The Globe symbolizes the coming together of people from all over the world to achieve a common goal and to share in a common purpose. Its rings memorialize the tracks of Yuri Gagarin (First man in space), John Glenn (First American in Space) and the first communications satellite. Man’s ascension into the space was only accomplished through a myriad of collaborative efforts.
However, because of its location in NYC, the Globe takes on a different meaning entirely. Lying in the heart of the city, the Monument to the World is representative of New York City itself. Because of New York’s intense diversity, the world that the Globe symbolizes can be found within the confines of this great city. Within its boundaries, people from every corner of the globe can be found. As such , we chose the steel Globe because it represents the diversity of NYC and the intermingling of dozens of cultures that happen in the city every day, to create a truly global community.
This poem by Willie Perdomo is a very dark portrayal of a day on 123rd Street. Despite this very gloomy look at a normal day on this street, the poem uses end rhyme that gives it a sense of rhythm and makes it an entertaining read. I almost felt bad reading this poem, because I enjoyed it so much. In the poem, nothing goes right on this street, from violence to nature that does not grow.
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ce of events in Shakespeare’s play.
