YOU'RE NOT IN RALEIGH (OR CHARLESTON) ANYMORE!

On at least two evenings, I spent my time looking over the fall listings of artistic events taking place in New York in the fall and early winter and preparing a calendar.  As one can imagine, the calendar has filled up quickly and is revised daily.

Although there are days on the calendar filled with multiple events of interest, I am comforted by the words of E.B. White in his extended essay "Here is New York."  He comments that in New York "every event is,in a sense, optional, and the inhabitant is in the happy position of being able to choose his spectacle and so conserve his soul."

The first concert I attended was on a barge docked by the Brooklyn Bridge in old, old Brooklyn.  Going to a concert on a barge is a different experience!  Every once in awhile the barge would move from side to side and up and down, mostly ever so slightly.  Fortunately, it was a calm night but I wondered what more blustery evenings might be like! To add to the ambient "interest," there was on this evening a fireworks display going on nearby. The sounds of the fireworks, along with their reflections on the glass Manhattan skyscrapers, provided some competition for the performer, who took it all with good humor.  The performer for this program, British pianist Philip Edward Fisher, played a recital of mostly recent music. The entire recital was quite wonderful--- very sensitive, colorful and technically polished.  He never quite “let loose” but considering the fact that he was performing on a barge where the possibility of the piano moving was not out of the question probably kept the reins on him.  Four of the composers of works he performed were in the audience and actually introduced their works (Paul Moravec, Sean Hickey, John Corigliano and John Musto). Most of the works were very “audience friendly” and included rags (or rag-inspired works) and nocturnes.  The composition by younger composer Sean Hickey (born in 1970) was the most challenging musically (Cursive, composed in 2009).  Fisher rendered a very moving performance of Corigliano’s Fantasia on an Ostinato as well as Lowell Liebermann’s 10th nocturne, composed in memory of Gian Carlo Menotti. 

The next evening I went to a program at another unusual venue, (Le) Poisson Rouge, a basement supper club on Bleeker Street (a famous street running between the “East” and “West” villages).  Musical events at this venue run the gamut from rock and “indie” to jazz and classical.  The two performers, violinist Anne Akiko Meyers and pianist Reiko Uchida, delivered truly exceptional renderings of mostly light (or lite) classical works, including a transcription of Debussy’s “Clair de lune” (probably his most famous piano work) and a transcription by Jascha Heifitz of Gershwin’s “Summertime.” I had hoped for some edgier music to hear and a bit more repertoire but what was offered was totally satisfying.  
 
I have a number of other musical events on my calendar for these venues and look forward to them.  I’ll keep tabs of the weather to see if I need to take some motion-sickness pills with me, however!
 
A side note – on revisiting the riverfront area of Brooklyn I was struck by similarities in architecture of many of the older buildings with my hometown of Charleston, SC.  Names of many streets, such as Doughty, Montague, Orange and Poplar, also rang a familiar bell. However, I only had to look over at the Manhattan skyline and also remember the venues I had been to in previous evenings to remind myself that I was “not in Charleston or Raleigh (the place I have called home for 32 years) anymore.”