Rick’s Music Journey - What has been yours?

One of my very favorite composers is Claudio Monteverdi. When I was participating in an all-Monteverdi concert here at home, I learned that he was buried in the Chiesa Santa Maria dei Frari, although he had worked at the Basilica San Marco, so when in Venezia, I visited his grave. Several people had left flowers, and someone had left a card.

Salzburg 2014 -- Salzburg Festival. My first Austrian classical concert. 80+-year-old Austrian conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt and his orchestra Concentus Musicus Wien. Mozart Symphonies 39, 40, and 41. Crowd went nuts at the end -- stomping on the ground, cheering, applauding. I thought, "Wow, this is different from a US concert." Later I realized this was not the norm for Austrian concerts, but the expression of a special appreciation for a special conductor.

Vienna 2015 -- Musikverein. I needed more Harnoncourt. Bought a front-row seat in the glorious Great Hall of the Musikverien.
Handel's Saul. Wow. What a performance. Threw my underwear on stage as Herr Harnoncourt walked by for one of his many calls back to the stage by the audience. He stepped over it.

Ternitz (Austria) 2016 -- Tagtraeumer. A happy Austrian band I liked. Playing at a small village's hilltop festival. I learned thunderstorms don't keep open air concerts from happening in Austria. Struck up a conversation (in German) with a drug/alcohol abuse counselor. She gave my friend and I a ride back to our hotel so we didn't have to walk 30 minutes on a dark, muddy path back to it. (If you're interested, meet Tagtraeumer: https://youtu.be/Axhgg_evBLg?t=40)

Berlin 2018 -- Small venue called Lido. Somehow lucked upon 2 of 500 tickets for one of Revolverheld's "lounge tour" shows. The band usually plays festivals and arenas. Fun show. Somebody shot video: https://youtu.be/4Uy_GtttWK0?t=500. I'm in the crowd somewhere.

Music, what a splendid art! And what a sorry profession." (Bizet)
Jean, one such musical moment for us was experiencing the 'Ars Antiqua' medieval trio perform live at Ste. Chappelle. The incomparable Joseph Sage was their vocalist, his range still capable of reaching an impressive soprano even at age 71.

I tape-recorded that show and am having it digitized professionally at this very moment. Fingers crossed that the quality has not deteriorated too badly.
I am done. The end.

My first trip overseas, from the UK, was to Austria 62 years ago. In Innsbruck we attended a performance of The Magic Flute by the Salzburg Marionette Theatre. Puppets performed the full length opera to a wonderfully recorded soundtrack. We soon forgot we were watching puppets and became totally immersed in the story thanks to both the masterful puppetry and the very fine recording. Every time I hear the opera or an aria from it I am transported back to that magical performance. The Magic Flute remains one of my favourite pieces of music.

A few recollections from a zig-zagging journey:

Denver, many years ago. I was about to check out at the grocery store, late afternoon/early evening. The man just ahead of me, who was finishing paying and gathering his groceries, had two tickets to the David Crosby (of The Byrds and of Crosby, Stills & Nash - and Young - fame) show that night at the Paramount. He couldn’t go, and asked if I wanted them, for free. I changed our plans for the evening and it was a great performance. One additional surprise was that David was joined onstage by his guitarist son, apparently whom he’d just met a week earlier - a son he never knew he had.

Edinburgh, 2013. This was during the Festival and Festival Fringe in August, and we’d just had dinner at Mother India’s Cafe. Next door was the Royal Oak pub, known for traditional Scottish music, but it appeared quiet, and no sign of any performances or even drop-in session happening. It had been a long day, and I was ready to just return to our rental apartment for the night, if some music wasn’t readily accessible. We poked our heads through the entrance door, and just inside was a long, long staircase leading down to the left. I was frankly not interested in descending lots of stairs, only to have to immediately climb back up. My husband, however, headed down the steps. At the bottom, he immediately waved for me to join him. I couldn’t hear anything at the top, but when I reached him, there was the most incredible music coming from the other side of the closed door at the bottom. We gingerly opened the door, and the tremendous sound was coming from simply a trio, performing before maybe 25 people. There were 2 seats left, right in the front, and we tried to take them without causing too much disturbance. It was Ben Miller on bagpipes, and a bassist and fiddler/guitarist. It turns out they typically performed in big venues, for audiences numbering in the thousands. This gig was unannounced and spontaneous, and they were getting a kick out of such an intimate setting. We paid the tiny admission charge at their first break, and offered to buy the band a round, but their libations were already being covered by the venue.

Vail has a summer classical music and dance series every summer, at the small (but big for the Colorado mountains) Gerald Ford outdoor amphitheater. The New York Philharmonic was scheduled for a weekend performance in 2019, and we’d gotten tickets for the cheap, unreserved, uncovered section on the lawn behind the covered, pricier sections with actual chairs. It was unseasonably cold that day, with possible precipitation forecast, so we dressed accordingly. Wouldn’t you know, it started snowing! Since a lot of folks never showed up, seats at the very back of the covered section were offered to those of us with cheaper tickets. Free hot chocolate or coffee, too. The musicians, true professionals as well as outstanding artists, went on with the show. How they kept their instruments and fingers warm enough during the performance, I don’t know. A little atmospheric hardship made the experience that much more rewarding that evening.

London, March 2020. One year ago this week, we saw Swan Lake at the Royal Ballet. Besides the phenomenal dance performance, the orchestra was spectacular. It turned out to be their last performance, before the Covid-19 pandemic shut down everything. The audience was seated and packed together, as if things were normal, and at the coat check, people lined up without any 2 metre distancing in effect. We really had no idea that things in the world were going to change a lot 2 days later, so that performance is memorable for more ways than just the music.

A sweet , uplifting thread , this ! Retired now , in my mid seventies , I spent my working life as a classically trained musician in New York City . The main part of my employment was playing in Broadway theater pits in the woodwind sections . As I travel in Europe , attending performances of Opera , Symphony , and Ballet are always at the top of my list . Our last trip , pre virus , was in the Autumn of 2019 . We were able to see Bernstein's " Candide " in Berlin , Bruckner 4th Symphony in Leipzig ( Gewandhaus ) , " Tales of Hoffman " in Munich , and " Tosca " in Dresden ( Staatskapelle ) to name a few . When in Vienna , I always take the tram up to Grinzing and pay my respects at the grave of Gustav Mahler . I was seventeen when I first played his Fourth Symphony . My tastes are broad , and here is an example of one of the finest groups I have heard . On the street by The Duomo , in Florence - https://youtu.be/7t3xBqAWLaU . Jean , as you are enamored of the Rachmaninoff Second Concerto , I hope you are familiar with its presence in this wonderful film - https://youtu.be/LguRis_h1qc . Rachmaninoff is buried a fifteen minute drive from my home , here in New York - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Rachmaninoff#/media/File:Grave_of_Sergei_Rachmaninoff.jpg

Thanks for all of your comments and examples!

Steven, your video of the street performers brought back so many great memories - made my day! My daily change either went to street performers or for gelato - or usually both! Your video was extra fun, reading that the bass player was an impromptu substitution!

Cyn, I love attending ballets, too. I used some of the money from a work recognition award one year to purchase box seats for a ballet at Vienna’s Wiener Staatsoper. I enjoyed it so much that it was the springboard for planning something musical for subsequent trips.

In 2010 we were in Rome and the relatively new Parco della Musica (2002) was on my list of places to visit. When I checked the concert schedule, I found that Kurt Masur was conducting all nine Beethoven symphonies in four concerts during September (two performances of each concert). One date fit our schedule, and it was the performance of the first three symphonies. Oh my - wonderful!

Two years before, we had been fortunate to attend a concert with Masur conducting the Orchestra Giovanile "Luigi Cherubini" in the jewel box Teatro Amilcare Ponchielli in Cremona. What a youth orchestra! They played Bach, Handel and Mendelssohn on that occasion.

My husband is a clarinetist, so in Paris we went to Le Bouquet du Nord to hear some gypsy jazz. Then, on the day we visited the Orsay, there were a clarinetist and pianist playing outside the museum. In talking to them we learned they were Olivier Franc and his pianist son, who would be giving a concert of Sidney Bechet's music in a few days, to which they invited us. The drummer was to be Daniel Sidney Bechet, son of the legend. Olivier now plays Sidney Bechet's soprano sax. We attended, of course!

The music in the opening of this film features Sidney Bechet playing soprano saxophone , a true Sui Generis ! https://youtu.be/JABOZpoBYQE

Ah, yes: If You See My Mother Gorgeous - thanks.

The film, The Third Man, was playing on TCM last night and the Zither musical score reminded me of my last trip to Europe in December 2019. It was a RS Munich Salzberg Vienna tour. We visited The Third Man Museum in Vienna and for our farewell dinner, our wonderful guide, Rolinka, engaged a musician to play the Zither for our meal. It was a spectacular evening!
Also, on the same trip, in Salzberg, she arranged for an added activity for those who signed up: a dinner and performance of arias from Mozart’s The Magic Flute in a beautiful, ornate Baroque palace ballroom. The singers wore actual costumes from the opera (operetta?). A delightful musical evening.
On the RS Best of Turkey tour in 2018, we were treated to a musical evening with traditional singing and dancing in a small village. A fun and hilarious time was had by all.
Thanks for this topic!