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Fed up with people making noise at classical shows

Last night I heard Vladimir Feltsman perform Chopin's Ballades at the Perelman Theater in Philadelphia's Kimmel Center. My excitement was building as my favorite part of the first Ballade approached. Immediately before the key was struck, someone sneezed. It was at that moment that I asked myself, "What the hell am I doing here? I have this at home, recorded by three different pianists." Throughout the performance were the sounds of coughing, sneezing moving in one's seat, dropping of programs, and talking.

I know this is the chance you take when attending live classical concerts and I LOVE hearing live music, but frankly I'm sick of it. I'm sick of paying money for traveling and the ticket itself just to be annoyed for two hours. Last Tuesday night a ringing cell phone disrupted a performance by the New York Philharmonic to the point where the conductor actually stopped the orchestra half way through Mahler's Ninth and addressed the moron who wouldn't shut it off.

Once, DURING A PERFORMANCE, someone got out of their seat, walked up to the stage and began "conducting the orchestra" with an imaginary baton.

As I said, I love attending live music, but when things like this happen, I'm ready to just stay home and save myself the aggravation.

Sorry, just had to vent.
devilboy
Ag insider logo xs@2x
smortega
67 posts
 
One performer's solution:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uub0z8wJfhU&feature=player_embedded.
learsfool
1,215 posts
 
Rok2id said "The American Orchestras don't record anymore. I look at my LPs and they are all NY, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston and Cleveland. My CDs are almost all European. I think for a few decades after the war we had the best, but then greed reared it's ugly head. Now the Europeans have recovered and have now surpassed the US."

One very important reason would be that the vast majority of European orchestras are state supported, so it is much more inexpensive for them to record than it is in our system here. Lots of folks don't like to hear that kind of talk, though....
rok2id's avatar
rok2id
7,816 posts
 
We spent 12 billion a month in Iraq. That's a lot of CDs.
devilboy OP
1,172 posts
 
Next weekend I will attend a concert by the Philadelphia Orchestra performing Rimsky Korsakov's Scheherazade. I believe there will be less,(if any), distractions due to the material being played and the volumes that will be reached. This is what I meant from the beginning. Much different than attending a performance of Chopin.
mapman's avatar
mapman
21,838 posts
 
MAybe people should be required to go to a training class on proper protocol and etiquette before being allowed to attend classical performances?

Really, this stuff bothers me as well but people should really be more worried about how this kind of music can obtain a larger following moving forward to avoid extinction rather than looking for ways to make it more restricted and exclusive. Most people learn proper protocol over time sufficiently given some experience. We should be more tolerant. Of course there are always the exceptions, but hey, nobody's perfect all of the time. Sometimes ya just gotta sneeze or cough. We're people, not machines.
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