The hype and hoopla at sports arenas are truly deplorable, especially to aged eyes and ears. At a Washington Wizards game in DC a couple of weeks ago, members of the starting team were introduced not only with spotlights, screeching, and "music" but also with bursts from a high-powered flame thrower. Even fifty yards away, I could feel the toasty heat.
Wild over-the-top absurdity and irrelevance, in my opinion. I go to a basketball game to see a basketball game, not to be danced at, kiss-cammed at, or showered with gift certificates, free pizza, and t-shirts.
I'm back home in Boulder again, and last night I heard performances of Prokofiev, Beethoven, and Brahms by the ever-so-formal Escher Quartet. Lord-a-mercy, did they ever make me long for a little sporty glitz. The Eschers (three men and a woman, all of whom appeared to be in their 20s) conducted themselves as if they just woken up from a long day of sleeping in their coffins. They were utterly joyless. They resolutely avoided looking at each other or at the audience or betraying the least emotion. The expressions on their faces did not say, "magnificent music"; they said, "is that curdled milk, or what?" They plucked and sawed at their instruments with as much enthusiasm as if they were cleaning out the septic system. Their playing was exact but uninspiring--but what can you expect from three mortgage brokers and a dental hygienist? The Eschers acknowledged the generous applause of the audience as if they were feudal overlords hearing the petitions of dung beetles.
Whenever I go to chamber music concerts, I feel young. Actually, I am young, because in the chamber-music crowd, anyone without a walker or an oxygen bottle is a kid.
The Escher should loosen up a bit -- and perhaps attract a younger and livelier audience.
Here's the fantasy. Cue spotlight. Cue big-voiced announcer. "And now, on cello, from Thousand Oaks, California, in his fifth year, out of the Manhattan School of Music, Andy Janss." Janss runs on to the stage, carrying his cello overhead, his rhinestones glittering in the lights. He high-fives the other members of the group, shakes the confetti off his shoulder-length hair, tosses some talcum powder into the air....etc. etc. Crowd roars. He plays with enthusiasm. So do his comrades.
But let us not sacrifice the dignity of classical-music. No flame throwers.
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