A Carter Sandwich

On our last night in Berlin, we went to hear the Staatsoper Orchestra conducted by Daniel Barenboim.  The program was three Mozart pieces, framing two works by Eliot Carter, (both written after the age of 100), "Sunbeam's Architecture" and a bass clarinet concerto.  We were eager to hear the Carter, as his music is never, ever performed in Vancouver, and in fact quite rarely in New York, now that the novelty factor of his advanced age has worn off.  The major disappointment, though, was that the tenor who was to sing both some Mozart arias and the first Carter piece was not feeling well. Thus the Mozart was terrible, and the Carter piece was canceled at the last minute.   I loved the bass clarinet concerto; it still sounded like the Carter I know of his earlier periods, but with more clarity and relative simplicity.  I wish I could hear more of this music!   With the Mozart, I found Barenboim's conducting overly idiosyncratic and impossible to watch.  He sometimes does nothing, leaning with one hand on the railing in front of the podium, waiting for something which he abruptly decides to emphasize.  Vera liked his Haffner Symphony alot, though.

We woke up at 6 AM to catch our plane to New York, dodging the few remaining piles of snow, and arrived in New York to find summer in full swing, with the temperature 82 degrees.