Friday, January 11, 2013

Thursday, January 10, 2013

Up about 7 am....weight at 135 lbs....not bad as I'm sure I forgot some of the food I ate yesterday!

It's raining out this morning.  Tonight we're taking the Westmorelands to a concert at the Orange County Performing Arts in Costa Mesa.  They are having us for dinner prior to going.  Should be a fun evening...our seats are overlooking the stage again.

walked 2 miles after the rain stopped

Breakfast:   dry cereal & coffee

Lunch:    can't remember

Dinner at Westmorelands:  pork, rice, creamed corn and dessert:  peach pie w/ice cream

Then we all attended a concert....fabulous....the violinist was Canadian....early 30's....name of James Ehnes...and he played his own "Marsick" Stradivarius of 1715.  It seemed to have a voice of its own in the performance.  It also attended the pre-concert talk, moderated by Allan Chapman, our local KUSC Classic Music radio personality, where we got to hear the personal stories of James and also the conductor...and how he managed to actually acquire his own Stradivarius.  He knew he wanted to play only the violin at the age of 4!   

The conductor:  Garry Walker, a Scotsman,  was one of gentlest persons you could meet and very personable.  He's probably about 40 years old and has lots of credentials!

But the best part was that we sat in back of the orchestra again and to watch the face of and body language of the conductor was absolutely fabulous.  He guided them with his baton but also his mouth, his eyes, his legs, his whole body.   We would have missed all of that if we were sitting in the regular audience.  And, the seats are cheaper!!  

The two pieces they played were:  Beethoven's Violin Concerte in D Major

And the full orchestra played without the guest:  Schederazade by Rimsky-Korsakov...we were directly behind the triangle player and she was so exacting and so nervous...it was so much fun to watch the percussionist section get ready for the bits and pieces .... a great evening.

Home by 10:30 pm....