October 10

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Walking.  Amelanchier leaf, and Gaudy Night.

Me and Burt, moseying.

That evening we took advantage of one of the happenings at the U.

We walked downtown.  This flying pig and green bug-eyed monster are painted on the sidewalk in front of Peaceable Kingdom.  As you see, they are dressed up for Halloween......  I love the way the pig's wings are translucent.  You can see the different colors of the pavement through the wings..........

We had dinner at Raja Rani with my better half's favorite golf buddy and his wife.  We enjoyed dinner (but must note that service was very slow, despite the place not being very full).  More time to chat, which was good, but we were late to the next event.

After dinner, we walked over to Hill Auditorium to watch and listen as George Gershwin's Steinway A2-long piano was welcomed to its new job as a performance piano at the U.

We heard a little about the process of reviving the piano back to a happily playable state, and we enjoyed listening to it as part of performance of many Gershwin pieces.  They wanted to showcase the breadth and depth of the Gershwin oeuvre, so the piano was heard with other instruments, including this violin, a marimba, various voices, dancers, and a jazz ensemble for "Rhapsody in Blue."

The guy on the left is singing, and the couple at left (you can barely see his face, behind hers, and you can see his arms by her arms, as he holds her in the air).  A woman was singing, too, but she's out of the frame on the right.

In addition to "Rhapsody in Blue," they performed several pieces from Porgy and Bess (including "Summertime" -- my fave -- which was beautifully done), and several other pieces that I'd never heard.  All of the performers were extremely talented.  One was chauffeured over from another venue where he was starring in a performance of Cabaret which was taking place while we watched him do Gershwin at Hill!!!

We also heard about the music -- apparently there is no "canonical version" of, say, "Rhapsody in Blue."  There are various versions....  One of the projects at the U is an in-depth study of the Gershwin oeuvre, hoping to discern which versions of pieces should be thought of as THE versions....  (At least, that's my understanding of what I heard.)



We were glad we went!

The icing on the cake of that very good evening was seeing our daughter's high school history teacher.  They hadn't seen each other in years.  Many hugs were exchanged.

We are so glad we opted for something Different and ventured out to indulge ourselves with company, food, and music.


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