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Violinist Michael Ludwig
You could certainly tell there was a big game on TV Sunday afternoon. The traffic on Highway One was lighter than I had ever seen it, there were hundreds of empty parking places in downtown Carmel, and there some conspicuously empty seats at the Sunday afternoon performance by the Monterey Symphony at Sunset Center.
For those of you living under a rock, or who just think it is too much of a hassle to go out at night, you simply must rethink your respective lives. Especially now, in the season of comfort and joy, there is no more comfort and joy to be found than that which you will receive as a precious gift gently placed in your heart by the incredible Chanticleer.
Anne Thorp, President of the Carmel Music Society, addressed the audience at the beginning of last night’s concert at All Saints’ Church by the Gryphon Trio and told us that originally a different group of musicians had been scheduled for this evening’s concert. However, after they unexpectedly cancelled, the Society immediately booked the Gryphon Trio for a reengagement based on the enthusiastic response to the Trio’s previous appearance here a year ago. This was our good fortune!
Julio Bragado-Young & Gillian Murphy
With Conductor Max Bragado-Darman at the helm, the Monterey Symphony launched its second concert of the 2011-2012 season last night in the Performing Arts Center at the Steinbeck Institute of Arts and Culture (most of us will forever continue to refer to it by its former name, “Sherwood Hall”). We heard on this occasion an unusual program with only two works performed. However, these two works assumed special significance since one included a ballet performance by four distinguished dancers from the American Ballet Theatre, and the other featured a new beginning of collaboration between the Monterey Symphony and Youth Music Monterey.
Yesterday afternoon at Mello Center in Watsonville we heard Conductor John Larry Granger, after twenty years of inspired service, conducting the second concert in his last season with the Santa Cruz Symphony. With concertos by Beethoven, Mozart and Tchaikovsky on the same program, it was obvious that Granger and the Santa Cruz Symphony know how to present a blockbuster event. The soloists were two locally known pianists, plus a young violinist who came to us today as the recipient of many distinguished awards.
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