Jimminy Cricket

The school occasionally gets free and/or discounted tickets to various cultural events about town. This time, there were tickets to the symphony. I like the symphony. I'm not as fond of choirs or the opera, but I do like some orchestral music.

Except, if I'm going to the symphony, I'm going to have to look nice. Part of the reason why I went on my Monday night shopping spree was so that I wouldn't have to wear my dirty puffy jacket to the symphony on Tuesday. I mean, call me old fashioned, but when one has tickets to the symphony at the Forbidden City, one gets a little dressed up.

So, get dressed up I did. I have one black dress. With black tights and my black boots. My new black jacket with the fur collar and my stylish black fedora. A (hand-made) scarf in muted blue and purple completed the ensemble. I looked good.

The Boys and I (who were complimentary of my outfit) headed off the 6:30 subway. As I promised them, we all got seats. A short trip to Tiananmen and a walk through a dark garden and we were there. I must say, though, it wasn't totally clear where we were supposed to go. There was no path of lights leading through the park. However, it wasn't so tough that a girl in heels and some slightly inebriated boys couldn't find the way. (The Boys thought some beer would help their enjoyment of the music. I thought it would just make me do the pee-pee dance.) 

The concert was pretty good. It was sort of a best-of line-up of Western symphony tunes. While I don't have all the names memorized, I'd certainly heard many of them before. It brought me back to my days as score reader for the symphony. You see, when you televise something like the symphony, the director needs to know where the symphony is in the music. It was my job to follow along with the score. It involved a whole lot of counting. I admit that to this day, when I sit in the symphony, I start counting. 

Well, counting and chanting a little ditty: Jimminy Cricket, Raggedy Anne, will-o-the-wisp, Yosemite Sam. Up in the air, through space and through time, a new place in history, not yours and not mine!

We also televised the Young People's Concert (where I learned that the oboe tunes the orchestra). And the reason why Peter and the Wolf is so popular is because it's so good. The one we did was about time travel to different composers. That chant was the "magic phrase" that started the time travel. It got old. Really old. And when we televised the opening night of the symphony that year, they played a song featured in the YPC. Every time we heard that song, I started chanting. The crew hated it (it was really annoying), but the director kept on laughing. (I would have stopped if he hadn't laughed so much.) 

So there I was, dressed to the nines, counting to 4 (or 3) and reciting a "magic phrase". At least I didn't burst out in laughter. (The Boys are excellent at getting me to laugh, loudly, at inappropriate moments. (OK. So everyone can do that to me. Fine.) My English Partner-in-Crime attempted with a couple of Chinese titles for the pieces -- Mao Crossing the Yangtze and Being Welcomed by the Grateful People of Hubei or Chairman Mao and the Revolutionary Forces Expel the Imperialist Americans from China.) 

The one problem was the conductor: he stopped and gave a 15 minute speech before each piece -- in Chinese, of course. What he needed was a little less talk and a lot more rock.

Of course, I was the best dressed person there. Every day, on every street, I am under-dressed. I wear comfortable shoes, cotton pants, and a down jacket. I wear a hand-knit cap most days. Women wear high-heeled boots, pretty dresses, and cashmere coats to go to the store, ride their bikes, or walk their child home from school. But to the symphony? They haul out their quilted jackets and sensible shoes.