The Beethoven Dancer

This weekend's concerts were a lot of fun. The two pieces I played in were Kodaly's Dances of Galanta and Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, which I believe was originally written for two pianos. There were also two double bass concertos, played by a phenomenal bassist named Edgar Meyer.

It was very well attended, which seems to be the running trend again for us (finally!), thanks to the valiant efforts of our management team. JoAnn Falletta conducted. She's the Music Director of both the Buffalo and Virginia Symphonies, and has turned them both around financially from floundering to flourishing. I really liked her. She possessed a lot of the requirements I have for a likeable conductor: respectful, didn't talk too much, relatively demanding, and clear.

Believe it or not, having a clear beat pattern is not always common in the conducting world! I never could understand that. Barnewitz (the MSO's Pr. Horn) and I have decided that all conductors should be required to complete an entire seminar on limiting their vocabulary to just six words: longer, shorter, louder, softer, faster, and slower. (The few conductors out there who have an ear for it can expand their vocabulary to sharper and flatter, but the requirement is that they be able to accurately discern this, and many cannot.) Some of them get up there and give you a whole sermon on how you need to put your entire life's passion into one measure, or how you need to spin the phrase into a beautiful gossamer rainbow with a pot of gold at the end.

To which we almost always ask a question like, "so....you want us to play it softer?"

Okay, so I have to tell you about this guy who came to both Friday and Saturday's performances. (The same concert both nights.) I noticed him sitting in the loge seat closest to the orchestra on the (from my vantage point on stage) left side. I noticed him because he was wearing a corduroy button down shirt loosely opened, with what looked like a string of rawhide bearing a wooden cross around his neck. He sort of stood out from the usual look of symphony-goers, because he was dressed very casually, almost hippie-like, and he had a large mane of long brown hair. Having gone to Oberlin, the hippie mecca of the midwest, I felt a sort of fond kinship with him. I was glad he was there.

In fact, I recognized him. He was one of the MSO groupies that I see sometimes, waiting at the stage door outside on State Street where the musicians come out to go to the parking garage. He's always smiled really big at me, and I have returned the favor, though we've never spoken.

Well, on Saturday, he was sitting in the loge seat closest to the orchestra on the other side, wearing the same shirt and cross on rawhide around his neck. Since he was closer to me and I could see him better, I noticed something new.

This guy wasn't wearing anything under his corduroy shirt, which was unbuttoned and just hanging right open. How am I sure of this? I could see his belly button, proudly winking at me plain as day just under his wooden cross.

At first I was shocked. I'm just not in many situations where I see naked manflesh outside of my own bedroom, and seeing it in Uihlein Hall admidst all of the other men in tuxedos and dapper suits was just wonderfully incongruous. There was definitely some shock value in that, and whether this guy knew it or not, he was making a very loud statement about the kind of person who attends a Symphony concert.

As I thought about this, I began to realize that this was, in reality, so completely awesome. This guy obviously felt so comfortable coming to the orchestra concerts just as he was! His presence there, in all his fleshy glory, made a huge statement about the improved image that the MSO is working so hard to project - that all you have to do to come here and enjoy the concerts is to show up as you are! We in the orchestral world desperately need to project this image and convince our community that you don't have to be a rich, academic, snobby, well-dressed older person to come to the symphony. Whether he knows it or not, this guy was really helping to change our image!

The other thing about this being so cool was the fact that this guy came both nights ~ and paid for a premium seat both nights. Not only is this guy helping to support the symphony, but his very presence is helping to add diversity and variety to the audience, which might encourage the development of other MSO "groupies". He gave standing ovations after every piece, oblivious to the fact that no one behind him was standing, but he didn't care. And he shouldn't have.

I turned to Krystof and Bill, and said, "do you see that guy up there?! He's not wearing a shirt! You can see his belly button!" And Bill said, "That's the Beethoven Dancer! That's the guy!"

Marty Woltman, our English Horn player who's been with the MSO for many years, loves to tell all kinds of stories. He especially loves to tell them on tour buses, when we're on a charter bus on our way through the cow-studded prairies of Wisconsin to play run-out concerts. Marty had told me all about the Beethoven Dancer, a story I remembered very well and fondly.

The Beethoven Dancer had earned this name back when the MSO used to have a summer season and played concerts on the Summerfest Grounds. During Germanfest, the MSO would do Beethoven's 9th, and there was a big grassy hill on which the audience could sit and picnic. Apparently the Beethoven Dancer would be up at the very top of the hill, behind everyone so as not to block the view of the rest of the audience. And he would dance the entire symphony. Man, I would pay a good sum of money to have seen that.

What was hilarious about this was that although he was behind the audience, of course the entire orchestra could see every move he made. Marty said that The Beethoven Dancer was very expressive and really got into it. Apparently the orchestra got an enormous kick out of him.

I just love this guy. I want to some day introduce myself and meet him, and thank him profusely for coming to our concerts.

Long live The Beethoven Dancer!!