One of the many things I love about living in Chapel Hill is the amazing cultural scene. One really has to pick and choose what events to go as there is always so much going on. Most events are free or $10 as a student. Since this is one of my few indulgences, I enjoy preparing my evening around the event, which always ends with a decompression session at Zog’s and debriefing with the amazing musician / composer and rock star bartender James Brown. This semester I have enjoyed:
Benjamin Britten’s Curlew River
The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra performing Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini and Mahler’s Symphony No. 1
The NC Symphony performing
Tchaikovsky’s first piano concerto with an amazing Di Wu on the piano
A Bach evening
Brahms Violin concerto #77
The UNC Symphony’s
Beethoven Symphony No. 2
The Baroque ensemble with the amazing, charming and funny Prof. Wissick doing a mostly Germanic repertoire.
The UNC Opera doing Shakespeare inspired bits
The UNC Playmakers theatre did Into the Woods and A Midsummer night’s dream in back to back performances
The “amateur” theatre group did Dracula, which was brilliant and funny!
And of course no season is complete without The Nutcracker, the NC Ballet’s performance.
Since I choose to go to all these concerts I do not go to rock, pop, jazz, etc. concerts of which there are, of course, even more. I hear about them from my students that go to see groups like Corporate Herpes and so on. Hmm, not for me any more. Although I do feel bad that I have not yet partaken in the experience of going to some of the more popular venues for those kind of gigs. Who knows, I might let my hair down someday (joke) and go!!!
I am already excited for next term’s performances, which include UNC Opera doing Strauss’ Die Fledermaus, The Mariinsky Orchestra, Kronos Quartet, Britten’s War Requiem, Martha Graham, Monteverdi Vespers of 1610, and who knows what else, I can’t wait…
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