Opera in the Park: enjoying New York with New Yorkers
Wednesday after class I rushed to pack a dinner from the cafeteria, grabbed the blanket off my bed, and piled into Marci’s car with Laura and Joel. Laura and Marci are classmates in the 9-12 program, and Joel is one of our instructors. Marci provided the car ride to the train station in New Rochelle, Joel came with the instructions to get to the Naumburg Bandshell on 72nd and Mid-Park (no question of which park, of course: Central), and Laura and I brought the mid-western enthusiasm. We hit the subway at Grand Central at 6:30, full rush-hour. There are more young people in cities than in South Bend, and hundreds and hundreds of people swarming by of every ethnicity and economic bracket. It always takes my breath away and leaves me with a headache to see so many intrinsically lovable, living individuals with their own histories, desires, and problems. I can’t get to them, even though I’m interested in them each. I don’t know how God does it all! There’s also the strange deja vu of recognizing total strangers. Seeing the kaleidescope of humanity running past, just statistically, you’re bound to see people who look familiar.
The Naumburg Bandshell is to one side of a broad mall lined doubly with benches. There was very little equipment set up, and people were there in lawn chairs and on blankets. Also on the blankets were the highest-caliber picnics I’ve ever seen: wine, bruscheta, cheeses, crackers. One Italian woman pulled out a whole loaf of bread, and hunk of salami, and a bottle of wine for herself and three children (I think she kept the wine to herself). Behind us were some French people to one side, and a homeless guy playing with his plastic whistle (very briefly, fortunately). People on bikes and roller blades would stop to watch - a few stayed for hours, leaning against their bikes.
The opera was La Traviata, by Verdi. The sound system was pretty primitive, so the balance was off with the chorus, but they didn’t sing all that much, so it didn’t matter. The leads were debuting, so the lead tenor - Alfredo - was a little lacking. But the lead soprano was astounding, and at the end of one of her duets I actually whooped before I realized that everyone else was calling out “Bravo” in more sophisticated tones. I glanced around me, and one of the guys with a bike gave me a broad, understanding grin. Maybe I was uncultured, but the feeling was there!
We had our blanket in a central location, so we could see everything from the ground. The evening was cool, but the sidewalk stayed hot - even through the blanket - all night. As it ended, the nearly full moon broke above the sycamores, and we walked down the avenue as the crowd dissipated. 10:30 on a Wednesday night in Central Park. I was torn between breaking into song at it, and reticence to lose the sound of Verdi still in my ears. By the time we reached Madison Ave, I was singing “Only Livin’ Boy in NY”.