I thought having already seen Jose Carreras and Luciano Pavarotti with my wife would have earned me enough husband points for life. Honey, I need a week in Vegas with the boys. No, problem. More like, no way. I had to complete the classical music trifecta last night with the Andrea Bocelli concert. Worse yet, was that it was the same day as the Chili Cook Off. She presented me with a fait accompli - tickets purchased without my knowing and then springing the concert on me as I was telling her about the meat I needed from Costco for my chili. Refund them! Can't (though I think she conned me on this one). Scalp them! There are still a few tickets left, can't take the chance. Give them away? They're $2,400NT apiece ($80 US). Ouch. Okay, what time's the concert?
Traffic in Taiwan. Motorists are like spoiled children who have been told once by their parents ( the police ) not to do it and then continue to push the boundaries to see how much they can get away with until mom and dad react. They're still pushing. Generally, they'll do what the other kids are doing until someone starts doing something different and enough people are doing it, making it safe for them to join in.
This night, most motorists were driving in the lanes for cars and not the narrow motorcycle lane on the side. Having policemen standing in the motorcycle lanes and making the cyclists swerve around them probably deterred them. That, or they thought they couldn't get to an ATM quickly enough to pay off the cops after hitting one of the lane-standers. I am sure their tickets were more expensive than ours and they were not going to risk being late. All except one lone taxi.
This little-taxi-who-wouldn't was zipping in and out of the motorcycle lane, looking as if it was trying to score a hit on any type of vehicle. But the cool crowd that night was having none of it. He just couldn't convince anyone else to come and play in the motorcycle lane, so he concentrated only on the motorcycles. He would feint to the inside lane and let a scooter start to accelerate past him in the motorcycle lane and the veer back over to the side, forcing the scooters to suddenly veer away or stop and turn off their cell phone to ask the person on the seat behind them what just happened. When he had eased up beside me in the car lane, he started to try to squeeze me off onto the sidewalk. I maintained 40 kpm and a straight bearing. His rear door finally started pressing against my leg so I took the opportunity to slam my fist into the door and yell a healthy string of constructive criticism at him. To my surprise, another scooterist joined in on my side encouraging him to reflect deeply upon his actions. Usually, messing with taxis is bad. Messing with Taiwanese is bad. I blame it on their math skills. They see 1 to 1 as too simple. They need something more complex, like fractions. So, being their country, they get to choose - denominator or numerator. They inevitably choose the denominator and will visit your house in forms ranging from 1/11 to 1/23 and beat you to a 1/100 of your life.
This time I was fortunate. He had pulled over to the curb and I pulled up beside him. Again, not the recommended move. The car was loaded. But it was loaded with Ma and Pa Chang and four more of their kin. My wife, yes, my wife, started into them before I could. I joined in explaining the obvious violations they committed. It wasn't to them. They gave us a big smile, bigger nonsense and then we scooted away.
From this point, things were different. For a two-block radius around the stadium there existed a traffic paradise. Cars obeyed the signals - and the several hundred cops - respected the pedestrians and followed the rules. It was as if the traffic cop honchos decided to give this enforcement of law thing a shot for once. Unless they conscript half the population into the Traffic Corps, I don't see this being replicated on a larger scale. But finally, we were in.
We had tickets midway down the first base line on the lower level. The stage was in the outfield section, straightaway center. Behind the orchestra and chorus was a big screen. There were two others flanking the stage. A final two more were posted at the 325 mark on the sides. Things seem to be starting on time. This announcement was repeated often. Welcome to the Andrea Bocelli Tenor Concert. Dude, beverage photoGRAPHY and foaming are not allowed. Thank you for your cooperation. I had to listen several times before I discovered that dudes and foaming were okay, but not food or filming. PhotoGRAPHY was a coin toss.
From left field comes a group of about 10 people to applause from about the same number. Woman behind me to her child: That's Ma Ying-Jeou. Ma Ying-Jeou. Do you see Ma Ying-Jeou? Oh, you don't know who he is. Well, I know who he is, but didn't know until today's paper that he was actually there. Whoopee! Celebrity proximity!
Warm up for the orchestra. Wow, this is really running smoothly. Now the conductor, Marcello Rota, enters. Thank goodness for the big screen, because people in the outfield look tiny from the first base line. If he pursed his lips, he could be the Italian Mr. Bean. Looks like they are starting. The program states the first number as one for the chorus. It's got a long Italian name and I'm not going to type it. Anyway, the show is starting. What! What the hell is this? This isn't any classical song from Nabucco! People are confused just like me, and about 10 seconds into the song, it hits everyone at the same time and...we...stand up. This, people, is the national anthem! Last heard by me at a movie theater years ago. No one ever sings this...wait, we are singing it now. Everyone. We finish. There is a lot of happy applause. The mood lifts and brightens noticeably. Well, I'll be.
Rota escorts Bocelli onstage and before we can rev up our anticipation, he begins. Songs are performed, Bocelli is escorted offstage, others - Maria Luigia Borsi, Gianfranco Montresor and Heather Headley - are rotated on and off. There is no time wasted. It is not rushed, but, however, proceeds at a brisk pace and never stagnates. The music. I cannot accurately comment on this type of music. I can say that it all sounded like what I thought it should. Bocelli's voice was sharp, clear and strong. The others as well, though I thought Montresor's baritone, while accurate, just seemed a little muddy compared to the clarity of Bocelli's tenor. The orchestra ( Evergreen Symphony Orchestra ) and chorus (Taipei Philharmonic Chorus ) were both tight and strong. This first half was over and we had a brief intermission which was timed to the second.
I recognized more songs in the second set. I also saw what I believe to be was my first classical music video. During a duet with Ms. Borsi, the screen behind the orchestra was showing Bocelli and another woman, maybe Borsi, in a video for the same song. Bocelli was standing on some red-carpeted stairs in front of a palace, library or someplace with columns and hundreds of marble stairs. There wasn't much to the video. Women would come to him, spin, wave their arms and he would extend a hand, tilt his head and occasionally turn his torso. Not much he could do being blind in the middle of all those stairs. Nonetheless, I'm counting it as a music video.
Equally impressive, to me, was the production quality. For the 15,000 in the stands and probably most of the 1,000 on the field, the screens were absolutely necessary. I have not seen camerawork, fade shots and shot selection this good on any TV show in Taiwan. If the oboe was being featured, the camera was already there with the shot. We got close-ups from different angles of the same person, overhead shots into the tuba, smooth pull-away shot, and great crane shots ( Johnny LaRue 萬 歲 !).
Call it the Italian in them or the KMT in me, but this was a well-run enjoyable event. I apologize for not commenting more on the music, but visit their sites and listen. They all have extremely incredible voices. That I do know. My wife loved it. I did also. I thank Mr. Bocelli for coming to Taichung ( his only other Asian venue is in Seoul) and sharing his music and now making my beard acceptable to my wife.
