Suzhou Update
We pulled off a wonderful concert at Shanghai Oriental Arts Center on June 29, 2019, with Anton Yeretsky conducting a full symphony orchestra and a local Chinese choir singing several pieces to start the program and perform the closing piece.
The repertoire included some classical hits such as Mozart’s Overture and Allegro to the Magic Flute, the dances from Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite, Mendelssohn’s Scherzo and Wedding March from his Midsummer Night’s Dream and Brahms’ Hungarian Dances Nos. One and Five. The other pieces consisted of movie classics: Star Wars, Harry Potter, Princess Mononoke, Indian Jones and the Pirates of the Caribbean. Each piece had clips from either nature or the movie shown on a massive ~15 m digital display behind the orchestra.
I loved connecting with old friends and making some new ones, and especially hiring a private car to take us back to Suzhou with Bernd’s double bass afterward. Unless you use one, you might have no idea about the logistics involved in transporting a double bass around eastern China without a car. Luckily for now, it’s still allowed to be taken on bullet trains, whereas we’ve heard that on the route to Beijing it no longer is.
We felt so honored and happy to see about eight friends in attendance in the rather full audience—thank you so much for coming!
I’m writing this blog today not to show off, but to show what music teachers can do when we put our minds to it, as most or all of the orchestra was composed of music teachers. Hats off to you, Anton.
