Coimbra

Today we all met at our hotel lobby to transfer to Coimbra. We are walking to Sao Bento train station to take a short hop to Porto Campanha station. Some of the group take a taxi with the larger baggage. 

We are in 2nd class (I think I got myself a 1st class ticket up to Porto) and it's quite comfy if a little more crowded than 1st class. The ride is smooth and once we get to Coimbra station, there's a short walk to the hotel. The rooms are cramped and the bldg feels a little run down. After we have a chance to settle in, the group meets for a walk and lunch. First we stop at this amazing mural that tells the story of a knight battling a cobra. Snakes used to be worshipped in the old days before Christianity.

Gerardo takes us to a bacalhao restaurant for lunch where I have cod fritters and tomato rice, like one of my Lisbon meals. 

Our Coimbra walk takes us to the lively main plaza, past very old churches, thru stone walls and up a very steep staircase called Backbreak street.

Coimbra is home to one of the world's oldest universities and we pass students in their traditional uniform which includes capes. They give off a bit of Hogwarts air. The University bldgs were mainly built in the time of the dictator Salazar and have a Brutalist look about them. The main University plaza is barren of plants but has a nice view and we saw students gathering for something. 

After the tour we have some time before our fado show. There's a ginginha shop and ice cream so a few of us did a shot in a chocolate cup pre-show.

The fado show was fantastic, two guitarists (one Portuguese and one classic) and two separate singers. The older man was particularly good. They described different songs they were singing and gave us some history along the way. After the show was a port tasting.

I got myself an ice cream after then Jyothi and I stopped at a place for a bite. I left earlier to go back to the hotel and showered then went to the roof terrace to view the sunset. 

Great little town that we only briefly touched on and could definitely see giving another day or so to fully explore. 

Girona and unforgettable concert

Today we took a day trip to Girona. This was a trip that Edie and Bill planned and I was happy to tag along. We took the train from the main station, which also gave me a chance to see how I would need to get to the station in a couple of days to head to Granada.

When we got into the town, we left Edie at a place where she could do some work while we explored. Bill took the rest of us to meet with his friend who is a professor at the university.

The campus is set on a hill with towers and a wall with a view of the city.

We hung out for a bit at a cafe where we waited for Bill's friend as it was a very hot day. We then strolled around the campus as well as around the town. The church in town was used as the setting for the Sept of Baelor in Game of Thrones.

After a stop at a bookstore and a long lunch where Edie joined back with us we went to a well known ice cream place. They are known for their fancy concoctions with ice cream topped by various candies and then a blob of cotton candy. I chose a frozen fruit popsicle in the form of Jamie Lanister's golden hand.

After taking the train home, we had to get ready for an evening at the concert hall. Bill, Edie, Maia and I were going to hear Mozart's Requiem. We chose the evening that worked best for everyone's schedule. And the primary reason to attend is to be able to see the inside of this beautiful hall.

The concert turned out to be one of the most remarkable choral concerts I've ever experienced. The Orfeo Catala were a small orchestra with strings, some winds and brass and one percussion player. They entered the stage dressed like they were going to their neighbour's backyard party, but all in warm colours. The conductor was wearing powder blue pants with a wide white stripe and a matching vest with a sequined lotus on the back. The choir were dressed similarly to the orchestra and the soloists were wearing long robes with ruffled shirts, where each robe had a different image on it (lotus, fish, ivy and something I couldn't tell). 

The choir started with some members in the aisles singing with the rest of the choir on the stage. Throughout the concert, the choir moved either with small movements of their arms or heads, or moving around the stage or up on the balcony, or dancing on the stage. It really felt like the choir's movements helped to illuminate the meaning of the part of the piece they were singing (which was in latin). The soloists also moved around the stage and balcony. At one point, the soprano walked in and sang holding a lit up globe in her hand. 

At the end of the piece, the choir was back on the stage, on the balcony and in the aisles and the space completely filled with beautiful sound. At the end of the performance we all looked at each other stunned. The audience agreed with us with a loud roar of applause. 

We later learned that this performance is part of a Greek festival, which makes sense in having the chorus telling the story. It was an unforgettable moment in an unforgettable hall.

After the show we were joined by Bill's friends Andrew and Joanna who had been at their wedding and was spending part of their summer in France. We all walked to Santagustina tapas bar for a delicious and perfect end to the day.

Your most precious appliance is your refrigerator

So apparently, refrigerators are a hot (😂 see what I did there?) and rare commodity right now. Sadly for me.

My fridge (which was here when I moved in) bit the dust. It died overnight with all of my freezer items pretty much melted in the morning. I had a repair guy come and look at it but there was no hope. 

When I tried to find fridges available to be delivered in the next few days-nothing. I thought I had some options but even those disappeared the next day. 

I was able to borrow space from a neighbour for a couple of days. I found a mini-fridge at Best Buy late on Thursday. Crossed my fingers that they actually had it and I could pick it up the next day. And they came thru! Thank you Best Buy!!

So now I've got the few things I could salvage from my fridge stored safely. A few things remain in my neighbours freezer for the duration. I took the weekend off from fridge hunting, I'll pick it up again this week.

One thing I found online that has been a wonderful salve for the soul is the LA Phil's Sound/Stage series. They are a series of 1/2 hr online concerts, filmed at the Hollywood Bowl in August. The musicians are spread apart on the giant stage, wind players behind a plexi screen. No audience. There have been 2 so far and they have been incredibly beautiful and poignant. 

Panama Canal

Today we had a bit of a surprise in the morning: no water! After a delayed start, Vicente came, fixed it and we went to the American Trade Hotel for a really nice breakfast.  

Then it's off to the Canal. We got to see a ship passing through from Pacific on its way to the Caribbean at the Miraflores locks. They have a nice exhibit here explaining about the old as well as the new locks, plus some of the local wildlife, and a simulation of being in the captains deck of a ship passing thru part of the canal.

After a drive through​ some horrible traffic (Panamanian drivers are crazy), lunch was at a lovely Italian restaurant with delicious spaghetti and spumoni ice cream followed by Frutita (of course). I tried the guanabana bastido this time. So yummy! When we got back to the house, we dropped off some stuff and we ladies went out to do a little souvenir shopping.  

Tonight we headed back to the American Trade Hotel's adjacent jazz club for a singer that Joel remembered from last year. It was a Cuban band with an amazing singer, Idomea Dowman. They played at least one song I recognized from Buena Vista Social Club. There were a couple of larger groups in the club and a few ladies sang along with a conviction and passion that would put American Idol contestants to shame. The group performed for two solid hours and we ended up quitting for the night before they did! 

Adele at Staples Center

Thanks to Edie's ingenuity, she, Mei and I went to the Adele concert on Aug 12th at Staples Center. We had really great seats, and had a super fun girls' weekend.

After they both arrived at LAX around 3p, we stopped at home to drop off bags and headed downtown, managing to get there in about an hour (miracle!). I found parking about a block away but we had some issues finding food, as all of the restaurants were booked. We lucked out on stumbling into the Marriott (to see if Ford's Filling Station might have spots) and found a wax Adele to take photos with! They also had a handy and really delicious taco stand where we were able to grab a satisfying dinner.

At Staples, Edie picked up a souvenir T, I got a photo book, and we found a small cupcake stand with yummy mini cupcakes. Our seats were terrific, first section above the floor, right at the end of the arena. We had a great view of the center podium and the stage and giant video screen at the end.

Adele put on an amazing show! She sang all of her hits, not just from 25. She also chatted the whole time, including noticing and commenting on specific fans near her, asking someone to come up on stage (because she loved his sparkly jacket) and crouching down to allow people to take selfies with her. No wonder her fans are so crazy for her!

On Saturday, we went to Rose Cafe for a yummy mid morning breakfast, headed to Sephora for mini-facials, spent some time at home watching Olympics, went to see Jason Bourne at the Landmark, had a delicious dinner at Westside Tavern, and tried out Atticus Creamery & Pies across the street (yummy ice cream).

They both had early flights, so it was back to normal life on Sunday.

Here are a few pictures from the event.

Invisible Cities

I had a chance to experience this event with a couple of good friends. This was a 'headphone' opera based on the book by Italo Calvino. The book is a description by Marco Polo to Kublai Khan of various cities in his empire, however the cities he describes are not real, but fantasy places. The opera was took part in the original part of Union Station. The small orchestra was located in (and stayed at) the old restaurant space where the audience started, after picking up our wireless Senneheiser headphones. As we gathered for the start of the opera, the words from the book were being read in Italian. The language is so musical that it made me realize why they invented opera. How could they not put music to such a language.

After a brief introduction (and guidance) by the director Yuval Sharon and a short overture, the audience was then welcome to wander throughout the areas of the station where various parts of the performance were taking place. In addition to the main characters, there were 6 other singers as well as dancers from LA Dance Project. The action took place in the two courtyards on either side of the main hall, in the main hall itself, and in the old ticketing area. The station remained open and commuters and travelers navigated in between the performers and audience members (and the regular homeless people who spend time there).

The performance was a truly eye-opening and amazingly wonderous experience. At first, I followed some of the dancers and focused on them. In my initial wanderings, I would glimpse someone seated in the great hall singing and realize it was a member of the cast (sitting reading a newspaper, or typing as they are singing). Halfway through I realized that the text being projected above the entrance to the train tracks were the lyrics and that they were singing in English. Marco Polo was dressed in a hoodie and backpack and looked like he could have been any random station denizen. Kublai Khan was also dressed in regular street clothes and sitting in a wheelchair. The dancers and choreography were wonderful as were the singers and I loved the music. The opera took about 75 minutes, ending in the old ticket hall. Kublai Khan at this point is dressed in imperial splendour. Before we reentered the ticket hall, there was a giant cloud of smoke hanging in the middle of the air. It retained its shape remarkably and when I walked under it, it smelled like burnt sugar.

After the performance, as the cast did their bows, they were standing not more than 10 feet from us. I was able to talk to one of the dancers on how it felt to dance so close to the audience (challenging and intimidating at first but he became accustomed to it). I also was able to talk briefly to the director and congratulate him on an amazing achievement. My friends Kathleen and Brandi and I sat at the bar afterwards to discuss our experiences (each a little different) and I couldn't help but feel like this was a quintessentially LA experience. I can't wait to see more events by this talented crew.

I was able to take some (flashless) photos during the performance. I actually had to restrain myself from taking more, because the visuals were so striking I kept seeing photos in my mind.

Barre Vermont's cabaret shows

There is a town in Vermont called Barre. However, I'm actually referring to a bar on Vermont Ave. in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles. The bar is attached to a restaurant called Vermont. They've been doing cabaret style shows in the bar revolving around the music from one director's movies. They've done Quentin Tarantino, Coen brothers, etc. I'm a huge Baz Luhrmann fan, especially of his Red Curtain Trilogy movies, Strictly Ballroom, Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge.

Last night I finally went to see what this show was all about. I really had no idea what to expect. I just knew if it had to do with Baz's movies, I wanted to check it out. They crammed the narrow space with as many tables and chairs as they could. There's a sound booth at one end, a small stage for a band at the other, stage lighting on the ceiling, a small platform in front of a red curtained niche and steps leading up to the bar itself. There is barely enough room for people to pass between the tables.

The show started with Romeo + Juliet. Interspersed among the songs from the movie is Shakespeare's actual words. They condensed the story into about 1/2 hour but managed to capture the essence of the tale. The performers are very talented. They have to sing while weaving in and out among the crammed tables and avoiding waiters bringing food and drink and the occasional patron coming and going. Since the performers are pretty much right next to you, they have the opportunity to interact and react to things going on in the audience. There is a feeling of being in the show unlike any other. After R+J, they did a few songs from Strictly Ballroom and managed to convey the weird humour from that movie brilliantly in a short period of time (as well as conveying the idea of ballroom dancing without actually having room to dance). The second half was all Moulin Rouge. As with the first two sets, the story is told through the songs while echoing the look and feel of the movie. For instance, in the movie there are a couple of scenes when the character of Toulouse-Lautrec is seen outside the window from where the main action is happening. At Barre, the performer playing TL climbs a tree outside the front window and sings from there (we hear it inside).

The venue is expanding into the adjoining restaurant soon, so there will be some elbow room in the future. I'm curious what they do with a director whose movies are less directly musical than Baz's. All in all, this was a fun and unique evening, one of those things that feel like you could only find in LA.

Carnegie Hall

I made it there and didn't even need to practice! Hardy har.

I ended up having another business trip to NYC and decided it was about time I took in a concert at this famous hall, since the hotel I always stay at (Parker Meridien) is on the same block and I walk past it every day. The Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique was in town playing two nights of Beethoven. On Thursday, they did a Prometheus overture and symphonies 3 and 4 (Eroica). This group is a period instrument group and the orchestra was a lot smaller than I've seen in groups with a less 'period specific' focus. The other major difference that I could see was that the horns and trumpets didn't have valves (and the horns in particular really sounded like the hunting horns from which modern French horns evolved). It's likely that the wind instruments also differed from their modern counterparts, although the only thing that was clear to my eyes was that the clarinets and oboes were mostly in a light coloured wood, rather than the typical black of modern instruments.

I don't know if it was the hall or the ensemble (maybe both), but the instrumentation was particularly clear, with particular solos easily picked out. A couple of times, the clarinetists played with their instruments lifted so the bell faced the audience (rather than traditionally pointed down) and it made them sound almost brass like, but with a beautiful reedy quality. The hall itself was lovely, in a deep horseshoe shape. The stage doesn't have wings or back drop so the performers sit in front of a beautiful paneled wall. The first two tiers are entirely composed of six seat boxes.

I had dinner at a nearby Italian restaurant, Trattoria del'Arte that I'd been to before, and enjoyed. Again, I was treated with a wonderful friendliness and warmth (the host shook my hand when I entered), the food was superb and I had a lovely chat with a couple in town from Michigan.

Gustavo!

The LA Philharmonic got a new music director on Thursday night, Gustavo Dudamel. He's been the talk of the town for months now. There are pictures of him all over the city hanging off street lights, on billboards. He's the 28 year old Venezuelan who has taken the conducting world by storm. I don't know enough about symphonies or conducting to compare him to Esa-Pekka Salonen or the various other conductors I've seen, but I knew it would be a BIG deal, so when Amy told me tickets were available, we got a pair of cheap seats to watch the festivities. There was a big party after for the VIPs so part of Grand Ave was closed off. From what we could see as we walked into Disney Hall, it was going to be a major shindig!

The concert included a premier of a piece by John Adams called City Noir followed by Mahler's 1st Symphony. I knew the Mahler would be enjoyable (Dudamel has a bit of a reputation on it) and that we would take our chances a bit with the Adams. Turned out the Adams was a lot of fun. His program notes indicate a 40's era LA vibe which clearly came through in the music. It reminded me of the feeling you got from those great black & white noir movies. The Mahler was great, with a very celebratory ending. Dudamel conducted this from memory and covered the podium pacing and jumping around as he conducted. He will be fun to watch. The symphony seemed to be really energized-who knows if that's season-opener-energy or new-conductor energy-but there was an electricity in the air.

Frankly, Dudamel had us at his first entrance. A couple of people stood up for him just for entering the stage! After the Adams piece, the composer came on and received his acclaim. Dudamel stood aside and allowed him to take center stage. After the Mahler, Dudamel stood in amongst the musicians to take bows, every time. The applause went on for so long that he finally had to grab the Concertmaster and escort the orchestra off stage. After all, he had a party to go to!

All in all a great night for LA, as the Dodgers won their game in the bottom of the 9th inning, so there was celebration at the north end of Downtown as well!

Recommended

I recently went to the Pink Martini show at the Hollywood Bowl. They really put on a great show. They performed songs from all three of their albums. They are a very large group: in addition to the main singer and the piano player, they had a trumpet, trombone, drum set, percussion, 2 violins, cello, guitar, backup singer, and I might have missed someone in the crowd. It was the fireworks finale so the Bowl was packed. They did the fireworks to Bolero, which is perfect because after awhile of hearing that melody over and over, you just need something to look at. They had actual flames shooting up from the stage and the top of the Bowl. Everyone went 'Ooooh!!" when the flames started, just goes to show you how elemental fire is for we humans.

Our latest book group read was "The History of Love" by Nicole Krauss. This was a terrific book, definitely not linear or straight forward. As you get to the end, you realize that things are not as they at first appeared, and there are layers that you completely missed initially. Some really beautiful writing in parts as well, and some great characters. I can't wait for the discussion.

South Pasadena salon

On Monday night, my friends Elaine and Alex had some people over for crepes. Alex, being French, was commissioned with the crepe making chores. Elaine's sister, Effie, was in town from Singapore. The crepes were 'fromage et jambon', 'marron' (chestnut puree...yummmm) and Nutella. Another guest, David, made mini chocolate souffles. While we waited for the souffles to do their thing, Elaine and a third guest, TK, played a violin and piano duet (Prokofiev). A fourth guest, Tamar, is a composer and Elaine played some of her music from a CD. (I was the least talented person in the room.) What more could you ask of an evening than great food, interesting company and some good music? We left quite late, and very stuffed.