This week at a dinner party I met Pam, who left the get-together early. I'm a night owl myself (on the air weekend evenings, after all), but Pam told us that she regularly gets up at 4 am each day. She feels that rising early lets her "own the day," and gives her invaluable time to think and get things done.
But, she told us, she has an unfulfilled wish: she'd love to be able to attend an opera performance at 8 am, when she's most alert and receptive.
Maybe there are other people like Pam. Do you think morning concerts are a good idea? Would you attend? Are any musicians awake at 8 am?
David Garland hosts Friday and Saturday evenings and Sunday afternoons on WQXR. He is the host and producer of Movies On The Radio, Saturdays at 9 pm, a show that explores the art of music for film, from classics to indies to blockbusters. Garland presents early music on WQXR, Sundays, 4 pm.
Comments [9]
Anyone who wants to stage an operatic full performance at 6:00 in the morning has never had to deal with unions.
I propose that the Opening Morning performance be devoted to Bellini's La Somnambula.
That way the cast won't have to get themselves up for a full operatic performance that early in the morning -- they'll have been up all night anyway!
I thought I was an early riser for a retired person, but 6:30 is usual and since 10 am is the first class I teach, it is an easy arisal. But no operas or concertos, please. The best wake up call I had was Ginastera's Estansia' by the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchesta.
I much prefer to be up early in the morning, preferably at or right before dawn, especially this time of year, when courting birds are singing.
I'd LOVE to attend an early morning opera, but how many singers would be willing or ready to indulge in a protracted performance so early in the day?
My first introduction to live classical music was an 8:30AM concert by the Cleveland Symphony back in the 1960s. The Cleveland was on the road in a barnstorming tour of Upstate New York, maybe three concerts a day wherever they could find a venue and an audience. A free ticket, a morning out of junior high school; I had no idea what a profoundly positive impression that terrific concert would have on the rest of my life.
Maybe we should get together a wee hours choral group and call it 'The Early Risers.'
Pam should make a pigrimage to Newport, Rhode Island, where the summer festival has concerts starting at 11 in the morning-- not quite 8, to be sure, but presumably well within her schedule.
See:
http://www.newportmusic.org/concerts.htm
Opera in the morning sounds like a fantastic idea. I regularly get up at 0530 or 0600 every day. This would be an excellent idea for a different type of appreciation for music.
When I was in high school, we had to be in our seats, warmed up and tuned, at 7:30 a.m. for jazz band rehearsal before school. So it can be done.
I'm an early riser, but I'd be satisfied if the Met would just reinstate the early curtains they used to do on certain weekday evenings. Getting out of there at 10:30 rather than 11 makes something of a difference if you're going to be up by 5:30 the next morning, and have a 45-minute (if you're lucky) trian ride back to Brooklyn.
What time does she go to bed ?
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