"Meteorology is an Inexact Science," or "How I Heard Four Minutes of a Concert at Ravinia"

It sounded like a great idea. The Ravinia Festival was presenting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in a concert of a number of shorter works, including two with a violin soloist and three opera overtures. Two of the pieces, Bernstein's Overture to Candide and Debussy's Prelude a l'apres-midi d'une faune, are personal favorites. Since college and high school students get free admission to the lawn with their student IDs, it was going to be a cheap night of culture for our family. My wife typed "Ravinia" into weather.com and saw "0% chance of rain." I listened to the audio forecast on the Ravinia website, and the meteorologist mentioned "possible scattered showers." So, we picked up some sub sandwiches and headed off to Ravinia.

When we arrived, we staked out our place on the lawn and settled down to hear Candide, which is a wonderful, rollicking work full of fanfares, soaring melodies, and cross rhythms. Then the Debussy work began with a very quiet unaccompanied flute solo, and the rain started. Our umbrellas were at home, but we did have a blanket and a plastic ground cover. My sons and I took refuge under the plastic, which of course amplified the sound of the rain and drowned out all of the delicate harmonies and orchestral nuances of the work. The thunder didn't help much, either. I don't really remember anything about the two violin pieces because the rain wouldn't abate, and occasionally large pools of accumulated drops would rush off the edge of our plastic shelter and end up on us.

At intermission, I gave up. The rain became torrential as we packed up our chairs and table, leaving us looking like drowned rats. We walked back to the Park'n'Ride bus and headed home. By the time we got to our car in the Metra lot, the rain had mostly let up (of course). Later we found out that they let everyone into the pavilion for the second half (of course). If we had done that though, it would have been hard to enjoy the music while soaking wet, so oh well.

When we got home, I made my family sit down in the living room and listen to the Debussy. Seeing as how I use this piece in music theory class and have a wonderful handout with my insightful analysis of the work, I made them read it while listening to the music and watching the score on my son's iPad. Yes, we are an entire family of music geeks. But in the end, we had our Debussy!

I'm hoping to hear the concert on July 31 when wind soloists from the CSO perform two works by Mozart in the Martin Theater: his Serenade in C Minor, K. 388 (an arrangement of which was performed by the WE sax quintet this past spring), and the monumental "Gran Partita" serenade (a movement of which the non-orchestra WE members will play this coming year). Again, I'll be on the lawn, and again, I'll be at the mercy of the elements. Hopefully, it will be a beautiful star-lit night!