A Hornist’s Dream Weekend…

…Mahler 3 tonight (Deutsche Symphonie Orchester – Berlin) and Der Rosenkavalier tomorrow (Staatsoper).

The view from the top corner of Section E-Left at the Philharmonie:

That’s slightly lower and around towards stage right than my last seat at the Philharmonie, and I have to say I liked this one a little better.  Good view of the orchestra, almost to the point where you felt a part of the group, looking out at the audience (maybe that was just me – I miss playing so damn much).  Didn’t help that Mahler 3 is one of those great horn pieces, and the horn section were all playing 103s (well I couldn’t tell with the first two – they might have had 503s).

Aside: realized tonight that you can always tell who’s playing an Alex from a distance, not by looking at the bell diameter, not by spotting the flipped change valve, but by watching them empty the water out. The Alex being the quirky instrument that it is – for starters, the change valve reverses the airstream through the valve section – there’s a specific order to how you empty it out, and it’s pretty distinctive, especially when you don’t have an aftermarket water key like I do.

The guy playing 6th had what looked like my horn’s twin, and it sounded like he had the same flaky Db. Being a professional, his sounded a hell of a lot less flaky than mine – of course, that might have been because he didn’t have to blend in with a bunch of damn Holton 179s and Conn 6Ds (which is 90 percent of my problem).

The icing was the performance by one of the best mezzos anywhere, Anne Sofie von Otter. Of course, because she’s something like 6 foot 2, they had to put her on a podium behind the second violins, which essentially made her 7 feet tall – I sort of wish I had a picture just for the scary factor.

All of that, however, wasn’t even the best part. The conductor, who doesn’t use a baton, somehow lost a cuff link during the final movement – I have no idea how, no idea when – and then near the end, when the music got a bit more emotional and he was waving his arms a bit more, his french cuff fell out of his jacket sleeve and unfolded over his hand. Of course, this was his right hand, his denoter, and from my vantage point, I got to watch him try and jam the cuff back into his sleeve every 15 seconds or so, whenever his left hand was close enough to make it somewhat surreptitious. No such luck, and he ended the concert with at least 8 inches of white fabric hanging out of his right sleeve.

I haven’t had that much fun since the great MacNamara cummerbund creep of ’98.