When I stepped into the Carnegie Hall conference room where our IDC class was to meet the Artistic Director at Carnegie Hall, I was truly grateful to be part of the compilation of Macaulay honors Students. It is an honor that really is a privilege to have. It is incredible to me that we are able to have a formal meeting with no other than the artistic director of one of the most prestigious artistic performance halls there is in NYC. Carnegie Hall has worldwide fame, and here we were, a group of Baruch freshman, at a conference table with a man of tremendous status. I thought it was very interesting that events at Carnegie Hall are planned years in advance before the actual performance time. I think its extraordinary that Carnegie Hall staff and people like Jeremy Geffen are able to deal with the inconveniences of having artists cancel their show and deal with the uncertainty of not knowing if a show will sell until days before the performance. I greatly appreciated this meeting with Mr. Geffen and it gave me a taste of what I was to see that as far as the performance went.

When I entered the Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall, I felt that my attire did not give the theater space the respect that it deserved. I looked around at the ornate decor, the gorgeously massive and sparkling chandeliers as well as the sky blue curtains the decorated the walls around us. This individual hall was so small it felt like a private affair. Indeed, I felt pretty underdressed. When the performance begun, I was surprised to see a white caucasian male sitting at the piano. I expected the instrumentalists to be Chinese, just like the brochure seemed to advertise. It was only during the second act that I realized the composers were Chinese, not the instrumentalists themselves. While I was taking notes for each of the acts, I noticed that I didn't exactly take notes describing the sounds themselves, but I almost narrated the performances, as if the music was creating a cartoon episode. I kept thinking about Tom and Jerry throughout the entire concert, due to the fact that there was so many dramatic pauses and creshendos and decreshendos in the music. I also took note of the feelings that the music evoked in me. I described certain parts of he music as dangerous, and violent and certain parts spoke to me of paranoia, panic and fear. In doing so, I was relating to the music as best as I could and in a manner that I knew how. Because I have no prior knowledge of Chinese classical music, I didn't have the skills or the acquired ear to appreciate this phenomenon occurring only feet away from where I was sitting. I call it a phenomenon because I saw and heard instruments being played that I've never seen before and in a way that I've never seen done before either. I do wish I knew a little more about classical and chinese music so that I would be able to identify and know the different elements that go into composing such pieces of music.

Performance is a key aspect of a concert, I learned upon attending  this ACJW concert. It was not only about listening to the music like you would through any type of electronic device, but it was also about the presentation of the performance and the dramatics of it as well. Throughout the second to last act with the three performers playing mallets, I couldn't help but be reminded of the Blue Man Group. And it was the dramatic effects of their performance that made it this way. Their movements were so precise and in sync with one another that it was almost like a theatrical performance more than instrumental. I loved this dynamic in this act, and it most definitely was one of my favorites.