Oh, to Have the Confidence of the Manspreader Onstage at Carnegie Hall

A Guide to Enjoying the Opera — Sorry — The Choral Music Thing That You’ve Wound Up At

A Thing from a Thing at Carnegie Hall

Tonight I got to attend a concert at Carnegie Hall (humble brag — I mean not really, anyone can get tickets — it’s not Hamilton or something) and wow did I learn a lot!

Let me start by qualifying this with a little background on my knowledge and appreciation level for music. I grew up in a house (sorry — home, I grew up in NYC, so our home was an apartment, but we’d call it a house because we went to public school) that was always playing music. And I mean all types of music. My mother was and still is a badass singer — and anyone who’s seen her perform will verify this. My father moved to this country from England because he fell in love with Jazz (no wonder he married my mother). And that’s just my parents — I have many cousins and aunts and uncles who can carry tunes and play instruments like nobody’s business. So, I’ve been to plenty of different types of concerts, from Jazz to Folk to Rock, to Classical. I even sang in a choir myself when I was a kid. I have a great appreciation for the stuff, which was why I was open to joining my friend for this evening of music at one of the greatest halls in the world.

Well, I was not ready for what was to come!

First of all, you can get all sorts of cheap tickets to things in this city — I mean I even put on a monthly show that’s only $7! So, although my friend got these tickets for free, from one of the performers, we could have easily (OK, maybe not SO easily right now) put together $80 between us to go see this if we wanted to — that’s about the face value for the tickets we had. But after having this experience, I probably would have been a little bummed.

Before I go any further, the music was beautiful. The vocals and the instruments, it was truly gorgeous music. But, like, truly gorgeous music that honestly would have sounded just as beautiful if I was listening to it from the comfort of my own home without the very serious rules that you must abide by if you’re AT Carnegie Hall.

When we began to climb the stairs in the lobby to get to our seats, the usher looked at us and suggested we were not going to have it in us to walk all the way up to our seats. “Are you sure you don’t want to take the elevator?” We get in and see that the “balcony level” where our seats are is actually the very top (4th/5th floor) and once we got out we still had another 2 flights to walk up before getting to our seats. “I guess you don’t get these seats if you’re in a wheelchair!”

Luckily, we didn’t have anyone who had to pass us after we got into our top aisle seats — which also meant we didn’t have anyone sitting behind us. Anyway, here’s what we learned before leaving during the intermission and never turning back:

1. Grand Concert Halls have nosebleed seats also. The major differences between this and a sports event is how close you are to the ceiling — because there is a ceiling, and that there are no jumbo-trons to help you see what you’re missing at the ground level.
2. The seats are nice and wide because of the older crowd that tends to frequent Carnegie. But they are not generous with legroom because of the older crowd that tends to frequent Carnegie.
3. If you are under the age of 50, prepare to have the regulars checking you out in judgement. They will be watching you and waiting for you to screw up so bad they can tell you how wrong you are.
4. NO PHOTOGRAPHY OR VIDEO OR EVEN THINKING ABOUT YOUR PHONE IS ALLOWED. This is pretty standard at these types of events, but this crowd will actually give you the run down if the usher doesn’t make it in time.
5. Although you can’t see anything from this high above the sky, you BETTER NOT LEAN FORWARD TO TRY! Because if you do, and you block the view of the black and white blobs from someone behind you — you better believe they will tap you on your shoulder and ask you to sit up.
6. The best way to enjoy the show is if you sit back, close your eyes and let the music transport you. Therefore, you could be sitting in your living room drinking a glass of wine and not dealing with the judgement of random judgey white folks.