Carnegie Hall

One day in 1981, I read an article in the New York times about the music director of Boston Symphony,Seiji Ozawa’s performance. The article highly praised his performance at Carnegie Hall. I learned that there were 3 regular performances of BSO per year in New York, so I reserved annual tickets for 1982 season right away.

I reserved an orchestra seat which cost something like 30 dollars, which was a very reasonable price then. The first concert was in early summer.
The audience chatted cheerfully until the appearance of the conductor. When Mestrro Ozawa showed up, there occurred grand applause. Exactly when he raised the tact, there was a complete silence for a moment. Then we fell into the charismatic world of Ozawa’s. I became a fan instantly. I even bought his autobiography in Japanese at Kinokuniya bookstore on 5th Avenue.

The second or maybe the third concert was in winter. It was snowing since the previous night in New York. The city was covered with snow on the day, and the traffic was disturbed enough to discourage people from going out. I went to The Hall by subway, which was running on schedule, and reached there on time. However, only half of the audience showed up by the time of the opening. Therefore, they decided to postpone the beginning of he concert by 30 minutes. They finally decided to start the concert after 70% of audience had taken their seats.

The main music of the evening was the Symphony #2 of Brahms. The concert began with a swing of the tact of the Maestro as usual and with comfortable solemnity. Brahms Symphony #2 has a very beautiful melody in the 2nd movement, which is repeated many times. From my seat in the orchestra I could see very clearly he movement of the audience below. There was an old woman in the middle of the 4th or 5th row swinging her body comfortably every time this beautiful melody was repeated. Since her movements stood out, the other audience noticed them as well and were smiling gently.
Everyone in Carnegie Hall on that evening was music lover being tempted to come out in the heavy snow. For me it was the most memorable concert of classical music ever.