New York, New York (part 2)
Apr 26, 2006
The Museums:
 Ellis Island was very impressive, though I lost my penknife to the security scanners. I knew that there was heavy security for the Statue of Liberty, which I didn't plan on climbing; but I didn't realise that the heavy security screened people before the ferry, which goes to both Liberty Island and Ellis Island. The whole presentation of the immigrants' experience at Ellis Island was very moving.
The Natural History Museum was a wonderful experience. The whole top floor was a modern exhibit about vertebrates, with rooms for fish/amphibians/early reptiles, the two main groups of dinosaurs, and mammals, all arranged with wonderful clarity according to the evolutionary relationships. Whole fossil skeletons included an Apatosaurus, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, and lots more dinosaurs, with some great mammoths and mastodons in the mammal room. We also visited the Hall of Gems and Minerals, which had some very impressive specimens.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art was another wonderful experience. Like the Natural History Museum, there was far too much to see in one day, so I concentrated on the European paintings, and the American wing, while M went off to see the Asian art. Of the huge Egyptian collection, I saw the Temple of Dendur (a whole temple rescued from the flooding by the Aswan dam, and presented to the USA by the Egyptian government). The American Wing had whole rooms done up in period style, from the 1780s onwards. The one that struck me most was the Frank Lloyd Wright room, where everything including the furnishings and colour scheme had been designed as an organic whole by Wright. Absolutely amazing! There were also a number of stained glass windows by Louis Tiffany, with lots of Tiffany glass in vases and lamps as well. M tells me I missed some fabulous Asian art, including a whole Japanese garden, and the interior of some temples. Maybe next time!
Azara
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New York, New York!
Apr 26, 2006
My New York trip worked out wonderfully well. The hotel was in an excellent location (though the room was a bit cramped): we could walk to the Met for the opera, to Central Park and to three of the museums we wanted to see, while we were close to a subway line which brought us pretty much everywhere else we'd planned to go.
The Opera:
The Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center is wonderful, and I can see that I'll be writing an entry about it soon. It's a beautiful building, with a very warm and welcoming interior (quite unusual for a 1960s building, I think). Our seats had a much better view than I expected, and the size of the stage was very impressive. The soloists were great, and the chorus were wonderful, while the productions were much less stodgy than I'd been led to expect: Fidelio and The Marriage of Figaro had very clever modern sets, and particularly good costuming in Figaro. (The complaint I've heard is that the Met's elderly subscriber base are very conservative and resistant to anything except very traditional staging, but the productions we saw didn't bear that out.) The staging of Lohengrin was done with minimal scenery and amazing lighting effects, with very stylised movements, and I really liked it. The orchestra were wonderful. Overall, a great success, and an experience to treasure.
(to be continued)
Azara
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Going to the Met!
Apr 10, 2006
On Wednesday, I'll be going to New York. It's my first visit to the States--I had planned to go a few years ago, but a back injury started to act up and I had to cancel. On our trips to the Wexford Opera Festival, M and I have been talking for years about going to the Met in New York, so that's the main purpose of the trip. We've booked for three operas: Fidelio on Thursday, the Marriage of Figaro on Saturday, and Lohengrin on Monday. We wanted to go for operas that would really make it worth seeing a big stage production, so we ended up not picking any of the Italian composers: on the weekends we were looking at, the Italian operas were either ones I've seen a few times, or ones which were on a smaller scale, so that's how we ended up with Beethoven, Mozart and Wagner.
Of course we're going to do lots of other things: the other Met (art museum), the Natural History Museum, the Botanic Gardens, Ellis Island. Many people associate New York with shopping, but I hate shopping for clothes. Luckily for me M shares my shopping tastes and we'll stick to the bookshops, with diversions to look at jewellery and beads.
The cat is booked into her cattery, so once I've dropped her down there tomorrow morning I'll really feel that the holiday is beginning.
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