What a glorious day! We left at 9 am, drove to Jackson, and boarded the chartered bus to Manhattan about noon. It took about 90 minutes to get to New York, so we had plenty of time to look around Lincoln Center, find our seats, and settle in.
It was a perfect fall day: a bit nippy, but brilliantly sunny with blue skies and just a gentle breeze. I had forgotten--it's been so long--how exciting and exhilarating New York can be. The streets around Lincoln Center were jammed with people of all ages and types, walking and strolling, talking and gesticulating, laughing and exuberant. There may have been some burglars, rapists, and neocons among them, but yesterday they all seemed wonderfully benign and determined to do good in the world.
The Met itself is so beautiful. The entrance is all red and gold with soaring ceilings, huge windows, a gigantic, sweeping, open staircase , and spectacular light fixtures. The motif is followed pretty much throughout and the theatre itself is breathtaking. We were seated way, way up on the top tier balcony in the heavens (apt expression!). These are the "cheap" seats--$44.50--but, I understand, the sound is better there, anyway.
Interestingly, there's a "standing room" area at the very top; spaces are reserved here, too, and they cost only $17.
The opera, Turandot, itself? Even I, the musical illiterate, loved the sound that arose from the stage. The singing and the orchestra by themselves, and the combination of both, transported the listener into a realm of beauty . And the sets! They were breath-taking and changed for each of the three acts, one a courtyard outside the Imperial Palace in Peking, the next inside the palace, the next the imperial gardens. The stage is huge and allows for spectacular effects, as well as the accommodation of what seemed to be several hundred members of the company. The costumes rivaled the sets in opulence, with the heroines in gowns and headpieces of brilliant blue, red, and green, and the comic relief, Ping, Pang, and Pong in dazzling colors, too.
At the close, there were several standing ovations, then we slowly filed out of the theatre, which took about a half hour, there were so many people there. We boarded the bus again and were driven to "Michael Anthony's," a restaurant right on--or over--the river in Jersey City. The views were spectacular and so were the appetizers, the wine, the meal, and the conversation. We met a couple--he originally from Ireland, she was England--who live in Great Oaks and I practiced my Irish accent on them. They thought it was good (at least, they said that), which heartened me and I was pleased when they said they intend to come to the play.
We ate, drank, talked, and laughed, and by the time we got back on the bus, it was past 9:00. Arrived back at the point of origin, St. Aloysius Church in Jackson by about ten, then got home at exactly 11:00. I promptly poured myself a second glass of wine and put "Nessun dorma!," meaning "Nobody Sleeps!" (the exclamation point is part of the title) into the search engine and enjoyed hearing it sung by Pavarotti and others. This is a famous aria in Turandot--which I had never heard of until yesterday, of course--and it's beautiful and moving.
What a day! What a thrill! What a realization that there are so many things in the world I know not and that I want to know. Opera? I barely knew what it was until a year or so ago and now I'm enthralled by it. I hope to go back to the Met--maybe in the standing section--before too long and to enlarge my embryonic knowledge of this basic musical theatre.