Armida at The Metropolitan
The weather has been quite warm and stable in the Twin Cities Area of Minneapolis and St. Paul. This has enticed many automobile drivers to roll down their windows and open sunroofs allowing the nice warm weather to permeate into our bodies. As I write this entry on Sunday May 02, 2010 around 09:00 AM the outside temperature has already reached 55 degrees F on it way up to a sunny and for us Minnesotans, balmy 65 F. It is going to be a great day!
A side effect of driving with the windows down is that the music playing on our radios can be heard by others on sidewalks and in some cases in other cars, which may also be listening to different tunes. Currently we have the sound track of Mama Mia in the CD player in our car. My wife and I like such type of background music.
I fully understand that we have all been kids at some point in time. For some of us, more than others, it seems like a longn time ago. I recall listening to rock and roll and alike, but my parents at the proper times, always promoted classical music. Some evenings instead of turning on the black and white “boob tube”, we would gather around the turntable hooked to the radio and listen to an opera on a 33 1/3 RPM LP record. The classical music was now and then interrupted by spontaneous conversations regarding our daily lives.
I am not sure when was the last time I was driving and heard classical music “blast” out of a nearby car. As a matter of fact I do not recall ever experiencing such event.
Yesterday at 12:00 PM CDT my wife and I were at the Regal Theater in Eagan, MN to watch the last season performance live from The Metropolitan in New York City. The current estimated population in the State of Minnesota is about 5.2 million people. The broadcast from The Metropolitan is only broadcasted to our state in two (2) locations. I have not spent time counting the averag enumber of attendees, but I would estimate that there were between 500 and 1,000 theatergoers at the cinema in Eagan. I would assume that the other location has about the same attendance. With an average of 1,500 people for both locations, simple arithmetic indicates that 0.03 % of the population in the state of Minnesota is interested in classical music. It is interesting to me to see such a small percentage compared to the false believe that most Minnesotans have that the Twin Cities is the center for education and culture in the Midwest.
My suggestion to Naïve American in general is to make a commitment to watch at least one (1) opera with their children or grandchildren. If there is interest then perhaps nurture it by attending a few more in the following years. Education and culture are quite important for the development and welfare of any country. Hopefully attendance to The Metropolitan presentations Live over HD will increase.
Not but not least, my wife and I fully enjoyed this last presentation for the season that featured Rene Fleming. She and the cast received a standing up ovation.
