Yefim Bronfman at Lincoln Center

 A view from my fenetre at intermission.

My good friend Ellie and I went to hear our fave pianist Yefim Bronfman at Philharmonic tonight.  (There is no apparent need to say New York Philharmonic when you live here I am learning, but for purposes of my vast worldwide audience, it is the New York Philharmonic.)  Like filing into a Yankee's game or the New World's Vatican of Tennis,  the US Open,  or wandering around the Met (Museum or Opera), the experience starts the moment you alight from the taxi or emerge from the subway.  You will not only have a wonderful experience attending the thing you are paying for, but you will also be part of a collective New York experience.   You will be one of the gleeful huddled masses.  There is a lot of "huddlage" in New York.  It is indeed a rat race, but I find, it is one where everybody wins.

I am off topic again.

What IS the topic?

I have two:

1.  People watching.  The Phil offers amazing people watching.  It is for music, but also for looking at interesting faces, imaging the state of those two over there's marriage, queens in fur coats, ladies in fur coats and comfortable shoes, men who look like they would rather be elsewhere, wondering if a new generation will come, picking out people from Westchester.  It is not for star sighting though last time I was there I body checked Caroline Kennedy on my way back from the men's room.  I am endlessly fascinated by all of us.  And I am not alone.  We love it. And it a funny thing in New York, the giant metropolis, I ALWAYS expect to know someone, or recognize someone, everywhere I go!  And quite often I do though not tonight.

2. Yefim Bronfman.  I wish I could call him Yeffy, but we are not on that level yet.  I first heard him at here last January playing Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op 16 and was so blown away.  He is a genius.  And I use that heavily.  The Yefster rocks my world with his playing. Tonight was no exception though you never forget your first time.  If you ever get a chance to hear this man where you are do go.  (See his link above for international schedule of future Yef sightings.)

4 Scottish Lassies

My cousin Bren, well my mum's first cousin's ex-wife's sister, but I feel so much closer than that, came to New York with 3 other retired school teachers from Scotland. We got to spend the whole day together tripping around the Big Apple.

I lived in Scotland for 3 years and Bren's sister, my "aunt" Maureen, put me up and was SO good to me. I always felt really close to the family and it was great to have Bren come here. (Maureen will only get on a plane for my ordination, she tells me knowingly!)


I like this shot. So rural, yet urban! Love every second of the Highline!

Margarite, me, Margaret, Bren and Maureen after a screening of "Where the Wild Things Are."

The rooftop at the Metropolitan Museum. You simply must get there!

From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Susan E. Frankeiler

(This was my commute to the Musuem)

My friend Sue works at the Metropolitan Museum of Art here in New York and on Mondays, when the Museum is closed, employees can take guests to this virtually empty museum filled with treasures and, not so much people. It is like being at Disneyland on a closed day, but all the conductors are there to serve you.

You also get this odd "behind the scenes" feeling seeing cases opened and the main entrance flower arranged not yet assembled!

It reminded me of the classic children's book where the kids hid out in the Museum and sleep in the 18th century beds and bathe in the fountain. I want to live here too!

We came mainly today to see Vermeer's "The Milkmaid" sans crowds. This masterpiece is on loan from the that city’s Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and has not been in the United States since the 1939 World's Fair. It is truly a wonder and it was such a thrill to be able to have some alone time with her. And joke a little. She liked that.





I also got to hang with some Modiglianis. Amadeo is one of my favorite painters and it was just us and him. Wow.

And through Egypt and Asia and Europe we made our way to the rooftop. I love it up here where you can look over the park and the Upper East Side and feel so at one, yet comfortably apart.


We took a lunch break and the hugely discounted employee cafeteria. I had a lovely salad and it all felt so private. They even have a courtyard fountain for the employees in their dining area. When has that ever happened at your work?

After lunch we saw some more beauty and then some wacky stuff.


Thank you Sue for such an amazing adventure to such an incredible place. Truly one of the greatest museums ever. Anywhere.

August Saint-Gaudens Saved Me from Drowning

It was a rough morning for me in my head so I had lunch with friends and went to the Met. I think that before any major decisions in life or before wanting to go postal or make a difficult call, one should simply put down the gun and go to the Met.

This is what I did.

And I came across a special exhibit about the work of Augustus Saint-Gaudens. A famous (not to me until today) sculptor of the latter 19th Century. He was born in Ireland to a French father and an Irish mother and moved to the United States as a baby. Raised in New York and trained both in the US and Europe he is most famous for his Civil War monuments and many still stand today.

This is what blew me away. You mean that statue of Sherman at the entrance to Central Park by my old place of employment, the Sherry-Netherland is his!?! What a pretentious snob I plan to be when I pass this statue next accompanied by anyone who will listen.

And he did the statue of David Glasgow Farragut in Madison Square Park which I know well as my sister Eileen and I have a friend Andy who lived next to the guy in Brooklyn who restored the sword and I think Andy touched the original or something. I am SO one degree from David.

Farragut in Madison Square Park (Eileen do you have a photo of Andy by this statue?)

So...here I am at this special exhibit and it is full of amazingness about this incredibly gifted man who worked in the city where I live and had his studio here. And my head cleared, I didn't want to shoot anyone or be shot, and I left feeling happiness and hope.

If you feel down, go see art. My two cents. (Speaking of which, he also designed the Double Eagle coin)



The Exhibit runs until 15 November 2009.

"Portrait of Augustus Saint-Gaudens" by Kenyon Cox. But don't be fooled. This is not the original, but a recreation because the original burned in a fire in Saint-Gaudens studio.

The statue of Sherman in Central Park. I see it all the time and now I will say hi to Augustus when I pass.




Diana sits outside the American Wing and Augustus made this too.

The Case of the Broken Bagpipe - A Love Story

I was on my way to bagpipe band practice at Kelly Ryan's Pub in the Bronx when the strap on my case broke and my pipes dropped in the street.


As a result, the ivory mount on my pre-World War I Henderson bagpipes broke. (They had been through TWO World Wars and I broke them walking up the street to to a pub?!!)

This is where the tail takes a turn. The traditional answer to this problem is to bring my pipes to a bagpipe mender, but I remembered overhearing this really nice French woman, Isabelle, who is in my Afro Jazz dance class mention that she works in restoration at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.


I told her my plight and asked her if she knew anybody who might be able to help me. She did. I gave her my card and she connected me to Beth Edelstein who is an Assistant Conservator at the Met and works in 3-D object restoration. (Meaning: NOT paintings, but everything else.) I wrote to her and she wrote a lovely e-mail back to me.

In the movie version of this it would have a "84 Charing Cross Road" vibe.

Okay this is the thing I LOVE about New York City. I know it can happen other places, but just not on this scale to me.

Let's recap: This poor broken down on his luck bagpiper trudging to practice one night drops the only thing of value in his life and it breaks. But meanwhile he takes an Afro Jazz dance class where he meets the exotic French dancer and former travelling performer to the great houses of Europe who happens to work in restoration at the world famous Met and she hooks him up with an expert in 3d restoration.

So I went through and met the superb Beth Edelstein. She is currently working on the reinstallation of the Islamic collection's Nur al-Din room, a Damascene period room dating to the early 18th century. (This is lifted from her website which I will plug on these very pages.)

She met me and took me BEHIND THE SCENES AT THE MET. (It reminded me of going to the off-limits places in Disneyland when I was a kid and the bagpipe band was playing there.) Or, better yet, "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler."

OFF LIMITS DOORS. (the doors themselves date back to the early 1980s I am guessing)

She showed me the project she was working on and it is amazing! The Islamic section has been shut for about 3 years and will not open until 2011. Wow.

We discussed my piece and she told me about the research she did on my bagpipes (Impressive!!) and what kinds of adhesives she thought to use and about how ivory works. I was blown away at the detail and attention to it she had. My pipes were in good hands.


And if there is ever a movie version you could NOT cast a prettier, nicer restoration expert. Let's just hope they put her opposite someone younger than Tom Hanks.

Beth e-mailed me after the weekend and I came in today and picked it up. It was better than I could have imagined. She did a brilliant job.

She and a partner operate a side business of doing expert restoration. If anyone has anything they need fixed with expert care I recommend Beth highly. I think she also has the skill to talk you through emotionally! Her company is SBE Conservation. Check out the site. It is cool.


Beth with the finished piece.

And THIS story is another example of the magic of possibility in New York City. A bagpiper meets a Met conservator through a French woman in a dance class and his ivory is restored as well as his faith that he is living in the right city.

Ahhhhhh....

And...if I were twenty years younger and straight and Beth were single and interested we would fall in love and get married and I would come to realize that this seeming tragedy of me breaking the ivory piece on my pipes was the best thing that every happened to me.

...and this would be the story of how we MET.