How to make Yannick crack up

MWnyc says:

They showed this last week at Verizon Hall to open a PhilOrch rush-hour concert program of Tchaikovsky’s 5th.

Roughly – very roughly – half the audience found the video funny and half were bored or embarrassed. The divide seemed to me to be generational: at least over here in the States, the humor of cluelessness (fake or not) doesn’t seem to appeal to people over 35 or so. (I say “in the States” because I know you Brits have been laughing at Basil Fawlty for decades.)

Yannick spoke about the Symphony after the video and before the performance, with the musicians playing a few brief demonstration passages. He was clear, informative, entertaining and generally delightful. (The rendition of the actual piece was terrific, too, but with these musicians, that’s no surprise.)

The concert was the first full outing for the PhilOrch’s new LiveNote app, which basically provides program notes and the like as the music is being played. I didn’t have the app, but there’s a report <a target="_blank" href="http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20150115_App_serves_new_orchestra_audience.html&quot;here.

The crowd was at least half younger people, but there weren’t enough people there overall. I suspect that’s partly because tickets were $45; for the stated purposes of this concert, the price should have been $20 or even $15.