“The Boston Symphony Orchestra’s eight-city, 12-concert European tour almost screeched to a halt before its grand finale this week, but quick thinking and resourceful teamwork ensured that the show went on,” writes Zoë Madonna in Tuesday’s (9/18) Boston Globe. “On Monday, mechanical problems grounded the orchestra’s noon flight from Paris to Amsterdam [on a 180-seat charter plane]…. Alternative modes of transportation were considered … but the only viable option was a smaller plane, in Luxembourg at the time, with 76 seats, far too few for … all the musicians needed to perform Shostakovich’s massive Symphony No. 4 that night.… They settled on a new plan … they would play Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7.… The Royal Concertgebouw hall in Amsterdam [pushed] the concert start time back from 8:15 p.m. to 9 p.m., and staff at the hall printed the orchestral parts for the Beethoven that the BSO library staff quickly sent over from Boston…. Buses on the tarmac [took] musicians to the Amsterdam hall, where most of their instruments had already been brought by truck…. The audience clearly recognized what such a concert had demanded of the musicians.” Said BSO Managing Director Mark Volpe, “It was quite exciting. Total eruption at the end” of the performance.
Posted September 19, 2018
