Orchestra Concert Observation

On March 4th, at three in the afternoon, my mother and I decided to attend a concert. It was an orchestra concert and it was held in this beautiful hall which was located on a beautiful campus. That afternoon the orchestra was accompanied by the pianist, Yefim Bronfman. The orchestra, along with Bronfman, performed the first piece, Emperor, by Ludwig Van Beethoven. Beethoven wrote this piece in E-flat major. This piece includes three movements: the first movement is set at an allegro tempo, the second movement is set at an adagio tempo, a much slower tempo than allegro, and lastly, the third movement is set in rondo: allegro. The second piece, a symphony written by Edward Elgar, was performed by the orchestra alone. Elgar wrote this piece

I was shocked to see how many people were there. Every row, from what I observed, was filled. With the exception of one or two seats in each row empty. I didn’t get to see the balcony from where I sat, so I don’t know if it was filled like the main floor was. I honestly was expecting fewer people because it was a Sunday afternoon. Most people have Sundays off and I assumed that a lot of people would like to enjoy themselves at home on a day off. I definitely underestimated the crowd and the traffic that day. The concert hall is another thing I was shocked about. For some reason I expected it to be bigger. When I looked up Severance Hall online, it looked bigger. Although, it might be for that fact that I looked at it from the balcony view and I sat in the back, left corner in row “V” on the main floor. Sadly, I didn’t get to explore more parts of Severance Hall due to the time I arrived there, but from what I’ve seen, it reminded me of the Akron Civic Theater. Both places are places where various performances happen, so the decor looked

I love the opening to this piece. The orchestra plays one long note and then Bronfman plays alone. Another part I loved about this piece is whenever the orchestra was playing at a piano volume while Bronfman was playing at a forte volume and then the orchestra plays at a forte volume too. My favorite part of the piece is the piano playing during the second movement. It’s my favorite part because it’s such beautiful piano playing and it was really relaxing and calm compared to the excitement I got from the first movement. I believe Beethoven did an excellent job transitioning from allegro to adagio. At the end of the second movement and going into the third movement, I love how Bronfman goes from playing the piano at a slow and soft pace to a fast and loud pace. Overall, I really enjoyed listening to the first piece. Bronfman did I wonderful job playing the piano for this