CROWDS PERFORMING, BEING ENTERTAINED, OR JUST HAVING FUN
These fans were apparently flocking to see a big fight between two well-known contenders.
College of the Pacific
(now University) Music Camp’s All Camp Chorus ready to entertain family and friends
with a final concert in July, 1958. I’m
in the third row back (seated) 10th in from the left.
A portion of the 1972
Gascapades audience in Gasquet, CA eagerly awaiting the opening of the show. We did the show every two years (took us that
long to recover from the last one!). The
first three times we put on the show we gave three performances – Friday &
Saturday nights, and Sunday afternoon. But
by the fourth show it had become so popular we had to give four performances –
Thursday, Friday, & Saturday nights, and Sunday afternoon. I was sad to hear after we moved away the
show was not performed again – apparently too many people who had been active
in the show had moved from the area and not enough new people were willing to
take on the hard job of directing and producing it. I’m glad, however, we were active in it in
its heyday.
The Golden Chain Theatre
audience sitting cabaret-style in Oakhurst, CA enjoying the show. We did two 6-weekend melodrama shows each
summer and most of the actors were in both shows. The smell of the grease paint and all that, I
guess. Practically the moment the first
show opened, auditions and rehearsals for the second show began. If we were in both the first and second
shows, you’d think we’d get our lines mixed up, but we rarely did.
Summer crowd at Sand
Harbor, Lake Tahoe, waiting for a Shakespeare play to begin.
1997, starting with the
gal leaning in from the left: one of my cousins, behind her the fellow in the
wine-colored shirt & gal in red are another cousin & her husband. Our youngest daughter is next in blue
followed by two of her friends, and then my cousin George who, sadly, is no
longer with us. Many people either brought
or bought dinners to enjoy before the play began. We bought our dinners which were pretty good:
BBQ’d short ribs with salad & garlic bread & brownies for dessert. Some people get really fancy at these things
with small tables covered in lace tablecloths set with cloth napkins, silver
candlesticks & silverware, fine china, and fluted glasses for
champagne. We made do with paper plates,
plastic knives & forks, and soda pop in cans. J
Summer Moband concert in Modesto,
CA’s Mancini Bowl in Graceada Park – 50 miles or so down the highway from
Sonora where we live. I keep thinking we
should go sometime, but so far, we haven’t.
Like the Shakespeare plays
at Tahoe, folks gather with their families & friends for picnicking before a
Moband concert.
On a somewhat smaller
scale, here’s a shot of the community band my eldest daughter played with for a
while. In the summer months they
rehearsed in a pretty little park in Murphy’s, CA. where folks came down to
listen to them – some bringing picnic dinners to enjoy while enjoying the
music. It was such a lovely place with a
little creek babbling its way through the park.
Sitting there under the trees listening to the band play marches and
popular tunes as well as favorites from the ‘30s & ‘40s. It doesn’t get much better than that on a
warm summer evening. The band rehearsed
their better known numbers for the first hour giving a sort of mini concert for
their audience. After a break, however, they settled in to rehearsing more
difficult or new numbers. When they
first began rehearsing in the park they sat up in the bandstand, but after a
while the band became too large for that so they sat out in front of it which
was better anyway because they could be heard better. Daughter is seated in the white chair wearing blue & white.
On August 25, 2016 the
Mariposa, CA Symphony Orchestra gave a special concert atop Glacier Point in
Yosemite. Imagine sitting there on a lovely summer
evening, listening to beautiful music while gazing out over such an awesome
scene. Pure magic.
The audience viewing the
“Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo” on the castle’s esplanade in 2019. It had been raining earlier, but stopped
before the show began and didn’t resume until after we’d made it back to our
hotel. Those bleachers, by the way,
simply hang out over the edge of nothing!
The madding crowd of
graduates and their families and friends following college graduation
exercises. In this case, our eldest
daughter’s graduation in 1995 from Fresno State University in Fresno, CA.
A big crowd gathered in
2000 to celebrate the 100th birthday of Yosemite National Park. I was amazed at how many people showed up for
the event which took place on a beautiful October day. Unfortunately, it had been a very dry year
that year and usually gushing Yosemite Falls – which the crowd was facing – was
bone dry!
This crowd is having fun
performing the “Grand March”. This was
the final ball of the 1958 Music Camp mentioned above with camp participants
and their dates. In the “Grand March”
couples come down the center by two with one couple going to the left, one to
the right and back around, then coming down the center in four, then in eight,
and finally, in this case, in sixteen.
I’m somewhere there in the back.
Fun for Halloween. This was a “Monster Mash” ‘flash’ dance held
on the local community college campus.
What a kick. This picture
represents a third of the group that showed up.
There were many more to the left and right of this shot. I wish I’d had a wide-angle lens so I could
catch it all.
:->
La Nightingail
That Glacier Park symphony would have been a high point (pardon the pun) for both audience and musicians (though they only got to turn and see behind them before or after performing!
ReplyDeleteWell, that's true. But as the view behind the audience was/is lovely as well it was a spectacular performance all the way around. :))
DeleteVery impressive! I like photos from the perspective of the audience but they are surprisingly uncommon. More rare are photos of an audience from the viewpoint of the performers on stage! The orchestra concert at Glacier Point in Yosemite was a spectacular setting. I wish my orchestra could find a similar location (though less dramatic) in the Appalachians but the cost of setting it up would make it impossible. I'm glad you liked the West Point Band and Chorus video on my post this weekend. I knew immediately that it was a perfect ending to what I wanted to write about and it brought tears to my eyes, too.
ReplyDeleteI was surprised to find so many pictures of audiences among my photos, I didn't remember taking so many but obviously I did. What surprised me even more when it came to the picture of the crowd gathered to celebrate Yosemite's 100th birthday is that the park was prepared - having enough birthday cake to serve every person there and not with little dinky pieces either! :)
Delete