Mostly Mozart

I know I have a tendency to announce only the high profile concerts I do in New York, and even then only at the last minute; thus those of you who have busy schedules or who are not in the immediate New York area don't get a chance to see me perform. And I'm sure that some of you couldn't care less ("Tell more stories about hoodlum Hassidim!" I hear you cry). Nevertheless, I am here to tell you that I will once again be on the stage of Avery Fisher Hall this coming Tuesday and Wednesday evenings for the Mostly Mozart Festival. We (the Concert Chorale of New York) will be performing Mozart's "Coronation" Mass (Missa in C, K. 317), conducted by Louis Langreé.

And for those of you who are not in New York or are in New York but extremely busy, this concert will be televised on PBS as a part of the Live from Lincoln Center series. Check your local listings for the air dates, but the performance will be taped live (isn't that an oxymoron?) on Wednesday, Aug. 2 at 8:00 PM. It's a small choir, so I'm sure you'll be able to pick me out in the crowd.

So set your TiVos, everyone! I guarantee it'll be a good performance. In case you're curious, the other half of the program includes Garrick Ohlsson performing Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 26 in D Major ("Coronation"). Can you see a theme developing with this concert?

One last story, I promise

The last Hawaii story that I have for you is that we visited the beach where they film Lost, and it's a rather desolate and out of the way beach on the North Shore. My mom says there are different spots on the North Shore...she was going to take me to the place where the plane crashed, but she said they removed the plane when they wrapped this past season, so there's really nothing to see.

She did, however take me to a beach in Haleiwa where you have to walk down this really obscure pathway and past tons of "No Trespassing" signs. She also said that when they are filming, there's a security guard at the entrance to the path as well as a bunch of people patrolling the walks. Nobody was around when we were there, but there were a whole bunch of tire tracks in the sand.

Anyway, I couldn't quite place this spot, but it looks awfully familiar. I think Jin fishes near those rocks a lot. So here I am, lost on the set of Lost. I'm also pretty sure this is the spot where Hurley and Libby almost had their picnic, before Libby went to go find some blankets and then got shot. Do any of you recognize the area?

Oh, and before I forget, we had a lot of geckos in our vacation rental, eating up the bad bugs. We thought they were cute, and none of them tried to sell us insurance, so we took a picture of our favorite one before he ran away from me and my camera.

More Belated Photos & Stories

Because I am really falling behind on my stories here, I'm going to try to skip over some of the more boring bits of our vacation. Actually, they aren't boring at all to me, because we went to different sites to pick out our wedding spot, but they might be boring to you, because you're not the one planning the wedding. However, I will let you know that although we have decided to get married at Waimea Falls Park, we have nixed getting married at the actual waterfall, because when we got there, it was so loud I had to yell for anyone to hear me. Can you imagine? "I do!" "Whaaat??" "I said, I DO!!!!!!!" "Sorry, I can't hear you. What did you say?"

We finally decided on a more serene area of the park called the Upper Meadow. It's got a lovely little stone stage with a backdrop of bright red ginger flowers. There are benches all set up, and our wedding consultant said most of the weddings are done in that area, so it's obviously tried and true. And hey, we can always get our pictures taken at the falls, even if we don't get married there.

And for those of you who remember Hawaii's Noah's flood of March 2006, yes, we do have a backup plan just in case it rains. There is a cute little enclosure closer to the entrance to the park called the Butterfly House that can be quickly set up as a contingency.

We also went to a luau on the Windward side of the island. Very touristy, but I'm glad we went, because I don't think my mom would ever have gone otherwise. Ray called it the "Hawaiian Renaissance Faire," because that's really what it was. You pay an exorbitant amount of money to wander around, buy folk crafts and souvenirs (in this case, Hawaiian folk crafts), participate in some activities like lei-making or learning the hula or watching a guy climb a coconut tree, and then you sit down to a buffet dinner and watch a hula show. I sort of think of it as a cross between the Renaissance Faire and a theme park, because the slick hula show, with the microphones and the lights, made me think of my time at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.

Mom had a good time, as you can see. I think she was a little sad at the beginning because K. begged off at the last minute, and there were no ticket refunds. But once we decided to say screw it and started acting like tourists, it was a lot more fun.