OTAS, you found it

Last night Diggerblue invited me out for an evening at the CSO, my first –and long overdue – classical cultural experience since my return to Chicago. Having lived in New York long enough to think that everything outside of Manhattan is second rate, I had forgotten about the great institutions here: the CSO is one of the world’s great orchestras.

There was a Stravinsky piece in the program that seemed more like a tranquilizer dart than a piece of music, but the hour-long stretch of familiar, soaring Rachmaninov melodies more than made up for it. Add to this the great seats we had on the main floor in CSO’s relatively intimate hall and you had the stuff of a great evening.

In more of a Chicago style, we went out for beer afterwards in the loop (as opposed to martinis at the Algonquin) and reminisced about yesteryears (Diggerblue and I have known each other since we were 10). Needless to say, this took us a few pitchers of beer and kept us out until about 1am.

So it begins. Once the Lyric season opens in the fall I’ll be a pig in shit, and it will be my turn to shoot a tranquilizer dart Diggerblue’s way. I plan to take him to see a live opera.