We got a guided tour of Carnegie Hall at 10am.  Our docent's name was Bob.  He was great!  The photo of the building above is from Wikipedia because when we were there, it was undergoing a "facelift" in which there was scaffolding all around it, but through the scaffolding, you could see they'd hung big sheets of plastic printed with a brick facade. Carnegie Hall was built between 1889 and 1891. It is in Midtown Manhattan on 57th Street, which originally was very far north of the city center on land that was rural.  Two years after it opened, the city had grown up around it. The building actually has three concert venues that occupy an L shaped area that was built in stages.  The main one is the Isaac Stern auditorium which seats 2,790 people and is 7 stories tall.  There is another smaller venue The Weill Recital Hall, which is basically in the basement, next to and underneath the Stern Hall.  There's also a third performance space in the tower which was added onto the original structure several years later. 

The architect that Carnegie hired was a young man called William Tuthill, who was also an amateur singer and cellist. Carnegie wanted the building to have the best, most perfect acoustics in the world, so he sent Tuthill around the world to research concert halls. He came back from his European tour and started drafting plans. Naturally, the bones of the building were made with Carnegie Steel. Because Carnegie was friends with Thomas Edison, it was one of the first buildings to include electric light when it opened, even though there were no power lines going out that far into the "country" yet.  The bare bulbs were powered by a generator at first. It didn't include electrical air conditioning, but they did truck in enormous ice blocks and fans that circulated the cool air through vents out into the audience.  

The building officially opened on May 5, 1891. The first concert was Tchaikovsky, who was working on The Nutcracker at the time. Bob told us a funny story about opening night.  Tuthill was hanging out as the house was filling up and all of sudden he had a panic attack as he saw the balcony filling up with people.  He was worried that his design wouldn't be able to hold the weight of 900 people, even though the whole thing was supported by Carnegie steel pillars and concrete.  He rushed up to his office and redid all the calculations to assure himself that it wouldn't collapse mid concert. Of course all the math was done with pencil and paper back then, and he still finished checking his work in time to get back to his seat before the concert started. Needless to say, the balcony didn't collapse.

Due to Carnegie's goal of providing affordable entertainment to the masses, it wasn't making much money at first. To provide another income stream, they turned the space under the stage into a second performance space that was leased to the American Academy of Dramatic Art.  During prohibition it became a speak easy, then after alcohol was legalized again in 1933, it became dance hall, and in the early 1960's it became a movie theatre. These days it is a smallish concert hall.

The Studio Apartments were built between 1894-97 directly on top of the building creating an 8th floor above the main hall. The studio spaces were made available to artists, writers, and actors who could paint, compose, or even rehearse plays in them.  Additionally, Carnegie bought up two other adjacent buildings and converted them to the studio apartments available for renting out. Each floor was designed for a different purpose.  The top floor was designed for artists.  It had floor to ceiling windows to let in as much natural light as possible. Each studio has perfect acoustics for rehearsing plays or music. One floor had floating floors for dancers. By 1910 between 150 and 300 studio apartments were bringing in revenue for the concert hall.   Isadora Duncan is its earliest known resident. Other famous residents included Leonard Bernstein, Marilyn Monroe, and Marlon Brando. 

In fact, it's such a well constructed building that it has only had one renovation in its history, which happened in phases from 1982-86, when it needed major alterations to accommodate patrons with mobility issues as well as fire and safety standards. The lobby was not originally on street level, but up an impressive marble staircase, and there were no elevators to the upper levels, just two narrow and steep flights of stairs. To bring the building up to code, the lobby was lowered to street level, elevators were installed and stairways widened in phase 1 as well as adding fire alarms. Phase 2 updated all of the electrical, mechanical, plumbing, and HVAC components.  Phase 3 was replacing all the cosmetic elements which included installing new carpet, seats, flooring and paint, and only closed the hall for seven months.The building restoration team was lucky that the original blueprints and plans were preserved in the archives for them to refer to, so they were able to use all the original materials and methods in order to preserve the perfect acoustics.

To fund the aforementioned extensive renovations, rents on the studios were raised dramatically. The biggest selling point was that the studios would then be rent controlled, after the rent hikes, to encourage tenants to stay there and pay the higher rents. The other selling point was that the leases would be inheritable by the tenants' descendants. This is basically the premise of Friends.  Monica inherits the lease on her grandmother's rent controlled apartment in 1997 that's literally right by Central Park and she's only paying 1977 rent on it. This very sweet deal raised the necessary cash to not only fund the renovations, but also to build a new Tower on the other side that was completed in 1990. The new tower was rented out as office space to businesses, wall street types, tech bros, and other billionaire companies, at much higher rents, and not to any artists.

A funny story that Bob told about the renovation was that after the renovations were complete, they brought in a performer who had a long history of playing in the Stern hall to test out the acoustics.  His opinion was that the sound wasn't the same as before. He didn't know what was wrong, but something was off.  They brought in a forensic architect to figure out what the problem was.  He discovered that the contractor had bought more cement than needed to redo the flooring deep underneath the stage. The original floor had been modified to put in a lift for getting pianos up onto the stage from below. Instead of letting the excess cement go to waste, they just poured it all into the new floor which ended up being too thick.  So they had to methodically and carefully rip remove the entire stage floor to jackhammer out all the concrete, repour the concrete in the right amount, and then put the stage floor back exactly the way it was. That fixed the sound problem. Here's a pdf from the official website where you can read all about the history of the building.

So to get back to the issue of the studios, and the really sneaky and insidious thing that happened to the tenants. After the rent hike in 1977, no new leases were granted on the 8th floor above the main hall and slowly the leases in the towers were not renewed. The Carnegie corporation wanted the 8th floor to house the archives and the towers to house the necessary office space, rehearsal rooms, dressing rooms and space for the instruction of student musicians that the original building was sorely lacking.  The tenants eventually realized they were being forced out unfairly. It all came to a head in 2000 when they formed a coalition, hired an attorney, went to the newspapers, started a website and a fundraising campaign, and basically started a huge fight to preserve their homes, but ultimately they were unsuccessful. In 2007 the last of the Tower's remaining artistic tenants were evicted, a photographer, a pianist and a poet. 

 Bob told us so much of the building's history, but to understand where the building came from, you have to know about the man who financed it. Andrew Carnegie was born in 1835 and started life as a poor immigrant kid from Scotland.  His dad was a weaver and moved the family to the Pittsburgh when Andrew was 12 because Scotland was going through a famine.  Andrew left school at 13 to work in a cotton mill factory with his dad to support the family. He was smart and a good worker and was very disappointed to not be able to continue his education. He eventually moved to work at a telegraph office as a messenger boy and learned to translate morse code by ear.  He was quickly moved up to telegraph operator at a salary of $2.50 a week. His employer was a kind man who opened his personal library of 400 volumes to his employees every Saturday night, which Andrew took advantage of, educating himself through reading.  Seeing his thirst for knowledge and his good business acumen, his employer gave him $1000 to invest in the stock market for him and when he doubled his employer's money, Carnegie was put in charge of the telegraph offices for his railroads, at a salary of $4 a week, working his way up to managing the Pennsylvania railroad for $32 a week. He used his salary to buy the Morse Code Co. and then invested those profits in the railroad, leading him to own a steel mill to supply his railroad business. At this point he made a deal with himself that he would spend the first half of his life making money and the second half, giving it away, which he started doing at age 35.  By the time he died in 1919 he was the wealthiest person in the world. He funded the building of many schools, colleges, and universities all over the US, most notably Carnegie Mellon University. He built 1750 libraries all over the US and another 250 worldwide. He gave 7500 organs to schools, concert halls, and churches. And to the people of NY City, he gave a splendid concert hall.

We started our tour at the top of the building, in the Balcony, and worked our way down. ​The design of the auditorium is curved so that the sound is projected out and evenly dispersed across the hall so that every seat has the same acoustics, making your seating choice inconsequential because the sound is the same from every seat. Bob told us that the ceiling actually has a round pebble-like texture to it that you can't really see from even the balcony.  That is to improve the acoustics. There is no  amplification of any kind used in the hall. There are three mics in the hall but they are exclusively for recording concerts and also for the House Manager and backstage crew to hear what's going on out there. The acoustics are so good you can hear a whisper on the other side of the room.   The first thing I noticed is it is not decorated like other theatres that we had seen. There were no chandeliers or curtains in the hall.  Apparently, chandeliers aren't good for the acoustics. All the seats are red wool velvet and all the ornamentation is 14 carat gold leaf. The balcony has the most seats at 900, and originally it was meant for the poorer citizens who didn't own a tuxedo and couldn't afford "high class" entertainment. The people sitting in the balcony can't be seen by the rest of the audience sitting lower down, so it didn't matter what they wore or even if they were all that clean. The next level down is called the Dress Circle, because that's the last seating that required patrons to dress in tuxedos. The next two levels down are the private boxes, which seat 7-8 people each and have coat racks and a mirror in the vestibule. The last level is called the parquet, because that's how the floor is made, although you can't see it because it's covered in red wool carpet.  The floor has a gentle rake.  The stage floor is maple. The panels behind the stage are made of wood and covered in fabric. There is what looks like a tiny black hole in the back wall of the stage.  They call it the belly button of the stage.  It's actually a camera lense that is used for recording concerts. We did not get to see the other two venues, nor did we get to go to the 8th floor and see the archives, nor did we get to see any part of the towers. There is also now a cafe that just opened this year and a museum on the street level, which we got to see.  Yes, the museum has a gift shop.

Carnegie Hall has a museum dedicated to the performance history. Churchill spoke there, as well as Einstein and MLK.  THere was a suffragette rally and the Beetles played there in 1964. With the 3 performance spaces, there are approximately 1000 shows every year. The Hall invites one third of the performers, the other 2/3 of the performances are done by people who have rented out the hall, which costs $35,000 per night. Florence Foster Jenkins famously rented out the hall to make her singing debut, but she famously couldn't sing.  There was a movie based on her life. I've posted the trailer for it below.

The show was nominated for 7 Tony awards including Best Musical, Best Costume Design, Scenic Design, and Lighting Design, as well as Direction, Choreography, and Book of a Musical. The lead was Grant Gustin from Glee and Flash. He was great!

We got to NYC before the Met Gala but obviously didn't go.  We did however, go the next morning and the tent was still set up from the night before.

The museum was very large, but not intimidating. Sylvan and I stayed about four hours and we ate lunch there.  The food available was very expensive especially for what little you got.  It was very hot inside.  The arms and armour gallery was closed which was very disappointing.  The costume institute was also closed because they were opening a new exhibition Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion on Friday which I was unable to see since that's the day we were leaving.  I've included a video about the exhibit below.

We got a wonderful tour of the center but didn't actually get to go inside any of the 25 theatres that make up the Lincoln Center complex. Our tour guide Gerri, looked like Edna Mode. She told us a long story about when Lincoln Center was being built in the 1960's and Jerome Robbins was trying to film West Side Story.  He was angry because he couldn't get the city to move the crane out of his shot. Rockefeller, who designed it, wanted it to be made of glass so that it wouldn't seem so formidable and elitist.  He wanted everyone in the city to be able to see inside it and feel like they were welcome there, which is why it has glass walls. Ballanchine designed the ballet theatre to look like a jewel box. The lobby mirrors the stage and the walls curver around like a dancer's arms are curved in first position. HIs dancers always wore diamond stud earrings to reflect more light, so all the chandeliers look like that. THe walls look like gold watch bands.  The concert hall where the NY symphony plays just got redone to improve its acoustics. Juliard is connected to Lincoln Center so that's where all their students perform. We got to see the inside of their small chamber ensemble space and she invited our students to sing in the space, although not from the stage, from the house. The acoustics were very good. We also learned that shows qualify for Tonys or Obies is completely dependent on the size audience that can be accomodated.  Any theatre bigger than 500 seats is considered Broadway and qualifies for a Tony award, while theatres between 200-499 is considered Off-Broadway and qualifies for an Obie award.  The physical location of the theatre has no bearing on it. Lincoln Center's Broadway theatre has won more Tony awards than any other theatre in NYC. THere was a small display in the lobby of the Broadway space with the posters of the shows that have been staged there.

I really enjoyed the costume design.  It was simple but elegant. There were very few characters so you could see how much attention was paid to the detail of all the costumes. It wasn't set in any particular time period, other than there was a distinct New Orleans feel to the scenery with the black wrought iron railings on the balcony. All of the photos below are from the Playbill interview with Michael Krass entitled "How Michael Krass Used Fashion to Make Hadestown Players into Singular Characters". ANd of course the show opened five years ago and has been through many different cast changes since then so new costumes have to be made for each new actor, especially for Hades and Ares whose replacements were much larger actors.

I made instant oatmeal with cuties and hot chai for my in the room breakfast but I didn't have anything for creamer, so the tea was not good. Then we went downstairs to the cafe for a $15 quiche lorraine and a cafe Americano. Sylvan got orange juice and a breakfast sandwich that he only ate half of, saving the other half for later.

Central Park is beautiful but it was already so hot and muggy even first thing in the morning. NYC is only ten degrees further south in latitude than London but it's so much hotter here. The temp was in the 60s this morning but it felt more like the 80s. We saw the carousel that was in Stuart Little, and the fountain from Friends, as well as the Castle, which overlooks the Shakespeare in the Park stage.  I was really surprised to find out that Central Park is completely man-made and that it was originally a big swamp.  You can read about its history here. We did 12,000 steps before noon.  We were so hot and tired that when we got back to the hotel, we had very cold showers first, then had a picnic lunch on our beds and took a nap!

After our naps, I went downstairs and got a $15 spinach and chicken salad from Fresh and Co for supper.  Sylvan at the rest of his sandwich and OJ for supper.  Then we headed out to take the Metro to the theatre.  The metro is much harder to navigate than the Tube is in London.  Also, it's dirtier, with more homeless people, and stinkier, and less musicians busking for dollars.  The one nice thing over the Tube is that you don't have to tap out when you get to your stop.

 I had to read the book three times between HS and college, and I never liked it or understood it. This show was snubbed by the Tony awards and I totally understand why.  This book doesn't translate well to a musical. However, this version turned all the nuance that I missed reading it, into songs, so for the first time I actually got the point of it.  But the first time we meet Gatsby he sings a torch song that basically says, I did it all for Daisy! The songs were utterly forgettable. The chorus danced up a storm with two tap numbers during one scene and a seemingly endless amount of costume changes. Jeremy Jordan played Gatsby and Eva Noblezada (originated the role of Eurydice in Hadestown) played Daisy.

Jeremy Jordan (Gatsby) and Eva Noblezada (Daisy) interview each other.  They talk a lot about mental health.

We're off in vans to Dallas Love Field to fly to NYC.  I'm taking Sylvan again.  This will be our last trips with the school group. Like last year, we left on my birthday again. We're seeing four shows, going to two museums, touring Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, and walking through Central Park.  It's a short trip, only five days, but our hotel is very close to the theatre district. It's Moxy at Times Square, on 36th and 7th.  

The rooms were the tiniest ones I have ever stayed in.  There was no mini fridge, microwave, or coffeepot. Fortunately, I had done my research online and I knew that when we were packing.  I brought my electric tea kettle and Sylvan brought his tiny electric fridge/heater. We also brought a box of chai, a ton of cup o'noodles for Sylvan, and granola bars and almonds for me.  I also packed a whole bag of cuties and baby carrots, as well as some sausages and string cheese, just to make sure we wouldn't starve.  At first we thought we weren't going to get free breakfast at the hotel, but then when we got there they told us we got $30 per diem per room at the cafe next door, so Sylvan and I got coffee and yogurt or juice and a pastry there every morning. Everything was super expensive, so we could basically only get one thing to eat and one to drink and we had to share, but it helped make our rations last longer. Food in NYC is crazy expensive and there's no Tescos to grab a $5 sensible lunch every day. I had the most trouble finding vegetables to eat. People were selling fruit, mostly mangoes on every corner.

We got in very late Sunday night so all we had time to do was eat supper across the street at Shake Shack, and then go for a quick walk up to Times Square and look around a little bit.  There was a giant hot dog sculpture that spit out confetti at midnight.  I liked the giant button and needle sculpture. Honestly, everything about Times Square is too much--too loud, too bright, too animated, and way too many people.  I couldn't live there.