“In Washington, politicians are yelling at each other. On cable TV, talking heads spew venom,” writes Howard Reich in Wednesday’s (12/11) Chicago Tribune. “But in our current troubled times, and in periods far worse than this, solace can be found [at] concerts, [which] prize one precious commodity above all, and it’s one in perilously short supply these days: silence. The classical concert hall and the serious jazz club require it as a means for artists to share thought and emotion…. Step into Orchestra Hall or the Jazz Showcase in Chicago, Carnegie Hall or the Village Vanguard in Manhattan … and you are entering sacred spaces where listeners seek something other than noise and sensation. Which is not to say that jazz and classical lack for visceral excitement. Ever hear the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra tear through Duke Ellington’s ‘New Orleans Suite’? Or Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra make the house tremble in Verdi’s Requiem? … These are not exactly sedate performances. Yet even at their most tumultuous, they’re built on clarity of sound and articulation of detail. Noise alone will not do…. Everyone in the audience must do something that increasingly is becoming a rarity: keep quiet and listen.”
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