Cough vigilante

Do you know the difference between Orlando and a cup of yogurt? The yogurt has an active culture. It is impractical to list in the concert program all the things that people shouldn't do during a classical music performance, but here in O-town, it's tempting. The admonition might read: During the concert, please refrain from coughing, sneezing, whispering, shuffling your feet, reading your program with a penlight flashlight, rustling the pages, dropping your program on the floor, making noise while retrieving it, letting your wristwatch go "beep beep" at the top of every hour, shuffling your feet, crossing your legs and hitting the seat in front of you or the person next to you with your foot, or making a minute-long ordeal out of trying to quietly unwrap the cellophane from a piece of candy during the quietest passage of the entire concert. I have witnessed all this and more here in Orlando, the cultural epicenter of the universe. But my all-time favorite episode was the one in which our little ol' mayor gal took the stage to read her pre-concert proclamation, declaring the entire week a tribute to our visiting orchestra from Russia. After presenting the conductor with the honorary keys to the city, she left the stage. Shortly thereafter, the lights dimmed and the orchestra began to play. Only then did our illustrious mayor make her way down the row to her seat (we have no center aisle), tripping over feet in the dark and excusing herself all the way as she went. When she finally found her seat and plunked down in it, she was right next to me. Throughout the entire concert, she and the gentleman seated on the other side of her, presumably her husband, exchanged comments about the performance. No wonder the number one radio station in town has a country format. Let's hear it for hillbillies tryin' to act all grown up and big city-like. Believe me, a simple cough pales in comparison.

Dougholdco,

Every time I read a post such as yours I'm reminded of why so much of my money has gone into elaborate stereo equipment and sources. Am full up with the coughers, whisperers, candy unwrappers, cell phoners et al. BTW, it's no better here in the big city; just a bunch of Northern hillbillies who also don't know decorum from a tropical fish. Exasperating, ain't it?

This isn't PLS1, but his wife, EMM4 (don't have my own log-in yet, as this is my first post).

In 30 years of concert-going, it's gotten worse. At CSO concerts in the 70's it wasn't too bad, even in the winter, but we sat in the Gallery (best acoustics) and Solti and the boys were so loud one couldn't hear the coughers anyway. Plus the little old Viennese widow next to us (we had her late husband's seat) handed out cough drops and hissed at offenders, so our section was pretty well behaved.

These days at SF symphony concerts, the coughing problem is as you all have noted, outrageous, almost as bad as the movies. And the audience is remarkably stupid about when to applaud (please, folks, not between movements, and let the pppp die away before leaping to your feet). But the orchestra is a bunch of slackers and the acuostics suck anyway, so it's just a further annoyance.

On the other hand, opera audiences in SF, at least in the Orchestra section this season, are quite well behaved (but I nearly died last season stifling a cough that started at the opening notes of Vissa d'arte; I had tears in my eyes throughout the aria, although not from the performance.) Lesson is, one can stifle even the worst cough if willing to give all for Art.

Back in Chicago, we once had box mates at the Lyric who were impossible (coughing, talking, snoring, etc.) Finally, we and the other couple in the box campaigned to drive them out, an effort which involved, among other things, glaring, hissing and even hitting them with rolled-up programs. The last straw was during Rheingold, when the offending husband whispered sotto (not very) voce to his wife, "that's the Tarnhelm", whereupon all 4 of us turned around and hissed, "No shit!". They did not renew the next season.

EMM4, your efforts have qualified you for the official "cough vigilante" club membership. Welcome aboard!

EMM4, if you ever move to the NYC area we're calling you in as an enforcer at the NJPAC!