Can You Imagine What This Crisis Would Be Like If We -- Or At Least Lots Of Us -- Didn't Have Access To Today's Onilne Resources?

Plus: Since the world needs music, I'm tacking
a bit on at the end of this post. Here's a tease:





Nobody could be more surprised than your humble author to find himself a practicing Zoomer.

-by Ken

I imagine that Howie and Noah have covered this by now. Nevertheless, let me note for the record how inexpressibly grateful I am, first, for the unbelievably vast range of resources for information and occupation now available online to those of us with decent online access, which is the other thing I want to express inexpressible gratitude for: that I do have such access. I have no idea how many people don't have such access; I just have this terrible feeling that there are a scary-awful lot of them. I try to imagine sometimes what this crisis, dreadful as it is, would be like without that access. It scares and horrifies me.

That said, count me astounded at the quantity and range of stuff being made available for me to read, watch, and do -- going beyond the expanded information and content universe the Intertubes have, in just a few decades, made us take for granted, to a new world of information, instruction, and entertainment which, at least for most of us, didn't exist even a few years ago.

While I don't think of myself as a Luddite or technophobe, I'm far from what you'd call can't-get-enough-new-technology type. I'm a confident e-mailer (hey, it's just writing and reading; I can do those!), but the whole social-media thing fills me with something bordering on dread and horror. I consort with Facebook only 'cause there's stuff and folks there I really do want to keep up on, and I shudder at the thought of going onto Twitter -- the only tweets I see are those for which I've been sent links by a trusted soul.

You can imagine, then, that I would never have imagined myself as even a candidate for Zooomerdom. When, from one week to the next, the leader of my clutter-fighting Meetup group Neatniks (or, more formally, "Hoarders No More"), took us virtual, I approached the first session, not really knowing WTF this Zoom thing is exactly, with intense unease. I got through it in a daze, but was grateful for the trian run when, in short order, my WW workshops also went virtual. By now they've both become fixtures of my life, and I've begun Zooming into a wider world. Just this afternoon, after doing another WW workshop (my third this week, with three different coaches, who've all figured importantly in what I've accomplished), I "attended" a slide-illustrated talk by the associate curator of the New York Transit Museum (one of my favorite places in NYC) on the history of transit signage in the city.


WHEN THE CORONAVIRUS BEGAN ITS LOCAL ROLLOUT --

Notices began to trickle into my e-mailbox, as I expect they did yours, from organizations and businesses I've had dealings with announcing at first the postponement of events or cutback in services, then increasingly cancellations and on-site physical closures. When the trickle started flowing faster, I had the presence of mind to create a folder into which I could dump the ones I'd read and wanted available for future reference and also lots of others I didn't take precious time to read but thought I might later want to.

At first the e-mails were basically informational announcements. Almost from the start, though, the announcements were including stuff to read or watch, and links -- lots and lots, and soon more and more links to a mind-boggling range of stuff to read and watch. It wasn't long before the onetime trickle had swollen to a flood, and my bluntly named "coronavirus" folder was overflowing to the point where it will now require a project in itself to distribute the contents into separate folders by category (which I'm still working out in my head), in order to have any chance to have some control over this material, and to retrieve any of it.


IMPORTANT AS THE MEETINGS ARE . . .

. . . for their stated purposes, they're godsends for the social contact they make a possible, at a time when social contact is the very thing we can't have. Granted, virtual meetups aren't the same as the real thing. Still, It's been wonderful to (literally) be able to see all those familiar faces at my Neatniks and WW gatherings -- and to meet up with new folks too.


AND ALL OVER THE COUNTRY TERRIFIC
PEOPLE ARE GOING ONLINE TO SURVIVE

I can't claim to have more than scratched the surface of what's out there. Early on I remember logging on to an entertaining audienceless performance in a series offered free, with the hope that we'll be moved to cough up some bucks, by Caveat, the politically charged comedy club housed (when it's offering actual performances, I mean) in a basement on the Lower East Side. Now, I can't keep up. For example, Brooklyn Brainery, where I've done a slew if interesting, offbeat, modestly priced classes in recent years, has virtualized its upcoming class schedule, and looking at the list the other day I spotted a class I'd have signed up for on the spot -- if it wasn't already full!

You say you've never heard of Caveat and Brooklyn Brainery? They're among the countless invaluably enterprising organizations which are now struggling to stay viable, and the thing is, anyone anywhere with online access can now participate in what they're doing. Ditto with all the museums and cultural organizations and . . . and, well, everybody.

All these orgs, large and small, are hungry for virtual audiences, and of course support. Brooklyn Brainery's Jen Messier, for example, put up this blogpost on March 15:

We Need Your Help!

The COVID-19 wildness has come at us all in NYC fast and furious over the past week or so. Like lots of other tiny businesses here, we have really small margins and depend on a packed schedule to cover expenses. Because we also have two storefronts, we have a lot of fixed costs, and this past week has been nothing short of devastating. My ultimate goal is to have nothing change once we all bounce past this phase - hell, to have even more classes to help our teachers make up any losses - but right now we're faced with a difficult situation where revenue has dried up almost entirely while expenses remain nearly the same. We'll of course be applying for the city's small business aid when available as well!

If you're able to and would like to help us during this financially tough stretch, we have a few options. Thank you so much!

1) Purchase a gift certificate to be used on a future in-person class: https://brooklynbrainery.com/gift-certificates

2) Try out an online class (more being added each day as we navigate this new world): https://brooklynbrainery.com/courses - just look for "online class" next to the class name

3) Sign up for a class further into the future: https://brooklynbrainery.com/courses

4) Join us as a virtual member to provide critical revenue for our fixed expenses at this time: https://brooklynbrainery.com/c…/virtual-supporter-membership

5) Grab a Brainery tote bag online (this is all we have to sell you!)

6) Share these options with friends!

There's really no good reason for me to be sharing this story rather than the thousands of others. It just happens to be something I'm looking at right now.

There's so much good work being done out there, and so much of it hanging by a thread. And of course this is happening everywhere. I feel horrible that I can't afford to help much, but for all of us this is a unique chance to get acquainted with stuff happening all over the country -- my guess is that any time you Web-surf you'll stumble across a zillion such opportunities, people and organizations who have gone virtual to survive, and are offering us all these riches.


BONUS: WE EXPERIMENT WITH TACKING ON
A BIT OF MUSIC, JUST FOR PLEASURE

I don't want to burden DWT readers, as I often felt I was doing with the old Sunday Classics posts, with the kind of music I love. But lately, as I've been writing a little, I've also had cherished pieces of music lodge in my head which I thought might be pleasant to pass along. And I thought maybe I'd tack one on every time I write a post.

One such is the overture to Leonard Bernstein's deeply delightful, verging-on-opera 1956 Broadway musical Candide. As I've mentioned in the past, this is one of those pieces which can seize hold of me to the point of listening endlessly -- 5 times, or 10, maybe 15. Just now, at a time when I think most of us could sure use an infusion of joie de vivre in our lives, I can't imagine a more sheerly joyous four, or four and a half, minutes' worth.

BERNSTEIN: Overture to Candide


Original Broadway Cast recording, Samuel Krachmalnick, cond. CBS-Sony, recorded Dec. 9. 1956

New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded 1960-63

Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Leonard Bernstein, cond. DG, recorded July 1982

London Symphony Orchestra, Leonard Bernstein, cond. DG, recorded December 1989

Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, David Zinman, cond. Decca, recorded Feb. 3-4, 1996

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Andrew Davis, cond. EMI, recorded live at Glyndebourne, Apr. 27, 1997

In the event that the Candide Overture has the effect on you that it so often does on me, you can of course listen to it now as often as you like, and you don't even have to listen to it the same way, at least not the first six times. We hear, in chronological order (and also, you'll note, in order of fastest to slowest):

• First, the boisterous performance (of which we sampled the final minute at the top of the post) from the Original Broadway Cast recording conducted by that crackerjack theater conductor Samuel Krachmalnick.

• Then three performances, steadily more gradual, by the composer -- with orchestras in New York, within memory of the original Broadway production; Los Angeles, two decades later, and noticeably broader; and, finally, a bit slower still, London, from the studio recording made at the time of Lenny's famous London concert performance of Candide (available on video).

• A suitably sparkling performance from Baltimore conducted by one of the more satisfying (and versatile) conductors of recent times, David Zinman.

• And a wholly international performance, recorded live, with another English orchestra but this time an English conductor, and a fine one, (not-yet-Sir) Andrew Davis (now music director of Lyric Opera of Chicago), who provides a rousing kickoff for a gala concert staged in the theater at Glyndebourne celebrating the centenary of EMI.