Weekend in NYC

Winter ended just long enough for a beautiful weekend in New York City for the Heritage Festival at Riverside Church. I heard some remarkable choirs, notably Rodger Guerrero's singers from Harvard-Westlake school in California, Janine Kirstein's choir from Oregon, and Ron Corbin's groups from Florida. While in the city I saw the Gauguin exhibit at MOMA and a small exhibit of Viennese composer artifacts at Carnegie Hall's Rose Museum, among them Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Mahler, Webern and Berg manuscripts. Also heard an interesting concert of contemporary unaccompanied choral music (nearly all of which I had never heard) by the Berkley Chamber Chorus, the Ad Astra Singers, and Dominick DiOrio's fantastic NOTUS from Indiana University in Carnegie Hall's intimate Weill recital hall. Memorable food included a great South Indian dinner at Sokum on Lexington Avenue and a few Blue Bottle and Stumptown cappuccinos. A chilly Sunday morning in Central Park (the temperatures went back down!), a prosciutto, pear and fig tartine at Le Pain Quotidien, and classical music in the cab to the airport were a great start to the day. Also glimpsed Alice Aycock's playful white sculptures along Park Avenue ("Park Avenue Paper Chase") on the way out -- fantastic!