Cheers!

What a wonderful afternoon and evening we've had! Today was the final concert in the Whatcom Symphony Orchestra's 2014-2015 season, featuring Antonin Dvořák's Cello Concerto in B Minor, Op. 104, performed by rising star German-Canadian cellist Johannes Moser. (See him below in one of a series of photos I took of him signing CDs for fans during intermission.)

His performance was passionate, visceral, and transcendent, moving me close to tears at times, and Johannes clearly enjoyed performing this beloved work with our local symphony orchestra. The WSO is "small potatoes" compared to the London Philharmonic Orchestra, where he'll perform the same work in November,  or the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where Johannes will play this gorgeous piece again in January, with a host of other concerts in between, but there are many devoted classical music lovers in its audience. We all were thrilled to hear this virtuoso cellist right here, and let him know with a prolonged standing ovation and shouts of "bravo!" 

 The other work on today's program was Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, orchestrated by Maurice Ravel, in which each section of the orchestra shone, ending the WSO's 39th season in fine style.

Afterward, Phil and I went to our favorite place to eat downtown, The Temple Bar, which offers a pleasing variety of small and large plates. Their hot stuffed dates with goat cheese, prosciutto, and balsamic are consistently our favorite menu item, but there is always much more to enjoy. That's where this photo was taken, for which I give Phil hearty thanks! 

(Side note 1: There is not yet a YouTube video of Johannes Moser playing this concerto, but you can hear cellist Leonard Rose performing with the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Eugene Ormandy, here. The sublime second movement starts at about 15:01and goes to 25:35 -- well worth less than 11 minutes of your time.)

(Side Note 2: Superstar cellist Joshua Roman also performed here recently in a special Bellingham Festival of Music recital.)