Thursday, January 12, 2012

Why it is important to turn your ringer off at the Philharmonic

It might make the conductor stop the symphony. [Link]
The New York Philharmonic's Tuesday performance of Mahler's Ninth symphony was halted by an unwelcomed sound: someone's ringing iPhone (using the marimba ringtone). It rang repeatedly in the fourth movement of Mahler's final completed symphony. From Super-Conductor:
According to an eyewitness, the offending phone owner was in the front rows of Avery Fisher Hall when his phone went off. (A post by Michael Jo on the classical music blog thousandfoldecho.com specifies that the interruption happened just 13 bars before the last page of the score.) In other words, in the final moments of a 25-minute movement, that ends a 90-minute symphony.
"Mr. Gilbert was visibly annoyed by the persistent ring-tone, so much that he quietly cut the orchestra," the concert-goer, music student Kyra Sims, reports. She related how the orchestra's music director turned on the podium towards the offender. The pause lasted a good "three or four minutes. It might have been two. It seemed long."


1 comment:

Frank Malloy said...

Setting the switch to Silent isn't enough! From the iPhone User Guide:

In ring mode, iPhone plays all sounds. In silent mode, iPhone doesn’t ring or play alerts and other sound effects.

Important: Clock alarms, audio apps such as Music, and many games still play sounds through the built-in speaker when iPhone is in silent mode.

For information about changing sound and vibrate settings, see “Sounds and the Ring/Silent switch” on page 146.

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