This has been pretty heavy fortnight on the Arts front

Over the last couple of weeks we have been flat out on the arts front.
Exhibitions at the Tate Britain (Another London)  Tate Modern (Edvard Munch), Portrait Gallery (BP Portrait Awards 2012) , Somerset House (The Rolling Stones, 50yrs), the V&A (British Design 1948-2012) and finally the Barbican (Designing 007: Fifty Years Bond Style).
Two great plays. A fantastic performance of A Midsummer Nights Dream performed at Regents Park Open Air Theatre and set in modern day English Romani caravan park with a theme along the lines of A Big Fat Gypsy Wedding.
Also an electric performance of Bernard Shaw's A Doctor's Dilemma performed at the Lyttelton Theatre at Southbank.
Straight into the classical stuff. Off to variously, Westminster Cathedral to take in one of the 2012 Grand Organ Festival  performances, over to St-Martin-in-the-Fields for an uplifting eighteen string performance of various works, the highlight of which was Dvorak's Serenade for Strings in E major (inspiring stuff). Then of course,  hanging out at the Royal Albert Hall to take in Beethoven's symphonies and a a performance of Bach's Mass in B Minor.
Finally,  we attended a rock concert the other night performed by Eddie Vedder (the lead singer of a group called  Pearl Jam). Good old Eddie isn't much cop as a solo act however, the theatre he performed in, the HMV Hammersmith Apollo was a class act in itself. What a great place!

All this spiritual infusion stuff aside, a couple of things happened during our last two concerts that basically rated as evening highlights for us.
The first was last night.
You see this shot above of the audience applauding. This shot was taken after the event in question.
Check out the older woman in the front centre of the shot sitting directly to the left of the old guy who is dressed in a white shirt and is leaning slightly forward.
Now picture the scene. 6,000 of us are attending a performance of Bach's Mass in B minor. We are all playing the classical unwritten rules game. No unnecessary coughing during the performance, no entry or exit from your seat , phones off, no photos, no clinking of glasses, and last but not least, no applauding until the end of each half.
Things in the first half went to plan and the second half was travelling along OK, that was, until the choir had belted out a particularly inspirational number.
The piece finished and just as the conductor was about to move on, this old woman started applauding.
Can you imagine it. A 6,000 person auditorium and exactly one person applauding. 
5,999 sets of eyes all immediately swung in the direction of the box that seated this unconstrained pensioner.
My immediate thoughts were, two things are going to happen here, and fast
1) this woman is going to realise she stuffed up and will stop applauding or
2) some others in the crowd might just join in to cover their own embarrassment at what was going down.
Well, I have to tell you neither of these things happened.
As one, the entire audience just sat there liked stunned mullets. Neither the orchestra nor it's conductor moved a muscle.
And this old duck just kept on clapping.
I have to say this was one seriously enjoyable moment in my classical life.
Said women, finally ran out of puff, the audience all let out a collective sigh of relief, the conductor dabbed his sweating brow and we got back to business.
Great stuff. I loved it!

The other thing worth commenting on, is the complete contrast between Classical Music and Rock Concert audiences. Talk about extremes.
Over here when you attend a classical concert there are all these common understandings as outlined above. Everyone sits quietly in their seats, nobody talks during a performance, drinking is kept to modest levels and applause is generally kept to a respectful clapping. And as I have already said, no phones, no photos, no moving about, just sit down , enjoy yourself and don't bother your neighbour.
Down to the Hammersmith Apollo to take in an evening of Rock. For starters, the ticket suggests an 1830 start when in fact the warm up act doesn't hit the stage until 1950 and the main act sometime just before 2100.
The crowd (maybe 3,000) arrive en masse at 1830 and hit the facilities extensive bars. There is some serious drinking going on here. Everyone but everyone is hyped up and is getting tanked on beer, wine and whatever. At the  point the lead up act hit the stage, my guess would have been that there were probably 300 in their seats and the remaining 2,700 in the bars.
No problem, as one we all buy as many beers or wines as one set of hands can hold and we then storm off to our seats.
The next three hours is total mayhem.
Photos , filming , people calling their friends on the phone, seemingly endless lines traipsing to and from the bars and toilets. Yahoo-ing at the start, during and at the end of each number. 
This wasn't a concert. 
This was an event of massive proportions.
As to the question of the quality of the headline act.
Eddie Vedder in a word was rubbish.
Who cares, these punters didn't come for the quality of the performance.
We were here to be uplifted and we were.
Off home on the tube, via a couple of pubs.
Now that was one concert worth attending.