November 26, 2020: Thanksgiving in Dallas
	September 25 - October 13, 2020: Our Fall Trip to Florida
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In early September, I contacted the Symphony to find out what, if any, procedures they would be following in this season of Covid. What I found out was that since the Symphony was implementing "social distancing", they would be severely restricting the number of attendees to each performance. This would mean many fewer seats available, of course. Regular ticket sales would probably be suspended, as not even all the season ticket holders could likely be accommodated. The organization would be calling subscribers as seats were available to offer them the opportunity to attend. Subscribers could also call themselves.

Beginning with the first performance, the Symphony would also be professionally filming each performance and allowing subscribers to watch them online if they did not feel comfortable attending in person. Fred and I watched the first one on the big screen, and it was even better than being there, it seemed. So we were not concerned with missing out, and I never thought to try to get any kind of refund for the season; we've just treated our subscription as a donation to the Symphony, and maybe this will help them weather this storm.

But we did get a call in late October asking us if we would like to attend a performance on November 6th, and we accepted- as much to see what it would be like as to actually hear the performance, which we knew we'd be able to see online anyway. So we drove downtown on our usual Friday night, noting that there were many more parking spaces on the street than usual. When we found our seats in the hall, we could see why:

The Orchestra Floor

In the picture above, you can see what's been done. Programs have been placed in the seats that have been assigned; if everyone shows up, only those seats where you see the white programs will be filled. Everyone is about six feet from everyone else. Not only that, but we found out that the only pieces that will be performed this season are those that do not require the entire orchestra- this so the musicians can be as socially-distanced as possible as well.

A Look Around the Symphony Hall (Mouseover Image if Video Controls Not Visible)

I made a movie looking around the symphony hall, and if you would like to get a live perspective of what it looked and sounded like, just watch the movie at left.

What it sounded like was normal. What it looked like was some dystopian disaster flick where some huge percentage of the world's population was simply gone, and the survivors, desperate to maintain normalcy, were continuing on, although staying apart from each other. It was a bit surreal, we both thought.

While we were waiting for the performance to begin, I took a few more pictures with my phone, looking around the hall, and I have put some of these below:

As far as the performance itself was concerned, we enjoyed it- even though I am partial to orchestral pieces that employ most all the stage space- "big" symphonies and the like. During the age of Covid, we understand, most of the pieces performed will be small chamber pieces.

A Performance Excerpt (Mouseover Image if Video Controls Not Visible)

Before we leave this page, I wanted you to get an idea of what the performance looked and sounded like in a hall that, compared with a normal performance pre-Covid, was basically empty.

You can use the player at left to watch this short movie.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	November 26, 2020: Thanksgiving in Dallas
	September 25 - October 13, 2020: Our Fall Trip to Florida
	Return to the Index for 2020