Last Friday Alison Knowles rebuked – in the friendliest and least self-important way – pretty much everything that has ever happened on the stage of Disney Hall.
For the duration, nobody knew what Disney Hall was for. Nobody knew why they were sitting in the audience. To watch a salad be prepared?
AK transformed the stage into a kitchen, and Disney Hall into a dining hall. It was performance without any of the things that are the justifications of conventional performances: no virtuosity, precision, intensity, seduction, drama, surprise, communication, ….
Instead of all that, we were suspended in uncertainty. Anxiety, but also curiosity. How long was it going to go on? Was the salad being made to eat? Were we going to get to eat it? How was that going to happen?
The audience – always the wild card – was mostly up to the challenge. There were some shouted out remarks. There was a mass dash for the exits as servers started distributing salad bowls to the audience. But, near the end, an outburst of “Thank you”s.
What other orchestra but the L.A. Phil would give Knowles a stage? Works conceived so far from the usual routines being given a chance to unsettle again, after 50+ years? Thank you, indeed.
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