Part 4 Carnegie Hall NYC Sat am before first 5-hr rehearsal

We first saw the Redeye Grill (home of the dancing shrimp) from our Golden Touch bus: it was literally right across the street from our hotel and from Carnegie Hall. At 8a on Saturday morning, all 90+ of us got the best breakfast buffet of our lives there while our Director debriefed us on what would happen during the rest of our time in NYC.

Not only was the food good but I thought the restaurant had the ambiance of a Parisian cafe and lots of large tables to enjoy socializing with others in the group. The hot buffet had frittatas, egg sandwiches, eggs benedict, Belgian waffles, delicious corn pancakes, cheesy scrambled eggs, bacon, and house-made chicken sausage. Plus they had all kinds of pastries. Bagels cream cheese and lox. Yogurt parfaits and smoothies. An oatmeal bar. We fueled up in preparation for 5 hours of practice.

 Got done eating about 9a so we decided to walk from our hotel down to Times Square. Today was our coldest day in NY (17 degrees) and I was glad for my hat, scarf and gloves. Found the theatre for our Broadway show on Sunday night -- Come From Away.

I liked getting a closer view of the New Year's Eve ball changing colors with 2020 underneath it. All the video was dizzying to me: certainly a lot different than the last time I was in NYC. Here's a photo I took of Lora and Karyn at the George M. Cohan statue on Broadway. Cold and clear day and lots of families with children in Times Square and obviously visiting NYC for the 3-day Presidents' Day weekend, so there's a "buzz" even beyond what's probably normal for Manhattan on a regular weekend. Kind of exciting...

At Carnegie Hall, we had trouble finding the gift shop and I got nervous wandering around on the 2nd floor listening to what we later learned was a music competition (figured out we were outside all the box entrances on that floor) until we finally found this museum area with all the memorabilia, which was very interesting and right near the gift shop.

Actually the gift shop was quite small and crowded so I preferred wandering around the displays in this area because it was roomier.

I didn't realize how Isaac Stern almost single-handedly saved Carnegie Hall from the wrecking ball. So glad he did! If you are ever offered the chance to perform there, I recommend doing it; you won't be sorry. Like my childhood friend said "It's every musician's dream"

We hadn't been on the stage yet when I was learning about all the people who had performed there, from Judy Garland to the Beatles. Here are Benny Goodman's clarinet, Gene Krupa's drumsticks, Lionel Hampton's mallets and Leonard Bernstein's conducting baton.

The gift shop was small but chock a block full of great souvenirs!

Time to head back to our hotel's ballroom for our first rehearsal with Mack Wilberg and the other choirs from Iowa, Minnesota, Oregon, and Arizona.

Part 3 Carnegie Hall NYC Tavern on the Green

Valentines Day dinner at Tavern on the Green was one of the highlights of my trip. What a beautiful, historic place and it sure felt special! Of course the holiday dinner was a 3 course Prix Fixe and we hadn't bought the wine pairings. And I think we were the only ladies in the room not there with our valentines. But Frank surprised his wife Karyn, and Lora, Margie and me, by having arranged a cocktail for each of us and a bottle of wine to share -- what a prince! (That's the card Karyn is holding in the photo)

Our table was small but I loved the room we were in and the beautiful floral arrangements. Apparently what was once the Crystal Room is now an outdoor patio - it was strung with white lights that I enjoyed looking at all evening.

For our first course, Lora and I had the Roasted Maine Lobster Salad with shaved green and white asparagus, frisee, and blood orange. Lots of lobster meat and very refreshing. Karyn and Margie had Jumbo Lump Crab Cake with baby herb salad and smoked chili aioli.

The amuse bouche they served us before the second course was a shot glass of mushroom soup with black truffle oil.

The Grilled Angus Filet Mignon may have been the best steak I've ever enjoyed in my life; that probably had a lot to do with the delicious Bearnaise sauce covering it and the thyme roasted potatoes and baby spinach were good too. One nice thing about prix fixe is the right size portion -- not too much food. I believe Karyn and Lora had the same thing I did.

With my seafood sensitivity, I couldn't choose the Carmelized Diver Sea Scallops with forbidden black rice pilaf and spicy mango coulis. Or the Pan Roasted American Red Snapper with leek fondue, ruby quinoa pilaf, and fresh pomegranate sauce. But after Margie had the snapper, she let me taste some of the quinoa with that pomegranate and it was delicious.

We thought we'd each get different desserts so we could taste all three. Lora had the Passionfruit Cheesecake with mango passionfruit compote, and red velvet crumble. Margie and Karyn had Pina Colada Creme Brulee with a toasted coconut tuile. I liked mine best, a Chocolate Raspberry S'more with housemade marshmallows, raspberry sorbet and raspberry coulis.

We all loved our strawberries in tuxedos as we finished our meals in leisurely fashion, enjoyed listening to live music in the bar, browsed the gift shop and watched as valentine-bedecked horse and carriages sat in the driveway hoping to give rides but there weren't many takers before we Uber'ed back to the hotel. I can see why my friend Susan liked this restaurant so much.

Part 2 Carnegie Hall NYC Feb 2020

Here we are -- the "Fab Four" -- at CVG airport with about 30 other United flyers to Newark on a bright sunny Valentines Day morning. So excited! And I'd underestimated how much more fun it would be sharing that excitement with so many other friends.

Paul Alexander (pictured above with his wife Sally) had the dubious honor of captaining all of us and making sure we were where we needed to be. In his numbering system (alphabetical), I was #1, Karyn #14, Margie #28 and Lora #33. We'll always remember that Paul and Sally were #3 and #4 because of this Valentine card he gave her while we waited to board.

Someone posted this great photo of the NYC skyline, taken from the airplane. It sure looks different than when I was here last 25 years ago. Lots of new buildings under construction! I think the tallest one is 1 World Trade Center, which we learned is 1776 ft. taller than the twin towers.

Welcomed by this Valentine display in Newark Airport (the red roses were real but the white ones were not), we had some excitement coming down an escalator with our luggage when several people fell down. Luckily our SCS buddies blocked any more people from coming down while some ran up from below and pulled us and our bags off to safety with no real harm done. Whew! We found our bus (Golden Touch) and the ride to the hotel took longer than the flight! I can't remember the last time my flight landed 35 minutes early -- way to go, United!

The bus ride was fun looking out the window at everything and we checked into our hotel in time to walk around outside a little bit before changing for dinner. Park Central couldn't have been more convenient to Carnegie Hall, Times Square, Central Park, etc. The only time we had to ride the subway was to 9/11 Memorial.

I didn't realize that the ball they drop in Times Square on New Year's Eve stays up all year long. You could see it standing in front of our hotel -- it changed colors right above a sign that said 2020. Our rehearsal's in the hotel ballroom tomorrow morning but the Carnegie Hall gift shop opens at 11a so we'll head over there first to check it out. Now need to dress up for dinner at Tavern on the Green, which is within walking distance but we decide it's too cold so took a cab there instead.

Part 1: Carnegie Hall NYC every musician's dream

It all started on January 17, 2019 when Sycamore Community Singers like me received the following email from our director...

• You are not going to believe this!!!!! 
• I have recently been contacted by DCINY (Distinguished Concerts International New York) inviting us to NYC over President's Weekend 2020 to perform under Maestro MACK WILBURG at CARNEGIE HALL!!!!!!!!! You know this name.....Mormon Tabernacle Choir Director!!!!!
• DCINY researches for many composers/conductors (Eric Whittacre, Joseph Martin, Deke Sharon, Mark Hayes, Mack Wilburg!) to see which choirs are "out there" performing their music.  They found us!  They listened to us!  They reached out to us.  Oh, that Internet!  
• I had a conference call with them last Friday to discuss logistics.   Very positive.  We would need to arrive no later than noon on Friday, February 14 (!) of the weekend, meeting in the afternoon, free time that evening.  There will be two 5 hour rehearsals scheduled on Saturday and Sunday with free time for the rest of the days with a Monday night concert followed by a Gala Celebration!   We will depart Tuesday morning, February 18, 2020.

Didn't know this was on my "bucket list" until I read that email. From that moment, it topped the list and I was committed to going.

How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice goes the old joke. And boy, we did! Starting in July 2019 with a piece of music that was 40 pages long (Cindy). Our teacher's been around choral music for awhile: she made sure we sang for other directors this year, even ones who normally direct professionals like Mack Wilberg does. She had us sing with orchestra, which we don't normally.

Meanwhile my friend Margie, who had never been to New York, decided to join me and my fellow soprano friends Karyn and Lora. Instead of signing up for the "package" of meals and sightseeing, we decided each of us would choose 1 thing we really wanted to do while there. So in November, we booked our tickets to the Broadway show Come From Away, the NBC Studio Tour, and the 9/11 Memorial and Museum but Tavern on the Green wouldn't take our dinner reservation until December.

In January we learned that we'd be staying at the Park Central Hotel and flying in and out of Newark on United with about 30 other choristers. Rehearsing Saturday from 12:30-5 and Sunday 8:15-12:30 in the hotel and in Carnegie Hall Monday from 12:30-2:10.

As my old friend Dan Wempe used to say when we worked for Linotype: don't wear anything but black in NYC if you want to blend in and look like everyone else. So that's what I packed with a few pops of color thrown in for good measure. And suddenly more than a year had passed and it was time to drive to the airport and fly to NYC.