Orchestra Miami is putting on a special program. Elaine Rinaldi, Orchestra Miami's founder, organizer, conductor, and pianist, calls it the "must-see event of the year." She says it's taking place in Miami's only remaining airplane hangar in Coconut Grove. (They had airplane hangars in Coconut Grove? Maybe it was for military planes during WWII. Although this one is described as having been built by the USCG in 1932 -- way before WWII -- on Dinner Key, and it's at Shake-a-Leg Miami.)
Anyway, "Dinner Key was once the site of the first continental US Naval station, which opened in 1918, and beginning in the 1930s, the home base for Pan Am(erican) World Airways." Now, this site is the home of Shake-a-Leg Miami, which is an organization that serves local children and adults with disabilities. So, how did Shake-a-Leg Miami get interested in this project? Beats me. But they are, and Orchestra Miami is all too glad to join forces with them.
So, on Saturday, April 9, beginning at 8:00 PM, here's what's taking place: Michael Yawney is directing two pieces. They will include Kurt Weill's "Lindbergh's Flight" and Marc Blitzstein's "Airborne Symphony," and they'll include the Rosie Herrera Dance Theatre and the Gay Men's Chorus of South Florida. There will be projected images courtesy of HistoryMiami Museum, and you can either attend in person, or stream at home.
I hope this link works, but here's how you can get tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/discover-miami-through-music-airborne-tickets-277609426267. If the link doesn't work, you can call Orchestra Miami at 305-274-2103.
This show is being called "Airborne." However many former Pan Am employees are still around, and still interested in their old jobs, are promoting this project. They asked Elaine to do it, and she said "YES!!"
By the way, if you're thinking "but wasn't Lindbergh famously anti-Semitic," yes, he was. But Weill was Jewish, and if he was willing to write this piece, then we can listen to it.
So, I'll see you there, and if you're not there, I'll be thinking about you Livestreaming this from home.
