The place is hopping… The waiters are all efficient smart alecky young men with infectious smiles. People come all the way from the outskirts of Paris to eat in this restaurant run by a short rolly polly French man and his Italian wife. The place is packed at every meal and people with plates of pizza and glasses of fruity tasting Chianti never fail to spill out into the street in front of the restaurant.
The clientele is varied as people from all walks and stations of life come eat here. Jocular red faced politicians eat next angry young students who marching in the streets just last year… Hardworking secretaries and factory workers rub elbows with dissolute musicians from the nightclubs on Pigalle, right next door… Young women with hard faces and short hair try ineffectually to impress the significance of their burgeoning movement upon the ladies of negotiable affections who work in nearby bars.
All these people congregate in a fragile understanding that for the duration of a meal, in this place, peace can be had... The penalty for breaking the peace is invoking the Antoine’s wrath (“Just call me Antonio, as does my wife…”), which usually meant a permanent banning. And people prefer to at least tolerate each other rather than to risk losing access to Antoine’s marvelous pizzas and pasta.
In the evening, the crowd thins and only the regulars who know what comes next remain. Antoine comes out of the kitchen and grabs his mandolin from its hooks on the wall. When he was sure that he had everyone’s attention, the short squat Frenchman in his off-white tomato-sauce stained apron would start playing, softly at first and then more strongly, as if gaining momentum. Finally, he would open his mouth and the purest baritone anyone had ever heard would spill out and fill the restaurant with ringing beauty, would fill the world it seemed, and Antoine sang. He would sing popular Italian and French operas stories of passionate love tried by life, of dark court machinations, of brotherhood betrayed, and for a time… time stopped…
Forty years have passed… and it has been a very long time since Antoine has left. The clientele has changed and though the restaurant still serves good food, it now has three wide-screen TVs showing non-stop football (aka soccer). No one remembers Antoine’s voice or the way he once moved Tito Gobi to tears with his rendition of Gioachino Rossini’s Guglielmo Tell. The mandolin is still up on the wall, untouched amidst a clutter of knickknacks and trinkets… And I expect that if I could put my ear to it, I could still hear that beautiful baritone echoing within.
All pictures courtesy of yours truly.
Aww what a great story! It's true how much our tastes as a society have changed. Orchestras are going out of vogue and struggle to get audience members to buy tickets, whereas Red Sox stadiums sell out. Oh well. Maybe things will turn around and people like Antoine will get to sing again?
ReplyDeleteWhat a sad ending. I love opera and hope one day to go and see one. I hate going to restaurants with TV screens, and if I have to then I make my partner sit with his back to the screen! hehe
ReplyDelete@Aubrie: Thanks, glad you enjoyed it. Indeed tastes of societies have drastically changed, historically speaking, over time. There was once a time when singing and making music were considered a popular (as in belonging to the people) form of entertainment. I don't see how this can possibly turn around without some dramatic change in the circumstances. On the bright side, though making your own music (or, if you get right down to it, making your own anything in the fat first world countries) has become marginalised, at least people still love listening to music (whatever kind it may be). I'll refrain from giving up on society as long as they continue to listen to music (but secretly I'll roll my eyes at commercial music and people who inflict it on themselves). As long as people listen to music there is a channel for musicians to reach out and touch either a specific group with a specific style, or to reach everyone by finding the way to articulate the music so that current crowds can understand and appreciate it. These musings apply just as easily to writing as it does to music. In many ways these are exciting and pivotal times and we need to make sure that the right things make it through the change.
ReplyDelete@Niki: Heya Niki. I hope you get your wish... Opera is a genre I really don't know very well so, out of curiosity, what would you want to go see if/when you get the chance?
TV screens in restaurants... Geh. I suppose it makes some kind of sense for people who follow sports (another curious custom, an ancient one, but curious nonetheless). But for anyone else, why come to a restaurant to watch TV? Curious thing is that a couple won't got to read restaurant to read books/newspapers at each other... Shrug.
That's a good trick! I'm fortunate not to have to use it, my partner is as interested in TV as I am (we don't own a TV).
What a great storytelling, I could almost scent the scents and taste the flavours and hear the sounds...
ReplyDeletexo
It takes two to tango so you are, in part, responsible for whatever you take out of the piece.
ReplyDeleteThanks for being such an involved reader... I hope the next dances work out as well. : j
There are some nice touches here, I am particularly fond of: 'ladies of negotiable affections'.
ReplyDeleteTo pick up on your response to Aubrie's comment: although commercialism has tried to enclose music, writing, and other art forms, and make them available only to those who pay, the arts are still being practiced and enjoyed by heaps of people. I know of lots of bars and cafés that host free jam nights and open mic events. I go to a monthly poetry and music open stage thing at a local café and the last time I was in London I stumbled upon several. Performance poetry is gathering momentum and, of course, blogging allows writers to share their efforts with the whole world. So I don't think we need to try and get back to a time when there were no TVs in restaurants even though I hate that particular development. Yes, I think you are right: these are exciting and pivotal times, there's so much out there.
Heheh... Alas I cannot claim credit for that expression. I used it as a tribute to the Ankh Morpork's seamstresses' guild...
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I think Aubrie was specifically mourning the passing of symphonic orchestras from the public eyes and hearts, and consequently the difficulties that represents for professional classical musicians.
Perhaps by extension the difficulty of making a living as an artist... For example, as a teenager, I realized my art wasn't going to get me by in life, so I chose to pursue other means of employment.
And although music and the arts are changing and are reappearing in different forms and in different places (like the ones you mentioned), how many people can get by solely on their arts?
I remember a lit prof I worked with trying to shock his sleepy hungover students by telling them there were only 20 full time professional writers in France (never checked if that was true, but it was a believable number); it didn't work, of course, those who were listening weren't surprised and those who weren't didn't hear him.
I don't think anyone here is advocating a return to the media dark ages. And yes, there is still a minority of people out there creating and making. Heaps of people? Perhaps not, relatively speaking, but they are out there. And in most cases they are working a bread and butter job to support themselves as they create.
Certainly there is still an audience, and one of the key points that are in flux is the means by which the creators and audience connect.
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"I go to a monthly poetry and music open stage thing at a local café "
So... do you do readings? or perform in some other capacity? or do you go as a spectator?
I got taken to one such place recently... It was... A lot like youtube in more ways than one.
These are the gems to find...the quiet venues where a soul shines through music, art, or poetry. Unexpected gifts, not to be shared with the masses who either misunderstand or seek to exploit. Rather gifts for the wanders and seekers, looking for just such place where beauty and truth coexist. This is such a venue. Always a gift.
ReplyDeleteMahalo, Annie.
ReplyDeletere opera, I think Gianni Schicchi because of the song O mio babbino caro. I love Mr Bean's version on his movie Mr Bean's Holiday. He's so funny but it still brings tears to my eyes.
ReplyDeleteI checked out versions sung by (or with in the last case) Maria Callas, Hayley Westenra, Montserrat Caballe, and Rowan Atkinson.
ReplyDeleteI was lucky in that the first video I found was subtitled. I don't think I can appreciate opera much unless I understand what is being said.
Probably because I'm more interested in the story than in pure musical aspect of opera. Heh, Atkinson's antics. ; j
Thanks for checking back and sharing, Niki.
I have a friend who plays in two orchestras but there's no money in it, you're right, both are amateur and thus unpaid. She does it for the love of it like most artists, I guess. But, I wonder how many artists through the ages have been able to make a living out of their art? Even Mozart had to teach.
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Sometimes I read, sometimes I just watch and it is rather like you tube, or karaoke! The musicians are usually better than the poets, some of whom are appalling it's true, but you get the odd gem. Actually there are a few who a pretty good and one or two who are very good so it's worth going for them and the general air of egalitarianism that pervades.
Which brings to an interesting tangent... If Mozart had lived in our time, what would have happened?
ReplyDeleteMozart on Austria has talent anyone? (maybe... at the age of four)
Or go visit Mozart's youtube channel, he has over three hundred thousand subscribers.
"Have you downloaded his latest hit single K.595 yet? It's only three dollars/pounds/euros/unicorns. I hear it's been downloaded 30 milion times!"
Or it could go the other way... "Ha, I found this dude on youtube who posts videos of himself playing music... Something called mass in C minor. he was totally being flamed in the comment section. People were all like saying how his videos were totally fake."
Love places like the old Antonio's. I also love opera. There have been a few restaurants where the waiters sing opera while they served. I think there is still one in Palm Desert, California. At least it was there 5 years ago.
ReplyDeleteHeya Kass, nice to see you again.
ReplyDeleteNot surprised that you'd know of a joint that would have live singing waiters.
Around where I live waiters tend to be undead and snooty... Unless they're of foreign extraction, in which case it's only a matter of time until they get their brains eaten.
The food looks beautiful. I'm visiting Paris for a few days in the beginning of June. Maybe I will seek this place out, although I won't be watching football (soccer).
ReplyDeleteHello Theresa, and welcome! If you'd like, I can give you the exact address. It's a good Italian restaurant... but there are most definitely better and more interesting places to eat.
ReplyDeleteWhat have you got planned for your stay?