I love all kinds of music, so it was by great fortune that I met Vicky, who is a musician and shares my passion for live performances. She invites K an myself to attend a show at a venue called Vinilo Cafe along with her retired father who was visiting from California.
The venue has a theatre layout filled with 2, 3 and 4 seater dining tables complete with romantic candle lighting, and an inconspicuous bar at the back. The Argentinian audience is politely serious, with zero tolerance of any distracting sounds not performance related. Meaning, that even if you speak quietly during an act, you can expect a chorus of ‘shushing’ to fly in your direction, but never anything nasty or rude.
K – ‘I can’t believe how polite everyone is, if this was London there would be heckling. We’re so rude.’
T – ‘Even during a good performance?’
K – ‘Yeah, coming from the drunk section. And God help you if the performance is bad ..’
Fortunately, the live performances were delivered by 2 brilliant men of great musical talent.
César Lerner, who played the accordion, piano and percussions, and Marcelo Moguilevsky, who played clarinet, clarón, flutes, harmonica, silbido, and the piano… an about 4 other instruments that I could not identify.
The music ranged from Spanish folk with a fusion of other European, middle eastern, Gaelic, eastern, and african, to jazz and soul influences.
Marcelo also had an amazing voice with a mesmerizing tone, the kind of tone that made you happy and sad at the same time, and even though he played all the instruments beautifully, I found myself wishing he would stick to the piano (my favourite) and just sing.
It was a pleasant night talking music with music lovers. And K, who may not be a music lover of great variety, but is always willing to listen and smile politely.
Tiara in Transit 