The St. Lawrence String Quartet is amazing. Geoff, Barry, Lesley and Alberto (their new cellist!) came over tonight to play an informal recital. They kept thanking me for the opportunity, which left me highly confused. We are the ones who are deeply indebted to them for the opportunity to hear them in such an intimate gathering. Duh! :)

They played Tchaikovsky 1 and Bartok 3 — brilliantly, of course. Alberto kicked some serious ass.

I managed to shoe-horn forty or so people into my place (a new record, I believe), and it was a great mix of people: software folk, string players, opera singers, a student or two, lawyers, and people in all sorts of other professions.

Lots of music folk were present: St. Lawrence String Quartet (obviously), Livia Sohn, Dawn Upshaw, Paul Groves, Jay Hunter Morris, Stephen Prutsman, Vienna Teng… and probably some others I just didn’t know about. There were a few people I didn’t get to meet (Elliot: there were quite a few faces I didn’t recognize. Me: yeah! me too. :)

Almost everybody cleared out shortly after the concert was over. They missed out. :) Paul started singing the theme song to the old TV show, “Taxi,” (which none of us could recognize, for some reason), after which he sat down at the piano to sing some pop songs from the 80s. I’m so pop-culture ignorant that I don’t even remember whom he was impersonating, even though I recognized it while he was singing. And, a bonus: they had been drinking a bit, so no one noticed that the video camera was still on.

Finally, you can check out an animated .gif of the evening — a snapshot taken every fifteen minutes or so. (I turned on my webcam tonight. Wonder if anyone was watching…?)

Before the show...

The St. Lawrence String Quartet plays Tchaikovsky

Between pieces...

A new record for the number of people I can pack into my place.

Mandy, Elliot, Adam, and Sean peruse the 1997 Stanford Class Book (Photo: Rae)

Paul Groves, Cindy, Chris, Semira and Sohil, in the loft (Photo: Rae or Adam)

Barry makes sandwiches for Heidi and Claire

Barry and his beef

Sohil and Semira

My fancy table ornament

Alyssa, Sara(h), Me, Mandy, Alberto (Photo: Rae or Adam)

Stephanie, Jeremy, Elliot, Adam, Mandy, Shawna (?) (Photo: Rae or Adam)

Lesley, Regan, Paul Groves, and Dawn Upshaw

View from the loft

Mandy, Elliot, Vienna Teng, and a blurry Livia

Livia and me. She's telling me that Paul told Jay I didn't take the photos on my wall (a false presumption!). (Photo: Adam Tow)

View from loft (Photo: Rae or Adam)

Vienna, Larry, Will, Alyssa, Rae, Adam

My camera and me. (Photo: Adam Tow)

Geoff Nuttall and the crazy tenors (Paul Groves and Jay Hunter Morris)

Stephanie and Rae (Photo: Adam Tow)

Jeremy, Stephanie, Rae

Adam Tow, with my camera!

Rae, close

Jim, Paul, Geoff

Ladies and Gentlemen: Paul Groves!