Third Concert was a Blast!

Last night, Tuesday, July 1 was our third concert. The setting was at the top of the hill in beautiful San Gimignano. We were on the Piaza Duomo. We shared the concert with the Dutch Orchestra. We had a full day before the concert with a rehearsal, a wonderful 3 hours in Sienna and a great sit down dinner in a Tuscan restaurant. Again, the concert started just as the sun was setting - around 9:20PM. The towers and the Duomo surrounded us and we had an audience of around 600 sitting in chairs and on the steps of the Duomo. The kids played their hearts out again and even though the darkness and the slight wind was a challenge, the audience gave us our third standing "O". They were very, very appreciative. The Camerata kids really wanted to hang out with the Dutch kids - who had graciously given each of us a logo shirt for their orchestra. I was all for arranging more time to socialize until the conductor of the Dutch orchestra suggested that we all mix up on the bus ride home. At first, that sounded like a splendid idea, but then he invited me to ride on the Dutch bus as they had lots of good Dutch beer on board. As good as that might have sounded to me personally at that point, I declined the invite for all of us. Our long bus ride back to Montecatini got us home around 1AM, so I decreed immediate bedtime and gave them this morning off for swimming, sleeping, laundry, etc. We left at noon for Florence with sack lunch in hand. We just had a guided tour of Florence and now I have given them 1 hour free time to explore and shop. We meet next for sit-down dinner at Restaurant Toto in the heart of Florence. When we come back on Friday 24 of the 33 have elected to visit the Uffizi museum. The cost is high ($1,000 US) so thank you very much to our final concert donors. Tonight we will return home to our hotel and possibly take the funicular up to the alta citta. Tomorrow we visit Arezzo (the home of Sara -our terrific guide) and then to the Tuscan hillside tiny town of Reggello for our 4th concert. One neat thing that happened last night in San Gimignano was that several people who heard our first concert in Lucca followed us to San Gimignano for last night's performance. It seems we have groupies. Ciao!

O