A symphony of horrors

went to the berlin philharmonic orchestra. the performance was a piece by joseph haydn, Orlando Paladino. the philharmonie, which is the name of the concert hall, is gorgeous. vast and dramatically designed. my seat was good, in the first balcony, second row. i did not, however, enjoy the performance. at all. first, it was a classical vocal performance, an opera without sets, and the orchestra, while still positioned on stage in front of the vocalists and not in a pit, was just for accompaniment. the piece was sung by seven different performers, and they also took it unto themselves to "act" the performance in operatic style (overly melodramatic). the performance by the symphony was sporadically interjected in the vocal performance, often just a couple notes between verses (baaaaa bum). the percussion, instead of being used to accent crescendo, was used to startle the listener, and always preceded the performance of a stereotypical opera fat lady alto in bright red. the 1st cellist was featured a few times for short periods of time, but was always accompanied by a pianist and a 12 string mandolin, which adulterated the sound of the cello and ruined the solo imo. obviously i need to take that up with Haydn but all the same.
it also went on for waaay too long. started at 7pm sharp and went without pause until 10:30 pm. my dinner reservation was at 10 so i was antsy to get the fuck out of there and cut out as they were presenting the bouquets to the vocalists.