Living in Greenwich Village
Living in Greenwich Village was very pleasant. I moved there in 1954. I bought a used car, a 1949 Oldsmobile, and was able to get to work and enjoy the many offerings and sights the city had to offer. I lived within walking distance of the Cherry Lane and Circle in the Square Theatres that hosted a variety of experimental plays and avant-garde performances. One of the musicals that I liked, the Threepenny Opera, was first performed in the Village.
My friends and I arranged parties during the year at our homes where we met young ladies and formed pleasant relationships. There were restaurants, museums, concert halls, Central Park and, of course, Times Square and Broadway. Too many things to list - a great city by any measure.
One of the joys of living in Manhattan was attending the “Summer Sings” that were held on West 57th Street on Tuesday evenings throughout the summer. About 150-200 fairly good sight-readers, many music professionals, showed up regularly. For a minimal fee, you would enter, be given a choral book of the musical work, usually an oratorio, and be assigned to a vocal section in the four-part chorus.
The featured work one evening was Carl Orff’s “Carmina Burana,” a work I was not familiar with. It was exhilarating. Let me assure you that the experience is quite different when you are a participant rather than an observer. How lucky the group was to get a different visiting conductor each time, some of the best from all over the country. A different musical work or oratorio was performed weekly.
Sunday Musical Concerts in Manhattan
Another big plus was the easy access to the magnificent choral concerts performed in churches and synagogues on Sunday afternoons. The musical standards were high and places of worship were filled with people who were hungry for and appreciative of the musical offerings. I will always remember my musical coach, Cantor Arthur Wolfson, singing the Ernest Bloch “Sacred Service” with choir and full orchestra at Temple Emanu-El in Manhattan on one such Sunday afternoon. Years later, of course, I recreated these special services at my synagogues.