Presentation

A decade ago I toured Sweden in mid-January with a couple of musicians, presenting electroacoustic concerts in small rural venues. We encountered no blizzards, but I drove my VW Transporter along white high-sided roads that showed ample evidence of newly cleared snow.

One afternoon we arrived at a community center that appeared to be in the middle of nowhere. It was of gleaming blond wood, inside and out, with a small auditorium and an all-purpose hall. All was pristine as though newly built, with no sign of life except the caretaker who let us in. We set up the equipment and waited for an audience which, we feared, we might well outnumber.

Come performance time, the auditorium was nearly full, perhaps a hundred and fifty people. And even more miraculously, they all proved to be enthusiastic devotees of avant-garde music!

After the concert we trooped into the hall, where shiny bare tables were groaning with piles of plates, bottles of good Belgian beer, baskets of crusty bread and huge deep two-foot bowls full of of fresh prawns, piled up mountainously above the rim. Now that’s what I call presentation! By the end of the evening we were all full and the bottles, baskets and bowls were empty.