benaroya hall last night, between the first and second act of joanna newsom’s perfomance
[This started as a footnote, but kept getting longer and longer so now it's a post of its own.]

Last night also features a last-minute decision to shell out $35 to see Joanna Newsom at Benaroya Hall once I thought about how lucky Seattle was to be on the orchestral tour and how stupid I would feel for not going.

It was a really beautiful show, with the first act featuring the conducted by a guy in an orange suit Northwest Sinfonia. I think that I expected to be overwhelmed by the presence of a large orchestra, but this didn’t really happen. I now realize that it just sounded closer to the album than the last time I saw her. As good as it was to hear the performance with a fleet of strings and full orchestration, something about the overwhelming centrality of the harp and Newsom’s unique voice make everything else fade into the background.

Nevertheless, both the symphonic section and the second, Ys Street Band only section were great, featuring new, old, and yet-to-be released material. Maybe my favorite part was the excellent sightlines throughout the orchestra level. Seeing her for the first time at the Showbox last year, I was awed by her skill. But being able to actually see her plucking ferociously at the strings of her giant harp made the experience all the more phenomenal.

Each of standing standing ovation was earned, and one of them even brought her back for an encore of “Peach, Plum, Pear”. I’d worried that it would be omitted for not fitting well enough with the newer, more mature material, but when Joanna returned to the stage, accompanied again by the the band it sounded terrific and fresh and new.