AFTER THE birth of my first child, it took me two weeks before I could coordinate showering, dressing, and leaving the house. My infant daughter was a good baby, but she had her days and nights mixed up which meant mom and dad weren’t getting much sleep. As this was the beginning of my motherhood, I was unfamiliar with the feeling of prolonged sleep deprivation, a state of existence I quickly arrived at and then wandered through for the next decade as we expanded our family from one child to four.
At this two-week mark, I was deep into my crash course on babies. Thus, I’m unable to remember how the arrival of my husband’s best friend, Tom Laine, came to be. Tom and Mike grew up together. Where my husband is quiet and nonchalant, Tom is boisterous and enthusiastic. They have functioned as each other’s foil for sixty years. At the time, his visit was undoubtedly a result of their collective decision-making and my enthusiastic overestimation of my as-yet-to-be-experienced mothering skills. He came to meet his buddy’s baby and stayed for two weeks. As a result, Tom got to witness firsthand my inaugural struggles with nursing, no sleep, and port-partum soreness.
Thus, it was with perfect synchronicity eight years later, when my fourth child was two-weeks-old, that Tom invited us to New York City to see him perform at Carnegie Hall. I would never have considered this adventure as a new mother, unless I could attend in my pajamas, but as a busy veteran of four it seemed like a vacation.
Tom is an opera singer. He had landed a gig with MidAmerica Productions singing the tenor part in a presentation of Mozart’s Requiem. It was his first performance at Carnegie Hall and he wanted his oldest friend to be there. Performing on the Isaac Stern Auditorium/Ronald O. Perelman Stage in Midtown, Manhattan was an honor. We wouldn’t miss it.
We did a little research and discovered that children are quietly discouraged from attending events there, something about “using discretion when bringing children to Carnegie Hall.” So we asked my parents to cover for us while we were away. We couldn’t leave our two-weeks-old infant behind so we took her along, figuring we’d work something out when we got there.
Upon arrival, every one of the 30 people Tom invited from Houston, Nebraska and Michigan wondered what we were going to do with our baby, Aurora, during the concert. I knew what I was going to do with the baby, I was going to keep her with me. Our challenge was how we would manage this.
Tom was so excited. He’d been rehearsing in a little room near the Lincoln Tunnel on the West Side. The first time he sang a note in Carnegie Hall was during the performance! He didn’t know the piece he got hired to sing when he auditioned. He spent six months learning and polishing it before the show. As a veteran of the Light Opera of New York, the Houston Grand Opera, the Michigan Opera Theater, the Opera Pacific, and the New Jersey Opera, this practicing method was customary for him.
On the evening of the concert, we made our way to the venue. There was a large crowd already there. With 2,804 seats on five levels, Carnegie Hall is massive. MidAmerica Productions, which is the foremost independent producer of choral concerts in Carnegie Hall, had the evening teed up with posters and programs announcing the event. We milled around with Aurora outside, not wanting to try our luck too early, fully expecting to be evicted from the hall if we tried to simply carry her in.
We stayed by the doors until the lights in the lobby started flashing, then my quick-thinking husband put our sleeping angel daughter in the football hold across his forearm and gently draped my trench coat (it was 1999) over her. We took a deep breath, held our tickets out, and proceeded forward, clearing the lobby and the ushers, our subterfuge undetected.
We found our seats on the Parquet Level and sat down, easing our baby onto Mike’s lap where she slumbered peacefully. We weren’t sitting with any of Tom’s visitors, they were mostly on the other side of the venue. The people around us were very nice, giving us interested looks and kindly smiles. We slowly relaxed into our seats. We knew we’d be escorted out if there was any disturbance, so we planned on keeping Aurora as quiet as possible.
I got our supplies ready, keeping one eye on our sleeping daughter and both ears tuned to the magnificent sounds around me. Tom was amazing. He appeared so brave to me. Although he is not a small figure, his presence was dwarfed in that giant venue.
Until he began to sing.
The Requiem is a mass in eight parts, written for four soloists (soprano, contralto, tenor, and bass), choir, and symphonic orchestra. Mozart wrote it at the same time he was composing The Magic Flute and The Clemency of Titus operas. When he wrote the Requiem, which is a mass for the dead, Mozart had been seriously ill for over a year. He believed he was poisoned and thus, sensing his end, decided to compose his own dirge for the repose of his soul.
Even though The Requiem is a somber affair, the highlight throughout was Tom, beautifully carrying the music from the Introitus through to the Communio. A tenor sings the part between the baritone and alto or countertenor, which is the highest of the ordinary adult male range. There are four quartets that take up most or all of The Requiem’s movements and the tenor has the best male part, which Tom made the absolute most of.
The parts of a symphony, or in this case a mass, are like chapters in a book. Like an author, a composer uses them to organize and present themes and ideas, and to build suspense and pace for the music. Fortunately, when Aurora woke up, she stirred quietly during one of the symphonic sections. I took her from Mike, fed her discreetly, burped her and gave her a pacifier, all of which she complied with silently. We were all the way to the Benedictus, the Hosanas sung, when we entered the fifth pause before the Agnus Dei. Then my little angel gave out the smallest, sweetest, quietest of baby mewls right when dead silence had descended throughout the perfect acoustics of the great Carnegie Hall.
Everyone around us started coughing.
The dear strangers who had witnessed our enjoyment of the evening, covered our baby’s single sound with fake coughing. I doubt everyone around us knew each other, but they miraculously responded as if they had a shared plan. Mike and I went from busted and breathless to relieved and grateful in seconds, which was how long it took for the violins to begin again.
Later, Tom’s aunt relayed a conversation she had with the woman sitting next to her.
Woman: “Was that a baby?”
Aunt Who Knew Better: “Noooo!”
Of course, there was no need to cover her up on the way out. We waved sweetly to the ushers and made our way through to the exit. Tom was elated and completely oblivious to our efforts, which was appropriate. We were all so high on his success. Standing outside the hall under the marquis, he looked like a king, his joy radiating out to all. We were so thrilled to be able to witness this for him.
We milled around talking with everyone for a little while and then decided to head over to the hotel as it had begun to rain. We gave Tom a big hug and then he asked us, “Are you guys going to stay in town for awhile? You should stay for a couple of weeks!”
I chuckled to myself, thinking of all the other two-week moments I had shared with this awesome guy. “Sometime soon, Tommy,” I said. And we turned and left.