Left Riga at 05:15. Argued with Air Baltic ground personnel, who wanted to charge me for a seat for the guitar, when the flight attendants already said I could bring the guitar on board. At last I was allowed to take the guitar on board, which neatly fit into the overheads, even though I was one of the last people to board.
Just arrived at home at 23:45. That comes to 27.5 hours of travel time.
10 performances in 14 days and that includes the travel days. It was hard, but Jon and I enjoyed it. Now sleep….
At lunch I was told I should learn a few sentences in Latvian, which I politely shrugged off. The local crew at the venue was very capable. The sound engineer was knowledgeable and friendly, and Jon liked the local lighting person, a young man who got the vibe of the performance and did slow light movements that complimented the music and images. I was told during intermission that Riga’s best guitarist (((how does one receive a title like that?))) sat in the first row and really enjoyed the concert. I didn’t meet him afterwards, but did do an interview for a Latvian website. The young man spoke English very well and had a surprisingly good grasp of my music and the Zeitgeist in which it is embedded. I spoke of the intersection of cultural “discs”. I mentioned my respect for tradition, but that I also feel a need for the discovery of a common musical language, in other words hybrid forms that don’t adhere to tradition.
Woke up early, again, walked downstairs in search of coffee, but found out that breakfast did not start until 08:00. It was still totally dark outside and I decided to sit and then surf the free internet. Met Jon for breakfast and created a list of drip coffee quality for the past two weeks – totally subjective of course and the experience would certainly change if we had stayed in different hotels. At the top, sharing the #1 slot were Milan and Vienna (((not surprisingly, both of those places had exchanges with the Ottoman empire))), followed by Munich, then Hamburg, Berlin… Riga took up the rear in the last spot. Took a walk outside, where it was quite cold and rainy. Found a little cafe/bakery in the neighborhood: Ordered coffee, Lavazza from an Italian espresso machine, and a slice each of sour cherry strudel and apple strudel, both of which were very good. I enjoyed this re-use of old bathtubs, which had been painted a deep red, placed on the sidewalk, and were used a planters.
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