Not Seeing at Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall, the great concert venue of New York City originally built in 1891, has a number of seats with partial views. This is one of the last great halls built entirely of masonry. As a result, there are a number of large pillars included in the original design that are used to support this mammoth structure and which can in a few cases obstruct the view one has of the stage. These seats are actually scattered throughout the main concert hall and vary quite a bit with respect to view, but I assume not in terms of sound quality.

Today we intentionally bought two tickets for seats with obstructed views to a February 28th concert of the Leipzig Orchestra playing the Brahms' Second Symphony and Chopin's First Piano Concerto. Naturally, these seats are cheaper than most and so we were attracted to the idea of paying less, but we also wanted to see what it is like to experience a concert in this Hall noted for its acoustics but with only a limited view of the Orchestra. Will this allow us to concentrate on the music better? Will we find ourselves frustrated and straining our necks to get a better look? Or will we grow bored and disengaged without a visual perspective to enhance our aural experience? We'll see. I'll be reporting on our reaction here on March 1st, so please visit again at that time and we'll let you know how it went.