This past weekend, I went to Blossom to see the Cleveland Orchestra, for the first and likely last time this season. The headline piece was a Ravel piano concerto. The pianist was impressive, as is usual with concertos. There was another Ravel piece and two Debussy pieces. They were interesting but nothing I recognized and not too memorable. I hadn't realized those composers went into the 30s: They had some jazz influence in the pieces.
It wasn't very crowded, a comfortable crowd.
The most memorable part of the event was the rain delay before the show. It was supposed to start at 7:00 PM. I got there around 6:15, a little early to ensure good parking and because I needed to buy a ticket at the booth. The sky was very gray and looked like rain, with an occasional slight drizzle. There was a little bit of distant thunder and lightning. I was parked in one of the paved lots, fairly close. I deliberated on bringing an umbrella, since I'd have to carry it into the pavilion, but ultimately went with it. As I approached the venue, I saw a few people walking back and heard mention of a rain delay. I had to go to the bathroom so I walked further and went to one of the porta-potties near the entrance. There were a handful of guys by the entrance talking to guests and turning them away. This was before the security and ticket booth. I walked a bit closer to overhear them mentioning they couldn't let people in when there was lightning, and it would likely be a half hour after. I milled around for a while near some other people. I overheard someone mention that their website had updated on the delay, so I pulled that up on my phone. I walked back to my car to sit for a bit. As I did, the rain started coming down. I was glad I had my umbrella, and got to my car just around the time it really started pouring hard. I sat in there reading on the e-reader I brought, checking my phone occasionally. Just around 7, it said that the gates were now open and the show would start at 7:15. The rain had let up to a slight drizzle or less by then. So I went out, waited in the security lines, then went to the ticket booth, which luckily had short lines. I got in, walked down to general admission, and sat in the relatively empty seats near the outer edge. A steady stream of people were still coming in when I sat down. Quite a few piled into my section just before the show who later left after the first piece: They must've not been allowed to go to their assigned seats, or just wanted better GA seats. Anyway, aside from a few rumbles during the show and the fairly sparse seating in the lawn behind, the weather wasn't too noticeable at this point.