I have an even better idea, although getting tickets may be tough. The Marlboro Festival in Marlboro, Vermont. It's where the elite classical music geniuses meet for the summer and perform every nite. Marlboro has been compared to a "kibbutz, a hippie commune, Shangri-La, a cult (but a 'good one'), Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study, and George Orwell's Animal Farm, where 'all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.'"
It was the most glorious experience of our 25th anniversary--and we went all over the East Coast to something like 15 festival concerts, including Tanglewood. But Marlboro was two days of unbelievable performances with recent conservatory grads and the leading classical lights.
One episode: We were standing outside the barn (where the concerts take place), along with 75 - 100 others and the maestro, Rudolf Serkin, slowly walked down the hill toward the barn. The conversations came almost to a complete stop in silent deference as he walked through the crowd. But the performances? Oh my God.
The last day was a morning performance with strings, Serkin on the piano, orchestra and volunteer choir doing Beethoven's Choral Fantasy. The nite before they'd asked for volunteer singers, and being a trained bass-baritone my wife suggested I go. Shyly, I refused, an act I will rue until the day I die.
Well, all this because the June 29 New Yorker has an enightening, even hilarious article on our beloved Marlboro: The Music Mountain: What makes the Marlboro Festival so great?