July 3. Concert for the 4th of July, Boscobel Park above the Hudson, across from West Point. The orator, who in a piece of Copeland is to recite passages about Abraham Lincoln, practices them during sound check. The conductor hurries across the lawn to the stage, shouting tell me your phone number so the orator doesn’t give away the words to be spoken later. We imagine the orator reciting his phone number in concert. That would have been something.

Concert in the course of which LED lights are switched on above the music stands, frogs start croaking and crickets chirping.