one of my favorite places to go is Ashland Oregon.  it is a small town (20,000 pop.) near the southern Oregon border with California, nestled next to the Siskiyou Mountain range.  but what makes Ashland particularly appealing to me is its live theater.  it is the home of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF).  pre Covid, it seemed like almost every night of the year, you could count on one or two live performances at one of their three stages.

i have been going to Ashland at least twice a year for 15 years, embracing, soaking in and reveling in its live theater.

this year, because of Covid, things are a little different. the OSF is only beginning to bring back live performances.  at most, one performance a night during the coming holiday season.

however, this summer OSF initiated a concert series once a week on Wednesdays.

here is the picture on their website encouraging people to sign up for the concert.  i thought to myself, it is not live theater that i always want, but it is better than nothing.  sign me up.

a week ago i was in Ashland.  i received an email just a few hours before the concert saying that the concert start time has been pushed back from 8pm to 8:30pm.  unusual i say to myself, but no problem.

when i arrive for the concert i notice that others are walking in with gloves on, wearing wool watch caps, and carrying blankets.  i don’t think anything of it at the time.  when i get to my seat, i suddenly realize that — oh my gosh — the theater is outdoors.  i forgot that the theater is outdoors.  OMG.  and it is cold, really cold at 8:30 at night in early October.

i start to hunker down.  i cross my legs. i put my hands in my pockets.  i put my chin down on my chest. i start to turn sideways in my seat, sort of crunching to try to generate some heat.  all to no avail.  i am really cold and the concert hasn’t even started.

i don’t know exactly what to expect in the concert, but i am assuming that 4 or 5 musicians will walk out on the stage and start to play some songs.  something like what the picture shows.

but no.  instead i hear some piped in music.  i keep looking for real musicians playing instruments, but i can’t find any.

then, a man appears on stage moving to the music, doing what i call lyrical dancing. not quite ballet, but just moving with the music.  he begins to move his arms and hands.  almost as if he is signing.  eventually, a woman sitting in front of me next to the stage starts talking into a microphone telling the audience what he is saying.  she is interpreting for him.  he tells us through his interpreter that he is deaf.

he continues to move/dance to the music.  he begins to use sign language to tell us about the number of deaf people in prison.  he says that we don’t really have a good count of the number of deaf people in prison in the United States.

at this point five women come on stage dressed in prison-like fatigues.  they also do some choreographed lyrical moves, dancing to the background music.  they do not sing or talk.  they move to the music.  when they depart the stage the man once again begins to move to the music, using his arms and hands to communicate with his interpreter.

the interpreter begins to tell us that deaf people in prison do not receive equal treatment because there are so few interpreters available in prisons.

meanwhile yours truly is squirming in my seat.  i am so cold.  i also cannot believe what i am witnessing.  where is the concert?

don’t get me wrong. i am all in favor of deaf people, signing, and equal rights for deaf people in prisons.  however, i thought i was coming to a concert.  and one that was in an indoor theater. boy o’boy.

i begin to look around to see if there is some way i can quietly and unobtrusively sneak out of the theater.  but i am stuck.  my seat is in the middle of the front row of the theater.  i am as close to the stage as one can get, and right in the middle.  i am stuck.

oh my God.  deaf people in prisons.  freezing my rear end off.  deaf people in prisons.  freezing my rear end off.  deaf peo…

eventually the performance ends, and i luckily find a bar still open that has a hot tea to try to warm me up.

i am still saying to myself, what the heck happened?  the fact that the theater was outdoors is my fault for not paying attention to the announcement.  but the fact that the performance was so far from what i had expected the “concert” to be, still stuns me.

so, i went back and reread the concert announcement, thinking that maybe i did not read the small print.  but no.  the only thing in the announcement of the concert is this picture.