SC - Feast entertainment

[Lee-Gwen Booth]

Linda Peterson wrote:
> 
> Size of the group may have an effect on this. At a feast of 3-4 hundred,
> even when people are trying to be quiet, the performer (stationed by the
> head table) is often completely inaudible in the back of the room. Which
> brings up a pet peeve of mine! Given a rectangular room, as most of our
> halls around here are, why do we put the head table across one of the
> narrower walls? A head table place in the center along one of the long
> walls would allow for much better visual and auditory arrangement of the
> event.
> Mirhaxa

Um, er, uh, why don't we?

I suspect that we are set in our ways and think that the high table at
one narrow end is more aesthetically pleasing or even more 'period',
when it its neither. It is what we are used to and we will make up
retroactive reasi\ons for doing it that way...

However, it does bring me to a more cultural point, and one of my pet
peeves. The entertainer, as I understand from period romances, accounts
of feasts, etc, is playing *primarily for those at the high table*. If
others in the hall happen to hear them, that's nice too. With our
knee-jerk desire to be democratic and inclusive, we tend to forget
things like this. How many times have you seen someone perform *with
their backs to the high table*? They wouldn't have been invited back to
Arthur's hall, I'll tell you that.

A halfway solution? My idea is two-fold: First, have 'mood music'
musicians, perhaps to one side or the other of the dais, to provide a
background for the diners. Second, provide a time- perhaps between
courses if it is a bit of a wait, or at the end of the feast, for the
high table to hold an 'audience', and then to receive performers. The
performers should play to the high table, but may try to do so in such a
way that the rest of the hall can hear. People may want to rise from
their seats at table and come closer to hear. Not a formal court, simply
'receiving' in the old way of the term. Who knows- it might work...

'Lainie
her last day as queen and bound to enjoy it!