Longrain is a short trot away from the Sydney CBD, and it's well worth the journey. Its long shape dining room is matched by long rectangular tables and benches with a long bar and seating area. When I walked in, I was surrounded by the smell of decent Asian cooking.
Recognising my singularity, the waiting staff helpfully recommended a few dishes for me to sample - deep friend soft shell crab on a bed of green papaya, slow roast beef shin and diced prawns on bental leaves. The Red Dragon cocktail (chili, coriander, cranberry juice, vodka) went very well with the whole meal. I finished it off with a scoop of their very aromatic coconut sorbet.
Those of us London-centric folks easily forget there are great concert halls in other parts of the world. I remember as a young kid buying DG LPs with von Karajan on the front cover conducting the Berlin Philharmonic. So as my first visit to the city, a visit to the Philharmonie to listen to the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra was a must. Ivan Fisher started the evening's concert with Haydn Symphony 88. A light and delightful work. As I'd expected, the acoustic of the hall was amazing - probably a good 2.5 second of reverberation - and much more generous than the Royal Festival Hall in London. The strings sounded sweet and the timpani came through clearly with definition. The audience was then treated to Béla Bartók's Seven Pieces for Choir and Chamber Orchestra: the Berlin Phil reduced in size occupying only half of the stage while the Netherlands Youth Choir took the other half. These young performers (all female) sang in Hungarian from memory - not easy at all - and rea...
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