caracolina

For the last two years we have attended the lumaria nights at the Botanical Garden and loved them. We would stroll through the park and enjoy all those different musical groups, most of them acoustic. There were people playing banjo, viola, guitar, American Indian flute, harp, a gospel group, a handbell choir, a barbershop quartet (our favorite), and a jazz band (the only act with electric amplification).

We bought our tickets for tonight long ago, looking forward to reliving another evening of seasonal joy, no matter that the prices were raised noticably over last year (from about $16 to $25 per person). So it wouldn’t be much of a surprise that we were shocked to find that most of the performers we new and loved were not in the park this year. Instead of most of the acoustic performers they had brought on 3 jazz type bands and a flamenco guitar player, all with electric amps, so that all could be heard simultaneously from the center of the park. Gone was the barbershop quartet, the cowboy singer, the gospel group. Only the handbell choir remained to serve holiday cheer. We were so disappointed! No fans of modern jazz we felt alienated by the overpoweringly loud music. After only twenty minutes I let John talk me into going back to the entrance to find someone to complain to. He talked to a very friendly and professional woman who basically told us that since this was an anniversary year they thought they’d try something different and it was only natural that some regular visitors would be turned off by it. Amazingly, she agreed to give us a refund, which was nice since the tickets were so expensive. We still love the park (we’ve been members on and off over the last years), but I don’t think we’ll bother coming back for luminaria nights.