Last week I had meant to account of my misadventure in San Francisco but after a late arrival back on Monday night I let it slip from my memory until now. Last Monday night my wife and I headed up to the city for the Dear Friends music from Final Fantasy concert. I had been eagerly awaiting this concert since the announcement of the Chicago and San Francisco dates. Fortunately I was able to secure 2 tickets for the lower floor @ $65 each plus a $5 service charge on each ticket. Pricey, but worth it.
Being that the concert was being held at the Nob Hill Masonic Center I expected parking to be troublesome, but not a nightmare. Unfortunately we got somewhat of a late start up to Frisco and arrived just before 7pm giving us just over 30 minutes to find a parking spot and get to the center. In hindsight I really wish we had left earlier as once we got near the Masonic Center traffic became an absolute disaster.
Driving around San Francisco is always a nightmare, but when there’s hundreds of people driving around trying to frantically find a parking spot in addition to you, things get ugly. We ended up driving around, up hills and down hills for a good 30 minutes around the general vacinity without finding a single parking spot. Lots were full, legal and illegal parking spots on the streets were taken. I got extremely frustrated and just as I was about to give up, we located a parking lot about 10 minutes away.
Clockwise (from left to right): Nob Hill Masonic Center Stage,
Nobuo Uematsu having fun with the crowd, Obligatory bad cosplay.
We ended up missing the first piece, Liberi Fatali, but I was thankful that we had made good on the tickets and were seated during the break for the formal introductions. Symphony Silicon Valley performed Uematsu’s arrangements with the help of the San Jose State University Chorale for Liberi Fatali and One Winged Angel. The only disappointments of this beautiful concert were that of the emcee (some blonde Sacramento King’s coorespondent) and the FFXI piece chosen was from Ronafare. (No Bastokian love?)
Overall I was very pleased with the concert and would recommend that anyone with the means to go to a future Uematsu concert do so. Nobuo mentioned that he would love to do more concerts in the United States. I know that if another concert is planned within an hour or two of where I live, I’d go again.
