Steve Lester’s review (in the July 10 issue of the Lake Placid News) was anything but a thoughtful critique of the music or performance of the Lake Placid Sinfonietta on Sunday, July 5. Rather it was a kind of contemptuous outpouring centered on his cat who aroused him the previous night by vomiting at his bedside. Though some of us may feel sympathy for the cat’s medical problems, to connect with them the Sunday night concert is both absurd and degrading.

As for the reviewer’s gratuitous comments on the “monastic little worlds” of the attenders at such concerts, including presumably himself, it should be pointed out that such a group may be much smaller than he thinks. That this review was apparently read and approved for publication by someone with responsibility is deeply disappointing for obvious reasons. It did not help the music. It did not help the Sinfonietta. And it certainly did not help the Lake Placid News.

Fred Calder

Lake Placid