The smell of seaweed at Powell Symphony Hall

Guest master percussionist Colin Currie (sketched rudely by me on the xylaphones Friday morning at Powell Symphony Hall), staff SLSO percussionist John Stubbs (sketched playing cymbals), musical director David Robertson and the rest of the Saint Louis Symphony conclude their "Currie x3" program at 3 p.m. today (Sunday) at Powell.

Currie has been playing lead in a different percussion-rich piece per day throughout this three-day stand. I sketched him Friday morning playing Steven Mackey's "Time Release," missed him yesterday playing the U.S. premiere of HK Gruber's "Rough Music" and, alas, will miss him today playing Christopher Rouse's "Der gerettete Alberich."

All three programs open with "The Abduction" from "The Seraglio Overture" by a no-name named Mozart and close with "Symphony No. 7" by this new kid Beethoven.

The Mozart Overture, with a storyline dealing in the white slave trade and set in Turkey, has a title that tickled my ear until this morning I remembered why. The Seraglio Point is an image in an Orhan Veli poem that I co-translated from the Turkish with Defne Halman:

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HAIKU

The smell of seaweed
At the Seraglio Point
And a plate of shrimp

- Orhan Veli