Attending a Lecture by My Favorite Teacher

Alan's Italy Show # 83 focussed on the beautiful and historical Orvieto Cathedral. Of course I could never actually give such historical and artistic perspective without the assistance of my friend, Ric Hirst. We have planned several shows in which he is the featured guest "lecturer" covering a wide variety of amazing topics including the Orvieto Cathedral, the Baptistery of Florence, the long forgotten but remarkable Ancient Roman town of Carsulae in Central Italy among other possibilities. Ric himself settled on this beginning, and it was obvious that his knowledge is just astounding !! Although he had many pages of notes, everything had been memorized already, so he just wheeled through the history and art crisply, and efficiently. His lecture was just mesmerizing, with the added plus of my being able to query him throughout the broadcast. At first he was afraid that the presentation was going to be too esoteric, but I assured him that since most of the time my broadcasts are fun jaunts through famous towns and cities in Italy with a variety of video interviews, that an occasional show with a narrow, but interesting focus is perfect. I want my show to occasionally present the viewer with a significant small window upon the artistic geniuses that have made Italy one of the world's great treasures. I told him that since I have been working in NYC, I have been unable to attend lectures at Bard College, so this will be the appropriate replacement. Meanwhile, if the viewer really would like to know how such a monumental cathedral such as the one in Orvieto came about, then this is the show for them. Ric starts with the inception of the idea of the cathedral, and all the events leading up to its completion with stunning detail of the machinations and personalities that create masterpieces of architecture. Weaving through the centuries leading up to the incredible fact that the cathedral was still being modified as late as the 1970's when the bronze doors were installed ! Thus a project which started in the 13th century continued for the next seven centuries !!!! Amazing !!!!

The broadcast was not without the usual trepidation. In this case at times Ellen had a few problems which, of course, she verbalizes as she goes along only to then state, "OK, there it is." The only obvious flaw in the Youtube video that you might see is that during the final montage of credits and photos, there is a sudden and very abrupt ending right in the middle of the music after about only 15 seconds, leaving out a number of beautiful images as a final statement of the excellence of the Orvieto Cathedral. So the perfect show it wasn't in that regard, but every minute of Ric's marvelous presentation is right there to gobble up any time anyone wishes, so please do enjoy !!!