Mahler Melee in Malmo!

Mahler Melee in Malmo!

Music can certainly stir the emotions of musicians and listeners, but it’s rare to experience the kind of reactions that all too commonly happen with soccer matches and other sporting events around the world. I’m talking about brawls and scuffles that routinely break out before, during, and after sporting events. But every once in a while….

Late last year at a classical music performance in Malmo, Sweden, during a performance of Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 5 by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, it was reported that an audience member became enraged at the distracting sound caused by the unwrapping of a piece of gum by a woman sitting next to him. Apparently, it was at a particularly quiet moment in the performance, and the crackling gum wrapper was excruciatingly noisy. So much so, the young man snatched the gum from the woman’s hand and threw it on the floor. If this were to occur at a football match or hockey game, the two probably would have come to blows immediately (of course, opening a gum wrapper at a hockey game probably wouldn’t be noticed, but I digress).

All parties remained calm until the performance concluded, nearly an hour after the gum debacle happened. According to witnesses, as soon as the music stopped, the woman turned to the gentleman and slapped him in the face, sending his glasses flying. The not-so-gentlemanly gentleman promptly began scuffling with the woman, which prompted the woman’s male partner to begin throwing punches. It’s not clear how it all ended, but probably cooler heads in the audience helped to separate the brawlers.

Sometime after the event, the concert hall, Malmo Live, posted a reminder to patrons on proper etiquette while enjoying performances of classical music…something like, “rattling into a bag of chips is not going to endear you to fellow concert-goers,” and “fisticuffs is never appropriate at our concerts.”

Maybe this could be a theme at a future concert – “Flowers not fists,” or “Mahler not Maulers.” Just a thought.