A portion of New York City’s borough of Manhattan experienced a massive electricity blackout on Saturday, impacting the city’s usual nonstop flow of energy in addition to affecting concerts at venues located along 30 blocks from Times Square to the island’s Upper West Side.
One of the events scheduled to take place at the time of the blackouts which began around 7 p.m. local time on Saturday was that of the Millennial Choirs & Orchestra, which was scheduled to perform at Carnegie Hall prior to the city’s mass electrical outage. As the sun began to set on what was a hot summer day in New York City on Saturday evening, members of the choir took to the streets to deliver their performance on the sidewalk along West 57th Street, sans electricity.
New York City residents who took to the streets following the midtown Manhattan were treated to the pop-up outdoor performance. While the moment must have felt somewhat surreal and exciting at the same time, those who stopped to watch the sidewalk performance were reminded of the seriousness of the situation when the FDNY showed up at the same time to rescue people stuck in the elevators in Carnegie Hall.
“As you may have heard, we were not able to perform our final concert at Carnegie Hall this evening due to a widespread blackout which affected a large part of Manhattan for several hours,” the choir shared in a statement posted on Instagram on Saturday evening. “In true MCO fashion, we made the best of the unfortunate situation and performed some of our pieces outside for passersby to enjoy during the stressful time.”
Watch parts of the performance captured in the fan-shot videos below.
I guess this is what they call a New York moment. After being trapped on the F for an hour because of the power outage I emerged to see dark restaurants & traffic lights, civilians directing traffic, & an evacuated Carnegie Hall concert happening in the street. #nyc #Blackout pic.twitter.com/3p9UWtRrel
— Briallen Hopper (@briallenhopper) July 14, 2019
Now this is what turning lemons into lemonade is all about! We can hear singing from the streets below…the entire @carnegiehall choir including conductor are putting on an impromptu concert by singing outside during the blackout! #NYCBlackout #BeautifulSoundsDuringBlackout pic.twitter.com/ll5ocnGYvc
— Caryn Ross (@SuperSassyMama) July 14, 2019
Manhattan Power Outage MIllenial Choir and Orchestra impromptu concert out on the street #blackout pic.twitter.com/rsDS7cjh8z
— Matthew Anderson (@manderson1978) July 14, 2019
A power outage in New York, but it couldn’t stop the Millennial Choirs and Orchestras, creating a makeshift stage right outside Carnegie Hall. #nycblackout pic.twitter.com/fPQJzvTS1t
— Ravi Agrawal (@RaviReports) July 14, 2019
View this post on Instagram
View this post on Instagram
The Millennial Choir wasn’t the only group of performers to take their shows to the streets following the blackout. The casts of Broadway shows like Hadestown, Come From Away, and Waitress also made their way onto the sidewalk to perform some songs after the blackouts forced evening performances to be canceled.
[H/TÂ Gothamist]