Crowd Surfing To Classical

David Glowacki was in attendance at the concert when Bristol artistic director Tom Morris invited the audience to “clap and whoop” in the standing area in front of the stage, according to the Independent.

Glowacki took things a step further, and reportedly raised his arms, began whooping and lurching from side to side, then attempted to crowd surf before he was physically ejected from the area.

“Classical music, trying to seem cool and less stuffy, reeks of some sort of fossilised art form undergoing a midlife crisis,” Glowacki told the paper. “Witness what happened to me when I started cheering with a 30-strong chorus shouting ‘praise God’ two metres from my face: I get physically assaulted, knocked down to the floor and forcibly dragged out by two classical vigilantes,” he said. “You’re free to behave as you like, and it’s comforting to think that you have that freedom, but it’s only available to you so long as you behave correctly.”

Morris responded that while the Bristol Proms concert series is helping to “pave the way for a new kind of classical concert,” crowd surfing will not be tolerated.

“David was investigating what the nature of the rules are using the skills that make him an extraordinary scientist – and for some in the audience, a slightly irritating one,” he told the paper.