This isn't PLS1, but his wife, EMM4 (don't have my own log-in yet, as this is my first post).
In 30 years of concert-going, it's gotten worse. At CSO concerts in the 70's it wasn't too bad, even in the winter, but we sat in the Gallery (best acoustics) and Solti and the boys were so loud one couldn't hear the coughers anyway. Plus the little old Viennese widow next to us (we had her late husband's seat) handed out cough drops and hissed at offenders, so our section was pretty well behaved.
These days at SF symphony concerts, the coughing problem is as you all have noted, outrageous, almost as bad as the movies. And the audience is remarkably stupid about when to applaud (please, folks, not between movements, and let the pppp die away before leaping to your feet). But the orchestra is a bunch of slackers and the acuostics suck anyway, so it's just a further annoyance.
On the other hand, opera audiences in SF, at least in the Orchestra section this season, are quite well behaved (but I nearly died last season stifling a cough that started at the opening notes of Vissa d'arte; I had tears in my eyes throughout the aria, although not from the performance.) Lesson is, one can stifle even the worst cough if willing to give all for Art.
Back in Chicago, we once had box mates at the Lyric who were impossible (coughing, talking, snoring, etc.) Finally, we and the other couple in the box campaigned to drive them out, an effort which involved, among other things, glaring, hissing and even hitting them with rolled-up programs. The last straw was during Rheingold, when the offending husband whispered sotto (not very) voce to his wife, "that's the Tarnhelm", whereupon all 4 of us turned around and hissed, "No shit!". They did not renew the next season.
In 30 years of concert-going, it's gotten worse. At CSO concerts in the 70's it wasn't too bad, even in the winter, but we sat in the Gallery (best acoustics) and Solti and the boys were so loud one couldn't hear the coughers anyway. Plus the little old Viennese widow next to us (we had her late husband's seat) handed out cough drops and hissed at offenders, so our section was pretty well behaved.
These days at SF symphony concerts, the coughing problem is as you all have noted, outrageous, almost as bad as the movies. And the audience is remarkably stupid about when to applaud (please, folks, not between movements, and let the pppp die away before leaping to your feet). But the orchestra is a bunch of slackers and the acuostics suck anyway, so it's just a further annoyance.
On the other hand, opera audiences in SF, at least in the Orchestra section this season, are quite well behaved (but I nearly died last season stifling a cough that started at the opening notes of Vissa d'arte; I had tears in my eyes throughout the aria, although not from the performance.) Lesson is, one can stifle even the worst cough if willing to give all for Art.
Back in Chicago, we once had box mates at the Lyric who were impossible (coughing, talking, snoring, etc.) Finally, we and the other couple in the box campaigned to drive them out, an effort which involved, among other things, glaring, hissing and even hitting them with rolled-up programs. The last straw was during Rheingold, when the offending husband whispered sotto (not very) voce to his wife, "that's the Tarnhelm", whereupon all 4 of us turned around and hissed, "No shit!". They did not renew the next season.