Last night Glenn and I attended a celebration for the Tenth anniversary of the Toulouse School of Economics. It was held here in Paris, at the Banque de France headquarters, and it was a very lovely evening. We heard four TED-talk-like research reports from four young faculty. (We got somewhat more out of the two of them that were delivered in English.) We also we able to catch up with various friends and acquaintances on the TSE faculty, most particularly Jean Tirole and his wife Nathalie, whom we have known for almost 30 years.
The food was elegant and delicious, the wine and champagne were very nice, but the highlight was a recital by Rafael Pradal. He is a pianist from Toulouse whose repertoire and style borrow liberally from southern Spain and Latin America, especially flamenco. One piece, tango-inspired, involved vigorous toe-tapping and even reaching into the piano with his left hand to manually dampen strings while he was playing. It was a fortunate coincidence (or perhaps entirely intentional) that the recital took place in a part of the bank with mirrored ceilings, which allowed us a great vantage from above to watch the playing and the inner workings of the piano in addition to the normal view from the front.
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| Rafael and the inside of his piano |
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| The crowd shuffling out |
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