The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 have not destroyed the spirit of Bargemusic, a popular New York chamber music series, held on a barge in Brooklyn's East River.

        Part of Bargemusic's charm is its panoramic view of the lower Manhattan skyline, a view now altered forever. But Bargemusic's founder, Olga Bloom, says the series will go on, and “the birds still fly by” in front of the New York skyline.

IF YOU GO

What: Bargemusic, the Cincinnati Chamber Music Society    When: 8 p.m. Tuesday Where: Corbett Auditorium, University of Cincinnati    Tickets: $20; $7 students (free to CCM students). 533-0451 or 556-4183.    Players and program: William Purvis, horn; Toby Hoffman, viola; Peter Nagy, piano; Nathaniel Rosen, cello; Mark Peskanov and Kurt Nikkanen, violins, in Ligeti, Trio for Horn, Violin and Piano; Schumann, Piano Quintet in E-flat Major, Op. 44, and more.

        Bargemusic opens the Cincinnati Chamber Music Society season Tuesday in Corbett Auditorium. It is their first concert outside of New York.

        Like the New Yorkers who are carrying on despite unspeakable tragedy, the staunch founder of Bargemusic and her musicians persevere.

        “I'm sad to say I saw the whole (attack),” says Ms. Bloom, 82, who started the series in 1977. “I'm filled with sadness to this day, and I think the sadness will remain for the rest of my life.”

        After Sept. 11, the series took a severe blow in attendance. People simply could not get to the converted barge, moored just under the Brooklyn Bridge. Parts of New York's subway system, bridges and tunnels are still shut down.

        Gradually, she says, the audience has returned to hear chamber music, played four times a week year round, on the water. There's a certain comraderie, a “contagion of spirit,” that brings people to the floating 125-seat concert hall.

        “They feel that this is not a place where they compete for their station in life. They come to hear the music,” she says.

        It's both intimate and informal. When a tugboat chugs by, sheet music has been known to fly off stands; pianos to roll. Perhaps it is Ms. Bloom's homey touches — she personally greets concertgoers and there's a buffet of homemade goodies — that attract Wall Street tycoons, international visitors from the United Nations and the locals she knows by name.

        Or perhaps it's the caliber of the musicians, a kaleidoscope of 400 professionals playing everything from Beethoven to Ligeti.

        Ms. Bloom credits the players for Bargemusic's success.

        “They have come to realize that the idea is worth the endorsement of their presence,” she says, with a grandmotherly chuckle.

        But it is Ms. Bloom who is the brains. A violinist who once played in Leopold Stokowski's American Symphony Orchestra, she bought the barge for $10,000 after she was widowed in the '70s.Her idea, she says, was to bring chamber music to the masses — through nature.

        “Especially in the cities, there's a need for the solace of the river, or the sky, or a bird flying by. So, I thought that this alliance would be effective,” she says.

        Her first board members were the dean of the Juilliard School of Music — and the man who sold her the barge. The first performers were Juilliard students. As the idea caught on, professional musicians became the headliners.

        “We have now evolved to a place where we don't have one music director: we have seven,” Ms. Bloom says. “They have full control over what is to be played and who is to play.”

        If the barge and the skyline and the water are so integral to the experience — why tour?

        “Just to spread the idea,” she says. “To make the profundity and the beauty of music more commonly known.

        “We mustn't underestimate the power of emotion. It's not visible, but it's always felt. I think those who come to a concert, and those who give it, are very generous people.

        “(The musicians) are going to Cincinnati with their hearts full.”
       

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