I once met the South African opera composer Neo Muyanga, who told me that he can listen to the first sixteen bars of any opera and know the system and framework of the rest of it—and, therefore, whether he’s going to like it. “The opening bars inevitably set up a paradigm using elements such as volume, meter, and progression to invite a listener to eschew their mundane world for a time and to plunge down the rabbit hole into an alternate universe,” he said. As he spoke, I realized that gatherings work in much the same way. The opening, whether intentionally designed or not, signals to guests
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