Ringtone Halts New York Philharmonic Mid-Song

A performance of the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center was halted for the first time ever, a record broken due to a ringing cell phone. During the final movements of Gustav Mahler’s Ninth Symphony Tuesday night, the music was brought to a dramatic halt by Maestro Alan Gilbert when a cell phone kept ringing with the distinctive sound of iPhone’s “Marimba” ringtone. The ringing phone in the first row could be heard throughout the Center’s Avery Fisher Hall each time the symphony came to a quiet moment in the performance. Maestro Gilbert turned his head to signal to the offending audience member that that was enough. Gilbert finally turned to the audience and asked that the culprit, said to be a male and a regular Philharmonic attendee, quiet his phone. Gilbert finally stopped the orchestra mid-song until it happened, and resumed the concert’s grand finale only after he received confirmation that it would not happen again. Gilbert was greeted with thunderous applause by the rest of the audience, which had earlier booed the man to silence the phone.