Piano Concerto no 3 in C minor, Opus 37 – Beethoven
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Category: music to ponder
September 23, 2019
Piano Concerto no 2, opus 19 – Beethoven
“Allegro con brio, Bourke St. West“ (1890)
Tom Roberts
________
a concerto is a movie, but for the ears,
one listens, rather than looks, for one’s
information
quite specifically, Beethoven introduces
drama into his inventions, where earlier
there’d been merely an invitation to the
dance, minuets, for instance, gigues, or
disparate, disorganized, appeals,
otherwise, to our more interior, whether
secular or mystical, emotions, see in
this context, for instance, early adagios,
heart-wrenching, melting often, odes
these, or the even slower largos, fit
neatly, however, into Beethoven’s
compositional scheme of things,
between the introductory allegros,
often con brio, and the closing,
and equally spirited rondos, by
becoming the pivotal element in
his intended musical evening, the
core of his narrative presentation,
the plangent centre of his three
part play, film
here’s his Second
listen
R ! chard
September 21, 2019
Piano Concerto no 1, opus 15 – Beethoven
Al Jolson, in “The Jazz Singer” (1927)
_________________
in order to abate my discomfort, my
consternation, after meeting up with
one of the candidates I considered
favouring in the upcoming election,
I put on Beethoven’s First, which,
incontrovertibly, from the first few
notes, did the trick, took me out of
politics and the uncomfortable
present, into metaphysical
pertinence, and magic
I’d referred to the issue of blackface,
a searing issue at present in the
media, I said, what about Laurence
Olivier doing Othello, Placido
Domingo doing the very same Moor,
not to mention Al Jolson doing,
unforgettably, “My Mammy“
but picked up that neither the
candidate, nor his mentor, standing
by his side, had any idea what I was
talking about
Placido Domingo, I said, one of The
Three Tenors, remember them
the aspiring representative indicated
a dim recollection, his accompanist
admitted to having nebulously heard
of him, them, somewhere
OMGess, I reared, I’m talking to the
next generation, maybe even the
generation after that, who have no
recollection, no understanding of
where I come from, it was, to say
the least, unsettling, discomfitting,
sobering
there was no one at home with whom
to commiserate when I arrived,
answering machines only at the end
of every line, I resorted, therefore,
not unwisely as it turned out, to the
said Beethoven, who was, as usual,
a lifesaver
listen
R ! chard
September 15, 2019
“The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross” – Joseph Haydn
“Lord´s Crucifixion“ (1990)
George Stefanescu
____________
my sister is not well, her situation,
though blessed throughout with
grace, is dire, in such moments I
turn to music for consolation, for
courage, and for a serene
acquiescence to whatever might
be the outcome, the hour that I
spend thus with her becomes in
that light a meditation, a mass,
a private prayer
I’ve lit a trinity of candles in her
honour, one nearby for our dad,
gone these already thirty years,
on something of an altar I’ve
fashioned, however all the while
unconsciously, about my
fireplace, by their flickering
silence, I find a place for
solemn contemplation
“The Seven Last Words of Our
Saviour on the Cross“ is to my
mind Haydn’s greatest
masterpiece, its subject is
self-explanatory, but you might
want to read again here what I
wrote about it earlier for
greater context
it is sung in the Oratorio de la
Santa Cueva, the Oratory of
the Holy Cave, in Cádiz, Spain,
for which it had been originally
composed
it is transcendent
R ! chard
September 1, 2019
Symphony no 7 – Anton Bruckner
“Cathedral“ (1991)
George Stefanescu
_________
it’s funny, upon the imminent demise
of my only sister, I chose to listen to,
instinctively, for solace, Bruckner’s
Symphony no 7, lighting candles,
everywhere in my apartment, at
dusk, like settings, for my somber
reveries
listen, you might understand why
Bruckner was a profoundly Catholic
composer, composing liturgical
works expressive of his profound
beliefs, fit, aurally, for, indeed,
cathedrals, ceremonial, arresting
his 7th, grand and utterly convincing,
is not an ineffective consolation, is
not an easily disregarded promise
of something, however ephemerally
manifested, beyond the meagre
aspirations of merely faith
and which finally produces an epiphany,
a human understanding, that just being,
just responding to our condition, within
the confines of our station, is,
eventually, nothing short of grace
art, in other words, is praying
R ! chard
August 14, 2019
rhapsodies – Gershwin / Rachmaninov
“Rhapsody“ (1958)
Hans Hofmann
_________
if a sonata is a piece of music with more
than one section, by definition a rhapsody
is not a sonata, a rhapsody has only one
section, only one movement, all that is
required, therefore, essentially, of a
rhapsody, is that it be – a subjunctive
here, incidentally, the mood of aspiration,
high hopes, ideals – that it be, I reiterate,
rhapsodic
in the spirit of juxtaposition, here are two
rhapsodies, the first, George Gershwin’s
“Rhapsody in Blue“, the other
Rachmaninov’s, his “Rhapsody on a
Theme of Paganini“
how are they different, you tell me
I’ll just point out that the one seems, to
my ears, steeped still in the Romantic
Period, the early 19th Century, despite
its publishing date, 1934, the other,
earlier, composition, 1924, sounds like
full blown, in comparison, 20th Century
America, the future
Old Europe, in other words, meets the
New World, however chronologically
counterintuitively
listen, you can hear all of it, both are,
either era, extraordinary, time is what
eventually tells
R ! chard
August 10, 2019
Sonata no 14 in C minor, K457 – Mozart
“Dinner at the Ball“ (1879)
Edgar Degas
_________
a formal dinner among family and friends
has traditionally consisted of a salad,
followed by a main course, then by
dessert, all of this by convention, it is not
forbidden to serve dessert first, just highly
unusual, and noticeably disconcerting
these primary courses have since evolved,
in more elegant places, to include an
appetizer, either added, or to replace the
salad, and cheese can do the same for
dessert, so that five services can now
outpace the original three
different cultural settings may change
somewhat the above order, some
Europeans, for instance, have their
salad after the main course, but in
general, this sequence is fixed
you can say the same for the sonata,
and all its derivatives
a sonata was originally served in three
courses, called movements, the first
sprightly, the second, in contrast, more
somber, contemplative, probing, the last
jovial again upon imminent farewells, for
the same reasons that applied to formal
dinners, to express opulence,
magnanimity, and variety of invention,
which is to say, power, and eventually,
cultural influence
here’s Mozart’s Sonata no 14 in C minor,
K457, in three movements, auditory,
rather than gustatory, courses, where
our era’s musical parameters, their order
of presentation, for better or for worse,
all began
listen
R ! chard
August 3, 2019
a degustation
“Lemons“ (1929)
___________
watching one of my cooking competition
shows on television the other day, the
twelve contestants were called upon in
pairs to create, each couple, one of the
six elements in a degustation menu
a degustation menu – I raised an eyebrow
at that one – is the same as a tasting menu,
but at a finer, it is implied, restaurant
the theme was citrus fruit, each service
had to highlight one of them, a mandarin,
a lemon, an orange, a lime, a tangelo,
a grapefruit, in that order
my goodness, I thought, a set of
variations on edibles, I was delighted,
not to mention synesthetically
titillated, all my senses were alive
the first course was a mandarin-cured
prawn ceviche, with pesto, something
to tease one’s palate, leaving plenty of
room, however, for what was to follow,
the second course, an equally light
lemon-cured salmon with smoked
crème fraîche and decorative
translucent radish slices, in again but
polite allotments
the third service introduces the protein,
duck with the nearly ever requisite
orange, but with beets, in this instance,
on an underlying sheen of all their
accumulated and colourful juices,
bread, I would imagine, would’ve been
gluttonously required
beef then followed, to fill the second
of the more substantial and filling
elements of the meal, with a lime
reduction and beets
for dessert, the fifth service presented
a tangelo cup with a surprise chocolate
truffle meant to burst in one’s mouth
with iced tangelo flavour, refreshing
and unexpectedly delightful, followed
by a grapefruit sorbet with chocolate
ganache and meringue shards as a
finale
not all contestants reached the heights
wished for, but some were memorable,
much as in any set of, even noteworthy,
variations
here’s Glenn Gould playing Beethoven’s
Six Variations in F major, Opus 34, each
variation is comparable to a culinary
experience, but for piano
listen, compare
these are preceded here by a late, and
haunting, Beethoven bagatelle, his
Opus 126, however, after which the
variations themselves are conveniently
spliced in the editing process to help
distinguish each movement from the
other
Glenn Gould doesn’t hit a note wrong,
but I think Beethoven’s introductory
aria, upon which the variations are
built, and which is repeated at the end
after a coda, or final interpolated wave,
is slow, a more engaging opening
would’ve been, to my mind, more
effective
I also would’ve, however peripherally,
degusted especially the lime beef
R ! chard
psst: incidentally, all Bach’s Cello Suites
are in six segments, their common
theme is dance, each one is a
scintillating Baroque example
July 20, 2019
Concerto for Keyboard / Violin, BWV 1052 – Bach
“The Nightwatch“ (1642)
Rembrandt
_____
for Barbara, who dutifully
kicked me in the psyche
there is apparent discussion about whether
the BWV 1052 of Bach was first a keyboard
or a violin, concerto, I’ve only known it as a
keyboard concerto till now, when looking
for it for a friend, I happened upon this
recently published rendering of an event
that took place at the Rijksmuseum in
Amsterdam in front of the very
“Nightwatch” of Rembrandt, historical
epochs coming iconically together
which is why, incidentally, I love Europe,
Disneyland for adults, where epochal
periods come together like fantasies,
tossing back at us their manifest, their
multifarious, and mythic glories
what do you think, which came first, the
chicken or the egg, the keyboard or the
violin
I think, however prejudicially, the
keyboard, but what do I know
enjoy either, they’re both riveting
R ! chard
psst: note how the painted faces and the real
faces in the violin version look alike,
Rembrandt‘s genius
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