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Brahmsian Coda

Brahmsian Coda

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The skies were stormy and the air was leaden, but the legs needed to be moving and the W&OD was right there. So on the way home from work yesterday I slipped off my jacket and necklace, laced up my running shoes and took to the trail.

The music was beside the point when I started. I knew that movement alone would work its magic. So I let my little iPod do its own thing. And what it did was play Brahms.

He’s my man, of course, but I don’t turn to him like I used to. He is a bit, well, heavy. And you have to be in the mood for him. But I was, and he delivered.

It was the last movement of the First Symphony, which my high school youth orchestra played the year I joined. Brahms is not easy, especially when you’ve only just taken up the string bass. My stand partner wrote “a la fakando” beside the notes of one especially difficult run. Let’s just say I did little for that piece but provide a low hum.

But being part of an orchestra that could play such music was enough to explode my adolescent brain. And now, when I listen to Brahms, those early memories of music-making create a powerful listening experience. I was lucky that the final moments of listening happened in the car, after the walk was over. There I could air conduct to my heart’s content.

It was a very good walk, with a perfectly Brahmsian coda.

Rain Song

Rain Song

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The rain began before I woke up. I knew it was coming, but I didn’t think it would sing to me. A pitter-patter, yes. But not this other sound, this low ping. It’s as if someone is tuning a cello or plucking a piano string.

And it has a steady and distinct pitch, too. I hum it, walk over to the piano. Could it be an A? Always a good first try; a million tuning orchestras can’t be wrong.

But no, it’s not an A, or a C or an F. Better try some black keys. And there it is — a B flat — or at least my out-of-tune piano’s version of that pitch.

Were I of a more mechanical bent I would worry about what’s making this sound. I would check for leaks or breaks. But instead, I listen. I let the rain sing its song.

(Waiting for Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden to arrive and tune in the large golden concert hall of Vienna’s Musikverein)

Every Valley

Every Valley

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The world doesn’t go away just because the holidays are here.  Even the most stubborn optimist must sometimes remove the rose-tinted glasses.

Mine were most decidedly not on this morning as I was working in a quick run before the rain started up again. When the mostly all-carols classical station switched over to a sedate Haydn number I switched my little iPod mini from radio to music. I needed a Messiah fix!

“Every valley shall be exalted,” sang the tenor. “And every mountain and hill made low; the crooked straight and the rough places plain.” At “crooked,” he warbled between notes. At “straight” he rang out true and bold.

I thought of all the souls these words have comforted through the centuries. I thought of how they were comforting me this morning. Every valley exalted. Yes!

Mozart’s Jupiter

Mozart’s Jupiter

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Just back from a run with Mozart in my ears. Last movement of his last (41st, Jupiter) symphony. What a piece of music this is! Listen closely and you can hear the Romantic period bursting right through the Classical form, mowing down the guard rails with its energy and passion.

Bold, contrapuntal, complex — the sound comes from so many different directions that it feels like the inside of my head will explode, that my earphones must be smoking as I jog along sedate suburban lanes.

But they’re not, of course, and I try to maintain a poker face, offering no clue to the musical miracle taking place between my ears,  to the near dissonance at minutes 5:40 and 8:40, to what some describe as a “cosmic” coda.

Instead, I exert every effort not to air-conduct as Mozart carries me surely from the first clean melody all the way to the exuberant and triumphant finale. Every time I listen I’m enlarged, calmed, emboldened, amazed.

Music and Memories

Music and Memories

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My little iPod is a treasure. The size of a large postage stamp, it clips onto a sweatshirt or slips into a pocket. It holds most of my collection and keeps a charge for hours.

But the music it provides is nameless, faceless. It arrives via iTunes or a thumb drive. A bit comes from CDs but none of it, absolutely none, from vinyl. I have records, scores of them, and at one time I had a gizmo that would translate them to digital files. But even that music becomes anonymous once it’s assimilated.

One doesn’t sit and listen to music while staring at a CD cover or the tiny image of one I see on my iPod screen. What will never be the same again is the visual dimension of music, the way the album’s cover art became a part of the listening experience — became part of the music itself.

I’m taking these and other albums from Dad’s collection home with me. Not just for the music — but for the memories.

Birthday Boys in Red

Birthday Boys in Red

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Today we celebrate two indeterminate birthdays. Beethoven was baptized on December 17, 1770, which leads most scholars to believe he was born on December 16 of that year. Happy 244th birthday, Beethoven!

Also on this date, Copper the dog came to live at our house. It was 2006 and things were pretty busy. Arguably too busy to add a dog to the confusion. But add we did, and once the dust settled (that would be the dust left by Copper as he ran away from us), we were left with a lot of joy. Not knowing his exact birth date, we’ve always celebrated it today. Happy 9th birthday, Copper!

Can’t think of much else Copper and Beethoven have in common. Unless it’s their Christmas attire.

Hallelujah!

Hallelujah!

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We left warm dry homes to venture out on a cold, wet night. We left willingly, joyfully; we left to sing “The Messiah.”

There are hundreds, maybe thousands of “Messiah” Sing Alongs held through the country — from the grandiose ones with full symphony orchestras to the most humble held in church basements and community centers.

Last night’s concert featured four soloists, a conductor and a crack organist who didn’t miss a note. The chorus was, well, us — people who’ve hung onto their old scores from the first time they sang the oratorio in college or choir. People who probably worked a full day and did no vocal exercises before arriving. The most enthusiastic and wondrous of choirs. 

We may not have hit every note — in “His Yoke Is Easy” it is doubtful whether I hit any right notes — but as we belted out “King of kings/Forever and ever/And Lord of lords/Forever and ever/Hallelujah! Hallelujah!” it didn’t matter one little bit.

Piano at Rest

Piano at Rest

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After half a century on its feet the piano needs a rest. And it’s getting one.

It all started when the instrument kept losing its tune. The tuner diagnosed loose pins and proposed a remedy. Turn the piano on its back, insert a wood-expander solution around the pins and wait a week.

Luckily there’s a largish space in the front half of the living room so the piano could rest there — well barricaded, of course, so Copper doesn’t interfere. Meanwhile, the room is topsy-turvy, and there’s a big wall space where the piano used to be.

Still, I think the vacation is well deserved. I imagine the piano on a beach, a gentle breeze tickling its ivories, its noble shoulders sunk into the sand. Soon it will sit up, shake itself awake and be ready to play again.

Summer Radio

Summer Radio

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I had forgotten what it was like —the splash of pool or surf, laughter in the distance and always, always the radio. In many ways it was the sound of summer, the low simmer of pop tunes from the transistor.

With the advent of the Walkman decades ago and for many years now the iPod, music is only in our  ears and not our neighbor’s. But this week I’ve lounged beside a pool and listened to tunes from the 60s, 70s and 80s.

Can’t remember the songs themselves; they weren’t important. It was the whole experience: the scent of sunscreen, the movement of breeze, the heat of the sun. The radio sounds just completed the circle.

It’s the sort of summer I always remember, and this year it’s summer still.

Oh Say, Can You Sing?

Oh Say, Can You Sing?

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In honor of the two hundredth anniversary of the national anthem, choristers are converging on the National Mall to stage the largest sing-along ever of “The Star Spangled Banner.” The National Museum of American History, which is sponsoring the event, is encouraging would-be warblers to join Anthem for America parties across the country. If there isn’t a party near you, just tune in and sing along with the huge chorus at 4 o’clock today.

What an anthem we have! One of the most difficult to sing of any, with a wide-ranging melody and a high note at the end. A strange sort of anthem for a democracy, when you think about it. “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” is easier, though undeniably British. Or even “America the Beautiful,” though it has its share of high notes, too.

Also interesting, I ponder today on Flag Day, is the fact that our anthem asks questions rather than makes statements. And it’s written in second person. “Oh say, can you see?” These features make it more conversational than most. It’s a song that wonders more than it pronounces, that marvels more than it prescribes. And in those ways, it is endearing.

(Manuscript of Francis Scott Key’s lyrics to the National Anthem courtesy National Museum of American History.)