Browsed by
Category: music

Noting the Passing

Noting the Passing

Comments 0 Comment

The pianist Leon Fleisher died August 2 at the age of 92. I’ve written about him before, both as a pianist and writer. I even vowed to learn a piece of music because of watching him play it, a promise I have not kept, by the way. So the least I can do is honor the man here.

Fleisher was a master of reinvention: winning competitions as a prodigy, losing the use of his right hand, despairing for a while, then eventually remaking himself as a conductor, teacher and performer. The difficulty he faced almost sunk him — he considered suicide — but he emerged stronger as a result. 

“Time and again, I would look at my life and marvel that so many wonderful things had happened that never would have happened if my hand had not been struck down,” Fleisher wrote in his memoir Nine Lives. “I couldn’t imagine my life without conducting. I couldn’t imagine life without teaching so intensely.” 

Curiously enough, Fleisher’s obituary shared the page with that of another artist and master of reinvention. The film director Alan Parker directed several movies I’ve loved, such as “Fame” and “The Commitments,” movies that, until reading his obituary, I wasn’t even aware were his. Like Fleisher, Parker took risks, made changes, didn’t find a safe path and follow it but continued to learn and grow.

Two men, two creative careers, but one lesson (at least for me): Whatever you do, they say, don’t get stuck. 

Bustin’ Out

Bustin’ Out

Comments 0 Comment

I’m not sure how much of my world view has been shaped by Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals — probably more than I would care to admit. Given that, perhaps I can be forgiven for hearing a certain refrain from “Carousel” pinging through my head these days.

“June is bustin’ out all over
All over the meadow and the hill
Buds are bustin’ outta bushes
And the romping river pushes
Every little wheel that wheels beside the mill

Because it’s June — June, June, June
Just because it’s June, June, June.

And my favorite verse:

June is bustin’ out all over
The sheep aren’t sheepish anymore
And the rams that chase the ewe sheep
Are determined there’ll be new sheep
And the ewe sheep aren’t even keeping score

Because it’s June — June, June, June
Just because it’s June, June, June!

All of which is to say … it’s a June-is-Bustin’-Out kind of day!

Wild Things

Wild Things

Comments 0 Comment

On yesterday’s walk I marveled at the wildflowers — the daisies and clover and honeysuckle — how they hemmed the sidewalk along West Ox where I was huffing and puffing in the late afternoon humidity.

Last night, I fell asleep to a chorus of frog song, as the critters enjoyed a dousing in the thunderstorms that rolled through our area after dark.

Then this morning, Copper and I saw a fox cross the road in front of us. The creature trotted confidently through our neighbor’s yard, turning his head occasionally to stare at us, as if to ask, what are you doing here?

We live in a tame suburb of Washington, D.C. — but we are surrounded by wild things. And yes, they make everything groovy.


(A tip of the hat to the Troggs and their great one-hit wonder.) 

Tick-Tock

Tick-Tock

Comments 0 Comment

From where I sit I hear three clocks ticking. There is the familiar cuckoo from the kitchen, the breath-in-breath-out grandfather between the windows, and the “bim bam” on the mantel, the fastest of the trio.

Listening to them all at once isn’t confusing; it’s multi-modal. It’s the solidity of braided ropes, a hammock of sorts, holding me in place.

It’s the calm center in the midst of the action: like listening to a Bach prelude or fugue, where you search for each voice amidst the harmony. Or like jumping rope, double dutch.

It’s all about the rhythm, about three adding up to one. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Tick-tock.

Right Arm Disease

Right Arm Disease

Comments 0 Comment

French horn player Barry Tuckwell, who passed away last week at the age of 88,  had a term for the allure of the conductor’s podium. He called it “right arm disease.”

From all reports, Tuckwell was an excellent conductor.  But it was as a horn player that he made his mark. Playing the instrument is “like driving a very fast car on an oily road. You have to anticipate the things that may go wrong,” Tuckwell said. But not many things did go wrong when he was playing the instrument.

My reference point for the difficulty of horn playing comes from my long-ago youth orchestra days, when we based our yearly program on the availability of passable horn players. If we had them, and only if we had them, would we play Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony.

Still, many have fallen prey to “right arm disease.” And I can understand. I engage in a little right-arm waving in the car, air-conducting, of course. But don’t worry. My left hand is firmly on the wheel.

(Photo: Imgartists.com)

Messiah Sing-Along

Messiah Sing-Along

Comments 0 Comment

Tonight we gather again, the wavering sopranos, the alto who has a little sinus drainage and is wondering if she can hit the high notes, the tenor who hasn’t sung in public since high school, the baritone who does this every year and secretly wishes he could have a solo.

Tonight we gather to sing Handel’s great masterpiece, a most forgiving work, full of runs and other acrobatics but at heart a piece for the people— an egalitarian oratorio that welcomes all pilgrims.

I’m making educated guesses on the other singers, but I can vouch for this alto. I’ll take out my score tonight with joy and trepidation. “And He Shall Purify” is not for the faint of heart. Nor is the “Hallelujah Chorus” with its pause right before the end, a trap that has embarrassed more than one singer.  In fact, challenges lurk in every recitative, aria and chorus of this piece.

But I can also predict the joy and gladness that will flood our hearts at the finish — that we, a group of strangers at 7 p.m. will by 8:30 have sung a great masterwork together. Yes, there will be botched runs and missed entrances. But the “hallelujahs” will ring out loud and clear.

(No, we were not singing in National Cathedral … I wish!) 

Salute to Sunrise

Salute to Sunrise

Comments 0 Comment

My classical radio station has begun playing a salute to the sunrise. Every morning at 7:14 (can it really be that late now?) or, eventually, 6:05 (ah, that’s better!), you can hear a flourish of strings and a fanfare of trumpets. Look out the window, the host says, at another glorious sunrise.

I like this because it reminds us of a meteorological miracle, a fact that can be ignored or noticed. We can stay in the darkness or turn toward the light. We can keep our eyes down, staring at our phone, or we can lift them up, to the heavens.

It’s easier to look down. Not just because gravity pulls us this way, but because we are busy. We have work email to check, social media to scan. But looking up just takes a minute, and in that minute we can reorder our day.

Eat Dessert First

Eat Dessert First

Comments 0 Comment

Long ago, when I was a musical purist, I would have thought it gauche to listen to only one movement of a recorded symphony. In most cases, I enjoyed the entire piece anyway, but even if I didn’t, diligence kept me on task. If I was going to thrill with the allegro, then I would muse with the adagio.

For several years now, though, my approach to music has been the aural equivalent of “eat dessert first.”  If I feel like listening only to the last movement of Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony, then that’s what I do.

Maybe it’s a matter of time, or lack thereof. Maybe I’m just giving in to a need for immediate gratification. I could also blame it on Washington’s classical radio station, which routinely cherrypicks the most notable movements of a concerto or symphony and seldom plays a piece in its entirety.

No doubt about it, listening to an entire work is a different experience, more ennobling, a journey rather than a destination. But these days I’m discovering the particular pleasures of listening to what I love best. In other words, to co-opt the catchphrase … Life is uncertain. Last movements first.

Rock On!

Rock On!

Comments 0 Comment

Last night we went to hear my cousin Marty’s band, Rockville Station, play the hits of the 70s and 80s at a dive bar in Bethesda. They opened with “I Feel the Earth Move,” an apt tune since I was sitting close enough to the stage that I could fill my insides move with each beat.

Once I’d adjusted to this strange phenomenon, I sat back and enjoyed the show. Here were people my age and older rocking the night away with a lead singer belting out the old tunes and, in a break, introducing her parents to the crowd. They were visiting from Hawaii and had to be in their 90s. The drummer, which turned out to be her husband, looked a little like the angel in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” His face had the same innocent rapture as Clarence’s did when he showed George Bailey his vintage copy of Tom Sawyer. But unlike Clarence, he was so intense that he broke one of his drumsticks during a long riff.

Marty, who played guitar and sang, was one of the younger ones on the stage. Who knew he had these talents? He wore a white cowboy-style shirt and confessed before the show went on that he had once dreamed of being a country-western singer.

Here are people following their bliss. They have day jobs, of course, but they also have alternative lives where they can … rock on.

Brahms to the Rescue

Brahms to the Rescue

Comments 0 Comment

Brahms came to the rescue yesterday. He didn’t ride in on a white horse, but he was there with his complex melodies and lyricism, with his passion and playfulness.

He was there in the morning when I walked, he was there in the evening when I bounced on the trampoline. And he stayed with me as I sautéed squash and onions and mixed it with farfalle pasta, as I broiled and plated the chicken, as I remembered I had fresh basil to season it all.

What a utilitarian composer! Brahms is not just for bedtime or funerals or academic processions. If you give him a chance, he will stay with you all day long.

(Photo courtesy New York Public Library Digital Collection)