| Music |
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| 6 December 2004 I attended Kevin Spacey's concert at the Wiltern Theatre! 4 November 2004 Composer George Crumb (that's Crumb, not the man who invented the potato chip--that was Crum) wrote a chamber work titled Voice of the Whale. Instead of finding myself wanting to take another trip to Sea World, I rather found myself very intrigued by the piece. The music was beautiful and had interesting notations such as this one: Crumb writes for the flute part, shimmering. That does not mean that the flutist wear sparkling bangles in her hair the night of the performance (and if it's a guy, all the more reason not to). What's even more interesting is that in the end, Crumb writes for all the musicians to play in pantomine. Here we have a theatrical element as the piece ends as mysteriously as it began. 2 November 2004 Music for thought: atonal or serial? Expressionism or impressionism? Pandiatonic or neoclassical? There is a tendency to put a title to 20th century music, especially that of Arnold Schoenberg, as to whether it's atonal or serial. There's a running joke in our class, and it goes like this: There was a village on the border of Russia and Poland, and there was a debate on which country the village was located. Finally, the villagemembers came to an agreement that it was in Poland, and they were relieved and said, "Oh good, we don't have to worry about those awful Russian winters." OK, so if Schoenberg's piece is indeed atonal, we can relax and say, "Oh good, it's atonal, and not have to worry about matrices and 12-tone rows." Serial music uses definite order of notes as a thematic basis, and helps the composer think of the next note. It's *not* what you'd compose for a Kellogg's cornflake commercial! 27 October 2004 Pianist Ivo Pogarelich was in town and I had the opportunity to go hear him play. The man was indeed eccentric, barely acknowledging the audience and taking extreme liberties in tempo and colour shading throughout the entire program. While some folks disliked the concert, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The colours in the Beethoven op 78 sonata were out of the world. 26 October 2004 For the folks taking the Music History midterm next week, be aware. A sign that reads, "Abandon all hope ye who enter here," should be placed about the doorway entrance! From what I hear, part of the questions are to figure out what the question is saying, which one would need a PhD in philosophy to decipher, then proceed to write an essay close to the length of War and Peace, identify correctly the pieces of music that your great grea great great great great great relatives probably listened to, turn the test in within 2 hours, hope that you sounded scholarly using the music jargon called for, then prey like those did in the Roman Catholic Church that you get anything close to an A. BUT, that's what I've heard. It may not be true, but after hearing this *consistently* from others, my guess is to grab your 24oz. iced latte, put your headphones on, forget the KMZT KUSC stations, read the music dictionary from cover to cover, and repeat for the next 7 days. **Okay, scratch that. It went better than expected. Another student and I were the last two to hand our tests in, and the professor says jokingly to us, "What are you doing, rewriting the textbook?" Hmmm, and *I* was thinking War and Peace... 10 October 2004 Tonight I attended the Garrick Ohlsson piano concert at OCPAC. It was absolutely fantastic. My mom, friend, and I had fourth row seats, almost in the center. We could barely see the pianist's hands but just to be able to watch and hear him was a treat in itself. Ohlsson opened with a Beethoven sonata, one that I had studied a few years earlier. His Chopin, however, was most exquisite. All those colours and shadings within the piano range were amazing. It's a wonder how a guy 6'4" with a huge hand span (13 keys) could get such shadings. Of course, the piece I was looking forward to was the Scriabin etude, D# minor. It's got the best stormy melody ever. Afterwards, I wanted to see if I could go backstage and talk to him. He was on the cover of one of the IPQ magazines with a full article on him inside. It was great to see him on stage! 8 April 2004 The recital went well. But what still puzzles me is, why do they even hold noon concerts? Don't they understand that most people work, or are in classes during that time? Don't they want the hall filled? Is my mind still buzzed from last night's encouter and today's performance that I'm letting my excitement spill over onto this topic? Something needs to be done. Right before I go on stage, I think I'm on crack or something, but once I walk out, it all seems to simmer away and the energy of the crowd (ahem....twelve's not really a crowd, I guess audience would be a more appropriate term), then you sit and focus and have fun! Next year I hope they do something about this noon time business though. Everyone gets nervous to some extent before an important event, so here's some tips on dealing with nervousness: link 7 April 2004 You won't believe it again, folks! I'm just back from the OCPAC, where my mom and I heard pianist Stephen Hough. We also got to go backstage to meet him. Somehow there was a mix up on who was allowed backstage, but after some talking we were let in just in the nick of time to catch Stephen walking to his room. He stopped and chatted with us for a while, and even took a picture! Which I have safely filed away in the photo album somewhere. He signed our programmes, and I told him his performance was very inspiration and exciting, and that I was giving my own recital tomorrow, and he asked what I was playing and so forth. What a night! But I know I'll still need my rest for tomorrow! |