Posts Tagged ‘classical music’
Art as Survival: The Terezín Concentration Camp
June 17, 2019
I go to lots of classical music concerts, but I’ve never been so moved as I was by this one. It wasn’t just the profundity of the music; it was also, and especially, the context in which it was composed. The concert was called Music from Terezín Concentration Camp. I’m ashamed to admit that I…
Read MoreThe Fearless Curiosity of the Ying Quartet
May 8, 2019
Ying Quartet, l-r: David Ying (cello), Janet Ying (violin), new first violinist Robin Scott, and Phillip Ying (viola) outside Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre, Eastman School of Music March 23, 2015 // photo by J. Adam Fenster / University of Rochester Of all the arts, music is the most difficult to write about. Maybe because…
Read MoreRichard Wilbur’s Poetry Captures Our Days
May 31, 2016
Last night I read a poem that showed me in a flash why I save evening-time for listening to classical music while I knit, or browsing through an art book, or reading fine poems like this one. I’ve said in a previous post that I keep a volume of poems by my bed for evening…
Read MoreOffertorium
June 30, 2008
I took a trip to Boston this past week. The youth choir from my church here in Dallas was touring the Boston area, and among them were my two teenage children. I took the opportunity to attend to some business I’d been avoiding, and to take my kids on campus visits while they were already…
Read MoreDo Dictators Have Anything to Fear from Musicians?
May 8, 2008
Last December, I wrote a speculative piece for First Things Online, regarding the upcoming visit of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra to the People’s Republic of North Korea. I was responding to a Wall Street Journal op-ed by the critic Terry Teachout, who thought that such a visit would constitute a serenade for Kim Jong-Il,…
Read MoreEars to Hear
March 24, 2008
Sometimes my worlds collide. I attended a concert this past weekend…a suburban orchestra conducted by a friend of mine. We hadn’t gotten together in a while and it was decided that we’d meet up after the concert for some drinks to catch up. I hadn’t realized that it was a pops concert (not my thing…
Read MoreAuf Wiedersehen, Karl!
February 22, 2008
Recently, I was home sick catching up on my reading. Flipping through an accumulation of The Economist magazines, I began in the back with the obituaries…a singular and fascinating specialty of this publication. What greeted me was the obituary of German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, who died December 5 at the age of 79. Ironically, I…
Read MoreThe First Pitch
February 6, 2008
I can recall the first time that I heard ‘classical’ music. My mother had just retrieved the long disabled record player back from the repair shop and put on an LP to test it out. For a kid of seven or eight, the novelty of the thing must have brought me into the room to…
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