Recital and Visitors

My third solo recital will be held at the Bloomsburg First Presbyterian Church at 7:30 on Friday, this 8th of July. I will be performing works of Bach, Mendelssohn, Franck, Messiaen, and Alain.

For the event, my dear friends Robert Fertitta and Darren Motise will be visiting. I presented Robert in recitals two months ago; he is the greatest musician I know. I hope to present Darren in recital in the Spring of 2012. Darren is a vegetarian so we're going to lunch at the Prana place on Main Street.

This Wednesday, Dr. Decker and I are going to Harrisburg to hear Mark Laubach in recital as part of the AGO Region III Convention. Mark is an incredible organist and musician, and a very kind friend.

Here is an excerpt of the first movement of Mozart's Piano Concerto no. 22 in E flat Major:

Bittersweet! Bittersweet! Ohhhh bittersweet!

Yesterday, the Bloomsburg High School class of 2011 graduated, amongst them were many of my best friends, old and new. I am excited for all the graduates, but especially for those I know and call friends. I'm especially excited for Andrea Fronsman, Tyler Dalious, Lydia Heier, Courtney Langmeyer, Meghan Ashford, Kelsey Flick, Christian Tloczynski, Hayley Miller, and Katie Knorr. I cannot wait to see what they do and where they go and who they become! However, I think who they are now is just as important, if not more so. They are all inherently beautiful people.

Afterward, Mrs. Zimmerman was walking around saying "Bittersweet! Bittersweet! Ohhhh bittersweet!" repeatedly. I love Mrs. Zimmerman, but for a good half hour after going home, I still had 'Bittersweet... bittersweet... bittersweet...' playing in my head! Ha!

Well, anyway, here's some great music related to graduation and this school year. First is Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1, which is where we get our 'graduation' march from.



Here is Michaela singing Faure's 'Apres un Reve'. I just have to put this here because it is such an incredible piece and she sang it so beautifully.



Pure joy. That's what Brahms Op. 39 Waltzes are - pure joy! Graduation is likewise a joyful event! May the rest of the graduates lives be as joyful as these waltzes, here performed by Dinu Lipatti and the legend Nadia Boulanger herself.

Lili Boulanger and Jehan Alain

Lili Boulanger may have composed very little, due to her untimely death of tuberculosis, but what she did produce is among the most beautiful music ever written. Her 'Veille Priére Bouddhique' is truly a monumental piece of music!



Her Pie Jesu, composed in 1918, was the last piece she composed, while she was dying.



This tragedy of a young composer passing at such an early age was repeated in 1940, when the twenty-nine year-old Jehan Alain, was killed protecting France from German invasion. His most well known piece is 'Litanies' from his Trois Pieces pour Orgue, played here by his younger sister, Marie-Claire Alain.



'Jardin Suspendu', also from the Trois Pieces, is another favorite Alain work of mine.

My new favorite passage of all time

Nadia Boulanger was one of the greatest human beings to ever walk this Earth, I am convinced. This passage about her says so many great things about that wonderful lady, music, composition, understanding... EVERYTHING.

"When I met her, I showed her my kilos of symphonies and sonatas. She started to read them and suddenly came out with a horrible sentence: "It's very well written." And stopped, with a big period, round like a soccer ball. After a long while, she said: "Here you are like Stravinsky, like Bartók, like Ravel, but you know what happens? I can't find Piazzolla in this."

And she began to investigate my private life: what I did, what I did and did not play, if I was single, married, or living with someone, she was like an FBI agent! And I was very ashamed to tell her that I was a tango musician. Finally I said, "I play in a night club." I didn't want to say cabaret. And she answered, "Night club, mais oui, but that is a cabaret, isn't it?" "Yes," I answered, and thought, "I'll hit this woman in the head with a radio…." It wasn't easy to lie to her.

She kept asking: "You say that you are not pianist. What instrument do you play, then?" And I didn't want to tell her that I was a bandoneon player, because I thought, "Then she will throw me from the fourth floor." Finally, I confessed and she asked me to play some bars of a tango of my own. She suddenly opened her eyes, took my hand and told me: "You idiot, that's Piazzolla!"

And I took all the music I composed, ten years of my life, and sent it to hell in two seconds."

—Ástor Piazzolla, A Memoir

That lady was a blessing to this planet. I never 'met' her, but she has still had a profound influence on my understanding of music and what I mean to be as a musician.

Igor Stravinsky and Nadia Boulanger

Mass for the Convents!

I'm currently learning Francois Couperin's 'Mass for the Convents'. This organ masterpiece is one of the great works of the French Baroque period! As cool as French Baroque music is - French Baroque pipe organs are equally cool!

Below is Jean-Baptiste Robin playing a movement from the Mass for the Convents on the Clicquot pipe organ at la Cathédrale de Poitiers, France. The organ which Couperin himself played his entire life at Saint-Gervais was also a Clicquot (albeit it a slightly larger organ).

The clicking sound the organ makes is actually the mechanics of the organ and its action - since this instrument was built in the mid-18th century, it has no electricity or anything to assist its operation. The entire functioning of this quite large instrument is mechanical, hence the clicking noises. These noises can be heard up close, but from down in the nave where one would be during mass or a concert, the clicking is to far away to be heard, and only the sounding of the pipes is audible.

Chorales, Chorales, Chorales!

Few things in this world exceed the beauty of great chorales and other music which incorporates great chorales.

Some wonderful chorales...

'In Deep Distress' - Johann Sebastian Bach (performed by Pierre Cochereau in 1959 on the Cavaille-Coll organ at Cathedrale Notre Dame de Paris, France)



'O Man, Bemoan They Grievous Sins' - Johann Sebastian Bach (performed by Michael Murray on the Muller organ at Sint-Bavokerk in Haarlem, NE)



'In Thee is Joy' - Johann Sebastian Bach (performed by Ton Koopman)



Sonata no. 6 in D minor 'Our Father in Heaven' -Felix Mendelssohn (performed by Peter Hurford on the Rieger organ at the Ratzeburg Cathedral)



There is much, much, MUCH more great chorale music out there! This is just a grain off the tip of the iceberg!

Thinking Right

I recently read an article about improving ones mind - of course it spoke of sleep and exercise and the like, but it also spoke of intentionally using experiences and thought to change one's mind. In terms of experiences, for instance, in my case, listening to, learning, performing, even analyzing lovely music or creating and looking at artwork are two great experiences I, or anybody, can do to help their minds and themselves. As for thinking right - thinking kind, loving, happy thoughts, can help to change the way one's brain works and can make one healthier in the end. Thinking thoughts opposite to these actually has much broader and more permanent consequences than people tend to think. Thinking bad thoughts can literally change the way one's brain works and make them less healthy - and more prone to continue thinking such thoughts. We all need to make a conscious effort to think right - if not for the sake of our health, then for the sake of the morality and justice that is in it. A loving, caring, selfless, forgiving, and accepting mind is the only truly moral and just mind.

Below is the Gloria from Franz Joseph Haydn's unbelievably gorgeous 'Theresienmesse' (Theresa Mass).