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Category: piano

Tuesday, August 23rd

never enough

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), Piano Sonata No. 5 in C minor
Jonathan Biss, live, New York, 2011


One of the things I admire about this performance is its immediacy: it feels not like recitation but spontaneous utterance.

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lagniappe

reading table

One insect
asleep on a leaf
can change your life

—Matsuo Basho (1644-1694), translated from Japanese by David Young

 

Wednesday, August 17th

passings

Bobby Hutcherson, vibraphonist, January 27, 1941-August 15, 2016

“Herzog” (R. Hutcherson), live, France (Antibes), 1969*


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lagniappe

musical thoughts

Speaking in recent years, Mr. Hutcherson was fond of citing a bit of insight from an old friend. “Eric Dolphy said music is like the wind,” he told The San Francisco Chronicle in 2012. “You don’t know where it came from, and you don’t know where it went. You can’t control it. All you can do is get inside the sphere of it and be swept away.”

—New York Times obituary, 8/17/16

radio

WKCR-FM (Columbia University) is featuring his music until 3 p.m. (EST).

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*With Harold Land (tenor saxophone), Stanley Cowell (piano), Reggie Johnson (bass), Joe Chambers (drums).

Saturday, August 13th

MCOTD Hall of Fame

Morton Feldman (1926-1987), For Philip Guston (1984), excerpt; Claire Chase (flute, alto flute, piccolo), Steven Schick (percussion), Sarah Rothenberg (piano, celesta), live, Houston (Rothko Chapel), 2014

Wednesday, August 3rd

more

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937), Piano Concerto in G major (1929-31); Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra (Yuri Termirkanov, cond.) with Martha Argerich (piano), live, Stockholm, 2009

Tuesday, August 2nd

more

Frederic Chopin (1810-1849), Scherzo No. 2 in B-flat minor; Martha Argerich, live, 1966


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lagniappe

It is like what we imagine knowledge to be . . .

—Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979), from “At the Fishhouses”

Monday, August 1st

Best five minutes you’ll have today?

Robert Schumann (1810-1856), Piano Sonata No. 2 in G minor, excerpt (4th mvt.); Martha Argerich, live, 1966


She’s one of a handful of pianists whose every note I’m hungry to hear.

Thursday, July 21st

sounds of New York

Dre Hocevar Large Ensemble (DH, drums, composition), live, New York, 2015

Wednesday, July 20th

more

One-word review: Wow!

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), Piano Sonata No. 8 in C minor (“Pathetique”); Annie Fischer (1914-1995), live


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lagniappe

reading table

To be alive – is Power –
Existence – in itself –
Without a further function –
Omnipotence – Enough –

—Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), 876 (Franklin), excerpt

Tuesday, July 19th

never enough

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor; NHK Symphony Orchestra (Miltiades Caridis [1923-1998], cond.) with Annie Fischer (1914-1995), piano, live


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lagniappe

reading table

Even now one is amazed
by transience: how it
outlasts us all.

—Geoffrey Hill (1932-2016), from “Scenes with Harlequins” (TLS, 7/8/16)

 

Tuesday, July 5th

All that holiday noise—BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!—leave you with a hangover?

Here’s the perfect antidote.

Morton Feldman (1926-1987, MCOTD Hall of Fame), Piano and String Quartet, 1985; Aki Takahashi and Kronos Quartet, 1993


(Taking a break—back in a while.)