never enough
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), Partitas No. 1 (B minor), 2 (D minor), and 3 (E major) for solo violin; Gidon Kremer (violin), live, Austria (Lockenhaus), 2006
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, Art Institute of Chicago
Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), Grapes, Lemons, Pears and Apples, 1887
Last night, in Chicago, worn out by work and the world, I walked from my office to Symphony Center, where I heard these folks perform pieces by, among others, this composer—and I’m so glad I did.
Kremerata Baltica with Gidon Kremer (violin), live; Mieczyslaw Weinberg (1919-1996), Sinfonietta No. 2, excerpt (3rd mvt., Adagio)
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lagniappe
random sights
yesterday, Chicago
The more kinds of music you love, the more chances you have to make wonderful discoveries, as happened yesterday when I heard this for the first time (Oberon Ensemble, Art Institute of Chicago).
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897), Piano Quartet No. 1 in G minor; Martha Argerich (piano); Gidon Kremer (violin), Yuri Bashmet (viola), Mischa Maisky (cello), 2001
#1
#2
#3
#4
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lagniappe
reading table
You don’t hear the sound; you go into the sound—you and the sound become one.
—Seung Sahn, Only Don’t Know
Alfred Schnittke (1934-98), Concerto Grosso No. 1, live, Russia, 2004
Kremerata Baltica (Gidon Kremer & Tatiana Grindenko, violins)
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
What do we want from music—a mirror or a window?
If I knew I had a week to live (as someday I will, whether I know it or not), this is one of the things I’d want to hear.
Johann Sebastian Bach, Chaconne in D minor for solo violin (Partita for Violin No. 2 [BWV 1004]); Isaac Stern (violin), live
Another take?
Here (Nathan Milstein).
And here (Gidon Kremer).
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lagniappe
musical thoughts
On one stave, for a small instrument, the man writes a whole world of the deepest thoughts and most powerful feelings. If I imagined that I could have created, even conceived the piece, I am quite certain that the excess of excitement and earth-shattering experience would have driven me out of my mind.
—Johannes Brahms, in a letter to Clara Schumann (translated from German)
You could listen to his music, and nothing else, every day for the rest of your life and never touch bottom.
Bach, Chaconne in D minor for solo violin (Partita for Violin No. 2 [BWV 1004])/Gidon Kremer (violin), live
Another take? Here.