Musings on ballet, classical music, the violin, and life
The Classical Girl This first appeared at Violinist.com in March 2010 Back in the late 19th and early 20th century a superstition developed in the classical music world that prophesied the Ninth would be a composer’s last symphony. Arnold Schoenberg summed it up in an eloquent fashion, stating that “he who wants to go beyond it must pass … Read more
I’ve been thinking about the recent Gil Shaham recital (https://www.theclassicalgirl.com/?p=81), how I enjoyed it, and how we as the audience were all delighted when Shaham and his accompanist delivered us an encore. It was a lovely one, a rag-based melody. As is often the case when the musician calls it out, I wasn’t sure about … Read more
It shouldn’t matter but it does. In my 40’s my hair thinned and split and didn’t regrow so plentifully. Vitamins, special shampoos and conditioners, special creams have yielded few changes. Genetics speaks louder, in the end. So. Each year the hair gets shorter, shorter, thinner. This last cut, I couldn’t even pretend to corral my … Read more
Congratulations, you’ve done it. Whether for the violin or for ballet or [insert name of creative endeavor you’ve been talking about doing for years now], you signed up for the class, maybe even paid for the first month. Yay! Congratulations! Except that now, the start-date looming closer, closer, maybe the prospect of showing up for … Read more
Listening to a live performance of a Bach partita, by a master on the violin, on an instrument crafted by the world’s greatest luthier of all time, in a world-class music venue, is about as sublime as it gets. Almost holy. Certainly the silence, the attention from the audience was reverent, worshipful. Gil Shaham opened … Read more