Bernstein’s response to violenceThis will be our response to violence To make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before. – Leonard Bernstein.
Scores and recordingsRecordings Scores Brass Brass ensemble Trombone Orchestra/Concert band Concert band Piano Piano solo Piano method Strings Cello and piano String ensemble Vocal and choral General Sacred Woodwind Bassoon
The key of E-flat“[The key of E-flat] was reserved mostly for moments of sublime seriousness, appropriate for dying thoughts, or of love unto death, whether human or divine.” – Heartz, Daniel (2003) Music in European Capitols. New York: Norton. Cited in: Siblin, Eric (2009) The Cello Suites. Crows Nest: Allen and Unwin, p. 144.
Britten on The Rake’s Progress“I liked everything about the opera but the music.” – Benjamin Britten on Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress Cited in: Jarski, Rosemarie (2005) Great British Wit. London: Ebury Press, p. 203.
Pavel Kolesnikov on the Goldberg Variations“Like climbing an infinite stairway, one step at a time.” —Pavel Kolesnikov, working on Bach’s Goldberg Variations. Jeal, Erica, “Pavel Kolesnikov, the pianist making ‘a palace of sound built by your own imagination’”, The Guardian, 9 September 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/sep/09/pavel-kolesnikov-the-pianist-making-a-palace-of-sound-built-by-your-own-imagination, accessed 11 September 2021.
Born for music“I was born with eyes closed listening to my heartbeat from my mother’s womb… There, without knowing it, I discovered that I would be born and would die for music…” – Alicastro Source: Peer Music.‘
Prokofiev is evictedSergey Prokofiev was once evicted from his apartment for playing the same chord 218 times. A tally was kept by the downstairs tenant. Source: Lawrence, Christopher (2001) Swooning. Sydney: Random House, p.69.
My tempo must be followedRavel was very particular about how his works were performed. Ravel always insisted that the tempo for Boléro should be moderate and rigorously maintained throughout. He made a recording of that, too establishing his requirement. Toscanini took it much faster and made an accelerando towards the end. Ravel, who was in the audience, objected. He […]
Old into newAn old thing becomes new if you detach it from what usually surrounds it. — Robert Bresson, French filmmaker J. Butler, Star Texts: Image and Performance in Film and Television, Detroit, Wayne State University Press, 1991, p. 170.
The nature of music“A verbal art like poetry is reflective; it stops to think. Music is immediate, it goes on to become.” – W. H. Auden, English Poet Auden, Wystan Hugh (1988) The Complete Words of Auden, Princeton University Press, vol. 3, p. 251.
