Adagio for things
Feb. 14th, 2010 10:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cosmolinguistI just spent a lovely night at the Bridgewater Hall. My first time seeing Manchester’s renowned Halle Orchestra after living here more than four years.
It was a night of American music: a Copland piece neither of us was familiar with but both Andrew and I liked, “Rhapsody in Blue” in its original jazz version rather than the rarefied classical rendition most music-lovers are now used to -- which was fabulous; it’s the only version of the song I like any more, being so used to the recording Andrew has of the Paul Whiteman orchestra playing it the day after Gershwin finished it, or something -- and Barber’s “Adagio for Strings.”
Which has always been a favorite of mine -- you get no cool points for obscurity, but then I’ve never been cool anyway, and I think there’s something to be said for music that’s good in an obvious kind of way, like Dylan Moran refers to a particular woman’s attractiveness by saying she was attractive in that way that other women would say about her “Well she’s attractive in an obvious kind of way.” This is music that’s good in an obvious kind of way. I wouldn’t mind writing music that’s so obviously good any more than I’d mind being obviously attractive.
Anyway, as I was saying, despite it being a favorite I’d never witnessed a performance of it before, and it is the only thing that could’ve made the piece any more captivating for me than I already thought it was.
It has inspired me to say, just now in a text message: I cannot even begin to describe the Adagio: despite being comfortingly familiar to me, it always retains a touch of the ineffable. It ebbs and flows like breath, but always leaves me breathless. It knows all the places your heart has been broken and shows them all to you, but it puts you all back together by the end.
It was a night of American music: a Copland piece neither of us was familiar with but both Andrew and I liked, “Rhapsody in Blue” in its original jazz version rather than the rarefied classical rendition most music-lovers are now used to -- which was fabulous; it’s the only version of the song I like any more, being so used to the recording Andrew has of the Paul Whiteman orchestra playing it the day after Gershwin finished it, or something -- and Barber’s “Adagio for Strings.”
Which has always been a favorite of mine -- you get no cool points for obscurity, but then I’ve never been cool anyway, and I think there’s something to be said for music that’s good in an obvious kind of way, like Dylan Moran refers to a particular woman’s attractiveness by saying she was attractive in that way that other women would say about her “Well she’s attractive in an obvious kind of way.” This is music that’s good in an obvious kind of way. I wouldn’t mind writing music that’s so obviously good any more than I’d mind being obviously attractive.
Anyway, as I was saying, despite it being a favorite I’d never witnessed a performance of it before, and it is the only thing that could’ve made the piece any more captivating for me than I already thought it was.
It has inspired me to say, just now in a text message: I cannot even begin to describe the Adagio: despite being comfortingly familiar to me, it always retains a touch of the ineffable. It ebbs and flows like breath, but always leaves me breathless. It knows all the places your heart has been broken and shows them all to you, but it puts you all back together by the end.
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(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-15 01:13 pm (UTC)I LOVE that piece of music :D
(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-15 02:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-26 11:01 pm (UTC)What a lovely program for an evening at the symphony!