kinda old. disgusting quality. but i post.https://youtu.be/dBCqiPh4gKo

Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven

Today i listened to Moonlight sonata composed by Beethoven. I happened to listen to it through a suggestion by a friend. As i was listening to it, i developed a feeling it was more of a ‘misery-in-life’ themed music rather than romantic which can be misunderstood by its title. Also, one of the things that suprised me, as i read more about it, was that Beethoven was deaf when he composed it,infact he was for more of his work. It took me by surprise and i started to wonder how it can even be possible,but as i read more about it,i came to know it,Beethoven was pretty sure of the patterns before he composes his music.He also used dissonance(it can mean something different to you, art is subjective) as a powerful tool in this piano sonata. He also didn’t follow the basic premise of a sonata and change the speed of three movements it consists of. I have listened to it more than any other musical art piece thats for sure and i still cannot comprehend its beauty as a music appreciator(not a nerd).

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He looks so young without the beard

Szymanowski–Métopes, trois poèmes pour piano(1915)

A challenge in describing music by composers like Szymanowski is that the works are usually about the atmosphere and the sound more than anything. Strange harmonies, chromatic shifts, decorations on the piano…a lot of attention to details like these instead of clear melody or strong rhythm. The music ends up sounding hypnotic at points, and that may be what Szymanowski was going for. He wrote this suite, Metopes, after a tour of southern Europe which included a visit to Greece. Szymanowski took this trip in 1914, just as Europe was on the brink of War. His interest in Mediterranean and Eastern cultures helped define his new style. What interests me most, or at least what I can relate to today, is this interest in escaping to an other-worldly soundscape while the world is on the brink of extreme conflict. Today, we have non-stop portable access to news stories, videos, and photos of war, terror, and pain. It’s too much for our brains to handle. How do we deal with it? We also escape into art that puts us into a new ‘world’. Szymanowski’s world is decadent, nocturnal, and alluring. The word “metopes” means the space at the top of Greek columns that can have elaborate decorations and scenes carved onto them. So each piece could be thought of as trying to depict a Greek stone-carving of the mythic subjects. Here, Szymanowski chose to focus on scenes from Homer’s Odyssey. The first piece, L’isle des sirènes, imitates the ethereal and deadly siren songs. There is also a lot of tone painting for the ocean waves, and we grow in anxiety, thinking back to the story where Odysseus is enchanted by their songs and has to be tied against a mast post to keep from driving the ship into the rocks. The next poem, Calypso, opens with and uses a lot of glittering tremolos, making me think of the Romani cimbalom’s sound evoked in 19th century music. In the story, Odysseus has washed up on Calypso’s island. She enchants him in staying for seven years. Likewise, musically, a perception of time is distorted by these floating harmonies and unpredictable resolutions, constant chromatic notes keeping us from thinking of a clear “direction” that is ingrained in traditional tonality. Calypso tries to get Odysseus to stay with her forever, promising him immortality. He remembers his wife, Penelope, and insists on being let go to continue with his journey. The third scene isn’t supernatural, and the music is more down-to-earth. Odysseus has shipwrecked on the island of Phaeacia, where the King’s daughter Nausicaa takes him in as a guest. With the hospitality, Odysseus is entertained by dancers. The music is a fun, and at times frantic, dance full of percussive dashes. It ends with a slower, reflective section, that kind of dies off into silence; Odysseus leaves the fun and games to continue his journey back to Ithaca. In his program on the work, Grant Hiroshima comments that we don’t follow Odysseus to the end of his journey, maybe to reflect the uncertainty of the future; will the next adventure be dangerous? Will he ever return home? And perhaps this shows Szymanowski’s own anxieties at the state of the world. While art can be an ‘escape’, it is still reflecting our culture and ourselves.

Movements:

• L’îsle des sirènes
• Calypso
• Nausicaa

Poulenc-Les soirées de Nazelles(1936)

Something that has been on my mind lately is how we perceive and evaluate music. I was born near the end of the cutoff for the “millennial” generation, so for me music is something that exists in the environment, it radiates as an MP3 from a computer, played on CDs, and then streamed digitally. For me, music is something that I can conjure with my phone and take anywhere. This personal and mobile music gives us a way to perceive the world that is so different from humans before the 21st century (really, before recording technology) that we often take for granted how special music is. At least before records, you had to physically be present where the music was being created. It was something that exists in that moment, and then once the music is done, you’ve “heard” it. You don’t always get to play it again. It’s why music was, and still is, a communal experience. This piece by Poulenc is a set of variations that are based on improvisations he played at the piano during vacations with friends at his country estate. Each variation is a little musical picture of a different friend, much like Elgar’s more famous Enigma Variations. Poulenc shows off his pianistic brilliance and his ear for textures throughout from moments like the opening slam into the bass, or the delicate and hazy “Le goût du malheur” with hints of Satie and Ravel. The mix of playfulness and severity in these variations is typical of his neoclassical style. Here as piano variations it makes me think of French Baroque keyboard suites. The music is still good without any program information or knowing which friend is referenced when, but still I love the picture of him creating music in the moment for a small group to appreciate in the moment of its creation. We can experience music as the personal digital soundtrack to our lives, and we can still experience it traditionally as a spontaneous act of creation for the limited number of listeners who are there to experience it.

Movements:

Preamble
1. Le comble de la distinction
2. Le cœur sur la main
3. La désinvolture et la discrétion
4. La suite dans les idées
5. Le charme enjôleur
6. Le contentement de soi
7. Le goût du malheur
8. L'alerte vieillesse
Cadence
Final

Chopin-Variations in A, “Souvenir de Paganini”(1829)

Every now and then I fall into a listening rabbit hole where I explore music from one composer for a few days, sometimes spilling into weeks or months. Right now, I’m back with Chopin. Odd choice, because I’m already familiar with him, and there’s tons of works in my “to listen to” list that are gathering dust while I replay the same nocturnes again and again. Chopin was the first composer that got me into classical music, so maybe because of how stressful the world is to live in right now, I’m turning back to something comfortable and familiar. And despite the familiarity, some Chopin has been hitting my ears as if for the first time. This “souvenir” is a set of delicate variations on Paganini’s Carnaval of Venice. Instead of virtuosic scratching violin solos, we get Chopin’s delicate nocturne-style piano writing and compact variations over a simple repeating bass. A precursor to his later more elaborate Berceuse. And it’s probably the mix of being a charming melody with a simple harmony (I-V-V-I almost throughout) that got this piece stuck in my head. The earworm’s been living in my brain for three days, but I don’t mind too much. Each variation adds a new arabesque figure into the mix, new ornaments, glittering extra-notes, and baroque figurations. And the calmer atmosphere makes me feel like I’m listening to music that could go on forever, constantly playing around with the melody. Feeling like one of those summer afternoons you wish wouldn’t end.

Ogiński-Polonaise in a minor, “A Farewell to the Homeland” (unknown arrangement) (1794)

I’m not above using a Harry Potter reference, but remember when Hermione picked up that brick of a book and said she was doing some “light reading”? That’s how I feel carrying Alan Walker’s ~700 page biography “Fryderyk Chopin, A Life and Times” out of the library. The name Ogiński comes up in the early chapters on Chopin’s childhood compositions and performances. Prince Michał Ogiński was a diplomat, military leader, and national hero for late 18th/early 19th century Poland. He also composed polonaises for the piano, and this one “A Farewell to the Homeland” is the most popular. The impressionable Chopin was greatly influenced by this music. I was listening to this and struck by how much of a resemblance to his mature style is here…except this *isn’t* the original polonaise. I cannot find any information on this arrangement, but it is a lightly Chopin-ized version of the more simple original, with little ornamentations, modulations, and added voices. Unfortunately since this was my introduction to the piece, the original is somewhat disappointing (although, historically, more believable). Even with these post-Chopin elaborations, you can still hear the strong influence on Chopin’s style, and makes me wonder about the nature of a “piece” of music. Is this arrangement inauthentic for trying to recreate Chopin’s style? Or is it a loving performance of a traditional polonaise that tries to retroactively translate it into Chopin’s style because he defines the idiom of 19th century polonaise? It is a shame that I can’t find more information on who arranged this, and makes me think of a downside to the Internet where so much information is shared but can easily be severed from its source and be left to float around as a digital mystery. As far as I can tell, this youtube video is the only evidence of this arrangement existing. If anyone knows more, please reach out to me! The polonaise opens with a melancholic melody, and the phrase ends with a gorgeous sighing cadence. We jump up the keyboard a bit into a B section that features a very flashy, more Lisztian cadenza that even evokes cimbalom mallets. The trio is charming, bright, and more classical. It continues its homage to Chopin’s style by recreating military fanfare. I am disappointed that I’ve fallen in love with this obscure rendition of the work, where there are no other recordings and where it wrongfully presents itself as the 1794 Ogiński original. But at least this arrangement is its own act of composition, even while being derivative of Chopin’s ‘juvenile’ style (which despite using this word, is nowhere near “juvenile” in its musical brilliance).

Do you have a song that you like a lot but generally skip in your playlist? Because playing it means listening to it for an hour on repeat.

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Figuring it out over time

There is nothing stopping you from making everyday life more enjoyable. Put on that piano mix when you’re writing your essay.  Wear your cat-ear headband at work just because you love it. Take a picture of that cute flower you saw when running errands. 

Life can be gruelling and there are many things you have to do, but please take the edge off of them for yourselves.