The Fine Art of Listening

We’ve all done it – you wake up in the middle of the night with the greatest idea to have ever been had by anyone ever. You write it down on a scrap of paper, and go back to sleep. The next morning, you wake up, ready to start on your great idea. But first, some coffee. And you know, a good cup of coffee is best washed down with a cheese danish. After breakfast, well, you need to have a shower to really be awake. Then you sit down at your computer to start planning your project. Check your emails. Facebook. Watch some cat videos to get you in the mood. Your mother calls (interrupting your favorite video, no less!) Now it’s time for lunch.

You get the idea.

Modest Mussorgsky completed only one opera, Boris Godunov. However, he is best known for his Pictures at an Exhibition, and his musical nightmare A Night on Bald Mountain. It is likely you’ve heard these two great pieces, but here’s the thing: the version you know wasn’t actually written by Mussorgsky. Both were originally piano compositions that were later orchestrated by Ravel and Rimsky-Korsakov respectively. And it doesn’t end there. When Mussorgsky died, left no fewer than NINE unfinished opera projects. Thankfully, his friends (a group of composers, known as the Mighty Handful, who were forging a distinct Russian musical style) completed some of the works he left undone. One of those is Khovanshchina, an opera which was finished again by Rimsky-Korsakov.

Mussorgsky’s marvelous sound is crafted from eastern European folk songs and scales against a rich modal accompaniment. It’s also important to remember that much of the magic of his music comes from having great orchestrators who finished the job for him.

It’s Wednesday. Hump day. Humps. Camels have humps. Camels. Camels make up a caravan.

Yup folks, that’s all I have for you today. But fear not, because even if the writing is poor, the music is good. Caravan is a 1936 jazz standard written by Puerto Rican composer Juan Tizol, who was a trombonist in Duke Ellington‘s orchestra. By the 1930’s, jazz had become a mainstream and permanent part of the American cultural landscape. Tizol’s influence sparked an interest in Latin-American musical styles and opened new doors for American jazz.

I was having a discussion this weekend with some friends about a choir that sings to people as they are dying. I suppose some people would find this morbid, but to me (and my musician friends) there is nothing more natural. It turned out that a number of us not only had our funeral music picked out, but we also had “last pieces” picked out for our final hours of consciousness.

A friend of mine, in her early 20’s, needed a very risky surgery; the doctors said she had a 15% chance of dying during the procedure. She asked if the “Agnus Dei” from Faure‘s Requiem could be playing as she was given anesthesia; if she died, she wanted her last thought to be of the music she loved. She survived the procedure, and a year later, I was honored to participate in the performance of the Faure Requiem that she conducted. Now, when I hear that piece, I can’t help but think about her bravery.

If I had to go through what she did, I’d choose Chopin‘s Nocturne in Db. Oddly, this piece doesn’t have any significant meaning to my life. I just think that the last 16 bars (4:48 to the end) would be the perfect soundtrack for a sweet death.