Real men listen to Tchaikovsky

I'd like to consider myself capable of most things. But if I had only been able to hear with my ears and whistle with my mouth, that'd have been just fine.

Over the past couple days, I've stopped in the middle of what I was doing to make a mental note of something I wanted to include in this post. But now that I'm actually sitting here and writing, all I can really think about is the performance I went to on Friday night.

I have been lucky enough to do some pretty fun musical things in my life. I listened to Fuare in Cairo and have played a solo on stage at Carnegie Hall. The [free] concert last week at the UT recital hall ranks right up there.

I've wasted hours on Google video and youTube watching old videos of Vladimir Horowitz and Glenn Gould perform manic masterpieces with vigorous appeal. Jura Margulis is, in my opinion, one of the greats on this very level.

With masterful accuracy, he powered through Chopin, Debussy and Liszt. I can't believe this was a free concert... in Austin freaking Texas. There were maybe 100 people at this perfectly underpriced performance and the content was worthy of an NBC live broadcast.

I showed up in my duds, sweaty with frito pie in my backpack again making the whole auditorium smell much better than its typical olfactory persuasion. There were no ties in the audience. Mostly piano students and old people, the audience was there for one reason: to make sure good music continues to be recognized.

I have to break here and mention the fact that not a single cell phone went off during this concert. I just had to say it. The audience was perfectly manufactured to respect the colors of the pieces and consider the musical intention of its composers.

The audience's behavior is probably attributable to one of three possibilities.

1. Mr. Margulis was technically magnificent with precision comparable to a successful launch of the space shuttle.

2. Mr. Margulis has obviously played so many great pieces for so long that he has in fact related directly to the composers' emotion and performed the pieces with relative sincerity.

3. Mr. Margulis was able to smell the frito pie in my backpack which, not suprisingly, inspired him to heights which he himself had previously considered to be unattainable.

I think it's most probably a combination of the three.

It was such a colorful program. Chopin's two mazurkas were technically interesting and the Polish folk was kindly apparent. His Polonaise and Ballade were great. I don't remember which one did what, but they were both nice.

Then was a piece by Debussy, Reflets dans l'eau. Some people are happy to build houses. Others teach children. Claude, at some point, decided to make audible the light bouncing off of water. I'm happy he did. This, along with the last piece, kicked me in the forehead and launched my ass into another plane for not nearly long enough. The emotion this guy created, and Margulis's replication, left for a couple moments of perfection.

The best composers understand the idea that music has no place without silence. And the silence in between is considerably more important than any single note.

The last piece was Consolation No. 3 by Liszt. I'm going to include an exerpt from Wikipedia about Mr. Liszt and his style.

"
Paris in the 1830s had become the nexus for pianistic activities, with dozens of pianists dedicated to perfection at the keyboard. Some, such as Sigismond Thalberg and Alexander Dreyshock, focused on specific aspects of technique (eg the "three-hand effect" and octaves, respectively). While it was called the "flying trapeze" school of piano playing, this generation also solved some of the most intractable problems of piano technique, raising the general level of performance to previously unimagined heights. Liszt's strength and ability to stand out in this company was in mastering all the aspects of piano technique cultivated singly and assiduously by his rivals.
^"

The "three-hand effect" and octaves are most easily described to folks my age as the "wiggly" music played on the calamitous cartoons with a cat chasing a mouse uncontrollably through an especially breakable house.

I don't know what sort of technical classification covers his Consolation No. 3, but it was brilliant. Liszt has this perfect way of mashing 100 different notes into a tiny space and time to accomplish a generally energetic statement. He might do this a few times and just when you think he's playing notes just to make notes, he cracks it wide open and walks right down the middle of the room with a melody on a platter. It's ridiculous.

Anyway, Mr. Margulis combined tremendous talent with a clear understanding and presentation of what I consider to be some of the most beautiful music in the world. This is why I like Austin. I rode my bike to a private, free, world class concert, and was able to enter with my frito pie. Life is good.

I'm looking at Panama. I need a vacation. But I don't want to go alone. So I'm back where I started again.

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