Immortal Beloved

Both followed a known style in their early days. Sinatra with jazz and Beethoven with large orchestras. Then ventured into their own styles as they became more popular. Sinatra grew up when jazz was just being perfected and written down in musical form. The great Louis Armstrong was a leader in the field and IMHO one of the greatest musicians of the 20th century. The way he could bring new voice to a trumpet was almost magic. Wether NY, KC, NO, or Chicago style Jazz is a truly American music, one of two. The other being bluegrass. Both have roots in what could be called the lower classes. For bluegrass the music of the highlands and Ireland and for jazz the African slaves. 

I suppose the culture of the times or zeitgeist, plays into how the arts develop. There never could have been two centuries of classical music without an underlying development of music in churches and synagogues. I think without the reformation western music would have been stuck in Gregorian chants. 

That Bach documentary made note that the church was the conduit for, and catalyst of, classical music. It’s who paid for it (mostly) and where it was regularly played. There were obviously rich patrons. But if you wanted to hear Bach, you pretty much had to go to church.

And then, for better or for worse, it became more “secularized.” I think it’s likely that the church often exerted undue influence. But at the same time, I think it likely provided the discipline, structure, scope (and money) to keep the really good ones (Michelangelo, for instance) doing something more beautiful and worthy than sticking Jesus in a jar of urine and calling it art.

Back a coupe of years I wrote an essay on music for ST. I think reprinting fits in to our discussion


It Didn’t end

With Mahler


Gustav Mahler, 1860-1911, was the last of traditional composers of the 19th century. His First symphony, composed in 1887/88 is a capstone to the late romantic period of classical music with numerous themes, some of which also appear in Das Lied von de Erde (Song of the Earth). Like many composers in Europe Mahler traveled to America. With his death in 1911 what was left of traditional classical music also died. Although, the style continued for a while in the USSR with Sergei Prokofiev. What happened to all the musicians, composers and conductors post WWI?


Quite simply, they went west, far west, following Dvorak, and Mahler in the mid 30s Erich Wolfgang Korngold moved to Hollywood. In 1935, he composed and directed the score of Captain Blood, followed by The Adventures of Robin Hood, Anthony Adverse, The Sea Hawk, and Kings Row. In the classical tradition Korngold and others, Miklos Roza, Dimitri Tomkin followed suit.


On Broadway 100 years ago, music was mostly minstrels with catchy songs. Then Asa Yoelson discovered in New Orleans, jazz; and as he said, “you ain’t heard nothing yet”. Alongside the patriotic songs of George M. Cohan, Over There, Grand ol Flag, and Yankee Doddle Dandy. There was Jolson in the first talking motion picture (1929), singing jazz often in blackface. Breaking ground for other artists, and composers and lyric writers, like Rogers and Hammerstein. Some of the most notable, Oklahoma, South Pacific and of course, The Sound of Music. For Rogers, the soundtrack to Victory at Sea. This was a brief time when ABC, NBC, and even CBS maintained full symphony orchestras.


The ability, in the 20th century, for an individual to listen to music of his own choice in his own home created one of the great intellectual freedoms of the 20th century. By the 30s it was common to listen to the best performers of the day on either the radio or Victrola. The class exclusion of the formal concert was broken forever. John Q. everyman could listen to the greatest orchestras performing the greatest music of the West, Bach, Beethoven, and all the rest. And, with the introduction of jazz, a truly American music form, popular music transitioned from June/Swoon to Cat Scratch Fever in less than 75 years.


The easy availability today to download for only a few dollars the best of the art, even recordings made 100 years ago, digitally cleaned of flaws and enhanced to a more pristine listening form has revolutionized the experience. It should not be a wonder to any of us that our children and grandchildren have the earplugs in and are not listening to us. We can and should try to insist that they have more discretion. Music in all its forms, except perhaps some of the most offensive hip, hop/rap/gangster forms holds memories for all of us.

I recall my parents listening to Glen Miller, the Dorsey’s and of course, ol blue eyes Sinatra. The era they lived is long gone, depression, unemployment and war, but also swing, hot jazz and the beginning of rock can all be relived with a simple download. Our dreams and or memories are tied irrevocably to music.


Some of my best memories are of the late 70s and the mother of my oldest son. We never married, but in small ways with some of the music we shared we are still together almost 50 years later. My taste is more traditional and hers more contemporary. One of her favorites was a 1968 hit by, of all people, Richard Harris; MacArthur Park. One stanza she said was a favorite:



There will be another song for me

For I will sing it

There will be another dream for me

Someone will bring it

I will drink the wine while it is warm

And never let you catch me looking at the sun

And after all the loves of my life

After all the loves of my life

You'll still be the one



In 1979, she moved with our son and my blessings, to Israel. She never married and was murdered by a Palestinian just outside of Jerusalem in 96, she was only 36 years old. Our Son is now a Colonel in the IDF, and we have three grandchildren in Tel Aviv. Diane lives in my memories daily and as I age many faces grow dim, but when I hear the music they loved; the sights, smells, and pleasures of the moment return. I would not trade it for anything.

This isn't technically classical music, but it's my new favorite song:

Ahhh, them were the days.



I consider classical music appreciation an immunization from becoming the kind of wretch who sits on Facebook all day hating away on Trump, conservatives, and Republicans. I got a real-world description of that today. This conversation confirms everything I’ve said. Everything.

These are wonderful things if we will avail ourselves of them.

I’m not even halfway into the free sample of Lewis Lockwood’s Beethoven: The Music and the Life and I’m inclined to buy it.

I had tried the free sample of Jan Swafford’s Beethoven: Anguish and Triumph and the mere introduction was so off-putting that I couldn’t make it through three pages. You can (at least I can) quickly see the difference between a real biography and a vanity piece.

That said, god only knows why Lockwood’s introduction ran on so long. I read about five pages and skipped ahead to the prologue. But it didn’t have the same vibe of air-headedness.

Now to the good part: Download and read this if only for the free Prologue that includes the best exposition on the nature of art that I’ve ever read. For instance, can you know what is in a person’s music by reading about his life? The answer seems to be: Yes and no, but mostly no. The two different aspects of the advanced artist (his life and his work) are often so different that comparing the two is not only difficult but perhaps mostly irrelevant.

For instance, Beethoven’s handwritten letters were said to be barely legible. And yet his musical notations and musical notebooks were entirely minutely readable in the smallest nuance.

Lockwood quotes Schopenhauer in regards to how to think about “life and works”:



The author goes on and does not deny that there is some connection between Beethoven’s life and music (for instance, his early work, La Malinconia—“Melancholy”), as well as the apparent fact that Beethoven did often speak in a sort of metalanguage of music with self-conscious intent:



I thought this prologue was a very good guide, both for how to think about the music (not much…just enjoy it) and the man. Lockwood states early that for the very reasons he had noted, his biography will concentrate on Beethoven's musical development, and his other life will be noted here and there in passing but not as a central aspect in regards to “understanding” the music. That seems a fair approach given these stated tenets.

I’m going to tell you a little secret: I’m not bowled over by Beethoven’s 9th Symphony. I can see where it is “dramatic.” Maybe that was a crowd-pleaser then and now. But musically I found it dull other than the "na na na na na na na" part, which was a hilarious scene in the movie.

His fifth symphony, on the other hand, is a true masterpiece. I’m enthralled by it, and not just the famous part.

I think there must be some kind of musical pecking order that makes 9th symphonies generally so good. Beethoven, Mahler, Dvorak, Bruckner all did some of their best work in 9th symphonies. Even Mendlesshon 5th is really his 9th. The earlier are discounted in the count because they were written when he was a teenager.