I am an utter disappointment to the marketing executives at Apple. Though I am an accomplished musician, I have yet to buy in to the whole ipod culture. I own an ipod—a thoughtful mother’s day gift from my family—but it sits in a drawer, idle, and many generations old. I also have an itunes account that carries an expired credit card number. I do not use it, so I have no need to update it. Don’t get me wrong—I have nothing against this technology, or even Apple’s monopoly of this segment of the music world. It’s just that this whole business simply does not fit the way I consume music.
I imagine that most people who use ipods are not dissimilar users to my kids and my husband. They snap up every new album and immediately load it on their playlists. Sometimes they bother to stratify their tracks, separating the few classical items from the “vintage hits,” soundtracks of musicals we have seen on Broadway, indie samplers, concert albums, and acoustic specials. Mainly, my husband uses the shuffle feature, serving up tracks from every genre in random order like a musical version of Russian roulette. I cannot stand it!
Listening to recorded music is like a journeying to a million destinations. Each piece—whether classical or not—is a personal treatise of the composer’s or artist’s state of being. It is not white noise that drones incessantly in the background; it is experiential. I find myself standing in the snakeskin boots of a country singer done wrong as easily as I follow the sturm und drang of a 19th Century harmonic progression. For this reason, I prefer not to listen to my own collection ad nauseum, but rather enjoy the surprise queue of the radio. When a Beethoven Symphony comes on, it typically is not the Bernstein collection that I own and recognize immediately; it is a fresh interpretation that peaks my interest with unpredictable phrasing. I enjoy each gesture, the conductor’s choice of tempo, and the signature tone of the orchestra’s woodwinds. Similarly, I love SiriusXM’s Coffee House for the acoustically naked reworkings of pop and rock songs. Music is so much more than the notes on the page. Performance offers infinite variations.
There is an even more exciting element to radio listening, however: the karmic serendipity of it all. The radio is a character in the sitcom of my life. I will stop short of suggesting that the Almighty Himself is spinning records just for me, but there is musical providence in the daily toil of my life that bears documenting.
I’ll give you an example. My nephew visited this past weekend for the purpose of securing an apartment for his upcoming surgical residency. As he texted me that his flight had touched down, the radio began playing the last movement of the Mozart Clarinet Concerto—which my nephew’s father (my brother) performed at the peak of his high school music career. If any single piece of music could be considered emblematic of my brother, this movement would be it. It serenaded us through the Ted Williams Tunnel, coming to a close just as we pulled up at the airport curb.
A few weeks ago I was sitting in morning rush hour traffic on my way to my hairdresser’s house, where she cuts my hair in her kitchen. I am fortunate to have this relationship with Nancy, as the alternative is the same haircut by the same woman, only for a much higher price in the Newbury Street salon where she works. As I exited the highway, a selfish driver with a particularly large gas-guzzling vehicle straddled the lanes in front of me crosswise, trying to insinuate herself across the intersection after the light in her direction had already changed. As a result, the car next to me and I were completely gridlocked, unable to advance when our light turned green. Out loud to myself, I said, “Augh! I cannot believe this!” At that very moment, the last movement (not the “duh-duh-duh-dah” first movement) of Beethoven’s 5th began its enigmatic opening, a set of chords that, in college, we music majors set to the words: This. . .is. . .sim-ply-not-to-be-be-lieved!
After a recent and surprising phone call from my mother, I turned on my car to find that the finale of Brahm’s 1st Symphony was playing. It’s lovely theme, vaguely reminiscent of “Ode to Joy” (earning the symphony the nickname “Beethoven’s 10th”) was used as the alma mater at the High School of Music and Art in New York, where my mother once sat next to Billy Dee Williams in homeroom.
After my father passed away two years ago, the Hungarian folksong Czardas was practically a fixture on the local Boston classical station. On a number of occasions, it was the piece that woke me when the radio alarm clock went off in the morning. My father played this piece as soloist at his high school graduation. I had the opportunity to perform with him as his accompanist on this same piece for his 40th reunion. Just as strangely, Khatchaturian’s Sabre Dance was playing when my daughter texted to inform me that she had made the finals at the National Women’s Intercollegiate Fencing Championships. Her weapon: sabre.
Just today I was thinking about how my blog-writing was consuming so much time that I was neglecting the piano. I am hoping to compete in an amateur competition in Poland in 2014 with an all-Chopin program. On my way home from settling my tax matters, I heard a particular Chopin Mazurka on which I am working. It is a beautiful piece that I selected for my program after viewing the manuscript in Chopin’s own hand at the Morgan Library in New York. It was a gentle but pointed nudge to tend to my other commitments.
How dull my life would be if I played and replayed the same versions of the same tracks from my ipod. I wonder whether our kids are enriched by what they are piping into their brains or sensory deprived by what they are not. I choose to allow music to enrich my life, providing its commentary with interactive whimsy. It is a constant companion, a supportive friend, and never ceases to amaze or amuse me.
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