While driving to a friend's this evening, I had my car windows down and was enjoying the light and refreshing breeze. One hand on the wheel, the other on the radio dial, I tuned in to my favorite all-classical music station...the one I used to play 24 hours a day in the nursery when my children were babies and toddlers. And while listening to a piece of music, I was carried back to my childhood...We went quite regularly down to Ontario Place, a beautiful entertainment venue at the lakefront, and sat to watch open-air concerts that took place, the Toronto Symphony playing with many talented and world-renowned soloists accompanying the orchestra.
To sit on the benches under the covered roof, or on a blanket on the grassy hillside, if we were too late for the concert, was a beautiful setting. The breezy air, the stars overhead, airplanes flying overhead and momentarily drowning out thunderous applause or magnificent music, the cawing of seagulls overhead... All lent themselves to the beautiful ambience of listening to classical music.
I can almost guarantee that if any of you readers -- even those who normally wouldn't be listening to classical music, favoring rock music, alternative, heavy metal, even R & B or country -- tune in to a classical music station, while under a canopy of stars and dark sky, or driving at night with a warm breeze on your cheeks and slightly mussing your hair, you will be caught up in the music, in the magic of the moment.
Get musical with Mendelssohn; slumber with Stravinsky; vacation with Vivaldi; repose with Rimsky-Korsakov.
Classical music...what a gas!
3 comments:
Thank you for reminding me of some of the more important (intangible) things in life! I'd forgotten about the following: a classical music piece I'm especially fond of is Felix Mendelssohn's Opus 20 - for strings - which he wrote when he was 16. It has so much of the urgent promise of youth in it!
Jeremiah: thanks for commenting. You picked a wonderful composer and piece of music. I used to love classical piano music the best, primarily because I studied piano. But as I got older,I realized the violin was where it's at, when listening to music. The richness, the way those strings capture a life and a soul have so much more depth. The sounds from the violin imitate a human cry much better, even laughter is mimicked. Just think of klezmer music...
Yes, yes. You're on to something about the power of the violin... Strings and vocals - they just transport me.
One regret I have is getting rid of a massive collection of classical CDs. I know why (morally) I did it, however, but still.... It's time to replace that Mendelssohn disc!
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