Ulysses, David Finckel and me

The stuff on the Internet! How does anyone get any work done?

Every day I feel like Ulysses who had his men strap him to the mast of the ship so he would not be able to heed the call of the Sirens.


I got that right, don't I? My knowledge of mythology is not great and most of it comes only from Schubert songs. People in Schubert's era, they knew their mythology. We are so stupid in comparison.

Speaking of which, back to me and the Internet. I have written before about the site Instant Encore and it is the source of constant distractions.

Because every day in my email it seems there will be something. If you sign up as a fan of someone on Instant Encore, the site lets you know whenever something new about that person is posted.

Now, I understand this can turn into a problem. So I have signed up as a fan of only three people. One is JoAnn Falletta, the music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. Because of my job as Buffalo music critic I like to know what is going on with her and what people are saying about her. Another person I signed up as a fan for is Leonard Pennario, because he was my buddy. But that is not too much of a problem because I am the only person in the world writing about him. I cannot believe the site even lists him!

The third person I signed up for is Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau because he is a singer I am just crazy about. Now there is my problem.

You throw something at me about Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, I will stop in my tracks and look!

And they have a way of doing this so it is irresistible. You get this note in your box. "New Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau video! WATCH NOW." That "Watch now" and all you have to do is click. Who can resist? Not I.

Today it is this cellist, David Finckel, taking apart Fischer-Dieskau's vibrato. I am serious.

Finckel is this intense and intellectual guy sitting at the piano and he has this gizmo that measures sound vibrato. And he turns and says to you, "Today we take apart the vibrato of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau in the Schubert song, 'Du Bist Die Ruh.'"

Now he's got me! This is a song I love!

Finckel, sitting there cradling his cello, plays the first lines, which of course are silken, seductive, beautiful. He listens, blinking, watching the screen. And I guess you can see the sound waves vibrating. I don't know. I forgot to watch. All I was doing was listening. And, I have to say, enjoying the idea of someone else listening along with me. That never happens!

And the time is passing.

I see this is "Talk 19: 'Du Bist Die Ruh.'" Now I am thinking, what about the other 18 lectures? They must all be out there!

Woe is me!

That is a picture up above of the cellist David Finckel who sabotaged my morning. He is posing with the pianist Wu Han. They have recorded with violinist Philip Setzer. He is from the Emerson Quartet. And I love to talk about my worst interviews of all time. The great Mr. Setzer was one of the best. He probably does not remember it. But it was!

However that is another story for another day.

How am I ever going to get my work done?

Hark, the herald

Hilariously crabby British Web log post about carol singing.

These British!

They would not last two seconds on our side of the pond.

Imagine, griping because a group of carolers is at your door singing "Silent Night." Here in Buffalo all we get is canned Christmas pop because anything else is considered politically incorrect. We are allowed "Feliz Navidad" because that is in Spanish and anything in Spanish is allowed. But it is this annoying song. At least the arrangement you always hear is annoying.

Another thing, try to organize a group of carolers. Just try. Every once in a while I think about it, because in my North Buffalo neighborhood you actually do see carolers, once in a while. But I usually think about it in July, when I do not have to consider the logistics.

The thing is, you would have to write out every verse and print it out so everyone gets a copy. Because I do not think most people can get through even the first verse of most Christmas songs. You would think they would be able to get through one verse of "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing" but trust me, they can not!

Someone in the Wall Street Journal worried years ago that America is letting go of its wide popular knowledge of, say, campfire songs and Stephen Foster songs. I think it is true of Christmas carols too. This is certainly a trend to track.

So I marvel at these Brits, sighing because the carolers who come to their door do not sing "Jesus Christ The Apple Tree."

Poor babies.

Mysterious Mr. Masselos

It is funny, all these pianists I have never heard of! I was looking up Leonard Pennario's debut in this book called "American Chronicle: Seven Decades in American Life." For some reason they have his debut in 1939 which, neither he nor I could make sense of that.

Well, what the heck, we are lucky he is in there at all. Normally no books ever mention him!

But here is what I am getting at. Also listed as debuting in 1939 is this pianist William Masselos.

I have never heard of him!

That is a picture of William Masselos up above. Not a bad-looking gentleman except I wish I could find other pictures so we could get a couple of perspectives. Anyone can look good for one photo anyway.

Oh, look, here is another picture of him as part of the Alan Hohvaness Artistic Circle. Our man Masselos is in the back row, third from right. If you look carefully you can also see Merce Cunningham and John Cage.


Wikipedia says Masselos studied with two disciples of Clara Schumann at New York's Institute for Musical Art, now the Juilliard School. I had not known that Juilliard used to be called the Institute for Musical Art. Now I do.

Also I like the word "disciples" used in that context. Disciples of Clara Schumann!

Masselos was known as a champion of contemporary music and premiered Charles Ives' First Piano Sonata and Aaron Copland's Fantasy.

And how about this, he was born in Niagara Falls! His parents moved him to Colorado when he was a baby, but still. It's funny, any entry you see on this guy, in any listing, there it is: Born in Niagara Falls, N.Y. He died in 1992.

Here is Masselos on the organ playing Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

Now that we know who he is.

Land of the Laendler

There is this great video of these people who learned to dance the Laendler by watching "The Sound of Music." And here they are dancing it at a wedding.

Everyone is applauding and laughing!

What a world, where you can get out there on the dance floor and bump and grind and no one thinks anything of it, but you dance the little Laendler and everyone screams with laughter! It sure makes you think, I will say that.

Mozart and Schubert used to write music for the Laendler. Mozart generally called his "German dances." People who love "The Sound of Music" should explore these other Laendler.

And, perhaps, learn to dance it themselves!

Will the real Von Trapp please stand up

This is off my usual beaten track, my usual beaten track being Schubert and Hugo Wolf, but I have been listening to the soundtrack to the Broadway musical "The Sound of Music." It has Mary Martin and Theodore Bikel. There is some kind of anniversary. Fifty years or something. Who knows.

What I am realizing is I prefer Theodore Bikel to Christopher Plummer as Captain von Trapp.

Theodore Bikel owns that role!

There he is up above, with Maria and all the Kinder. Here he is with Maria.


Theodore Bikel loved playing Captain von Trapp. That is, ahem, what he told me. I interviewed him a few years ago. The down side of that is, I was really stressed out and out of it because I had three interviews scheduled that day. The interview with Theodore Bikel was the third, and it was so disastrous that it had a lasting effect on me: I instituted the Theodore Bikel Rule which I still follow. It is not to schedule more than one interview in one day.

But Theodore Bikel was gracious to me in spite of me not having done my homework. Not exactly "nice," but gracious.

One thing he told me was that once when they were all out eating, Richard Rodgers kept getting up and bowing whenever the sound system played one of his songs. He says Rodgers was bowing every five minutes.

Another thing was that Rodgers came up with "Edelweiss" at the absolute last minute. He felt the show needed that one song to anchor it. I read that the same thing happened with Andrew Lloyd Webber and "Evita." He felt it needed that special something. So at the last minute he wrote "Don't Cry For Me Argentina."

These signature songs, they were last-minute additions!

Anyway, Theodore Bikel further confided to me that "Edelweiss" was kind of a tough thing for him to swallow because being Jewish he had no great love for Austria, because of Austria's history of anti-Semitism. So it was goofy that at the last minute Richard Rodgers comes running up to him with this song.

Now whenever I hear this "Edelweiss" I keep thinking of my little heart-to-heart with Theodore Bikel. I still have it on tape somewhere. He also told me though that even though he had reservations about things like "Edelweiss," he loved playing Captain von Trapp, and he would have liked to have played it in the movie. Especially as the role went to Christopher Plummer who was vocal about not liking it.

Christopher Plummer ...


... what a snippy pain!

Theodore Bikel told me that the trouble was, he and Mary Martin were a kind of matched set. She was too old to play Maria in the movie so they had to get a new Maria. And that meant he had to go too.

That is too bad! Theodore Bikel would have been better in the movie than Plummer as Captain von Trapp. Bikel had that adorable German accent. He once played a Nazi in "The African Queen." And he looks good, too. Admit it.

Theodore Bikel owned that role.

He and Mary Martin sang this song "An Ordinary Couple" which was not in the movie. In the movie, Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer sang "Something Good."

"Something Good" is better.

But still.

Richard Strauss - "Allerseelen"

Today is All Souls' Day so here is a song I have loved since I was a teenager. So romantic!

There is nothing like early Richard Strauss.

Hugo Wolf

Today I was ranging around the Internet and came upon this photo of a monument in Graz, Austria -- I think -- to Hugo Wolf.

Hugo Wolf is a composer I love.

And I love his name in Italian. It is Ugo Wolf!

That is how the Italian photographer identified his photograph of the Austrian monument to Wolf.

Wolf seems to get bashed a lot because people consider his songs boring, or tough to take. I disagree. Maybe I am made for this stuff. I like Chekhov plays too and everyone is always trying to tell me they are boring. I remember once watching "Uncle Vanya" and thinking, this could go on all night and I would love it, watching various scenes unfold, listening in on various conversations.

One song of Wolf I love is "Verschwiegene Liebe." That piano! Hypnotic! A beautiful video too, with translation. There is this girl who loves Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and she does beautiful videos to go with his performances.

Not that she loves Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau more than I do. No one loves Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau more than I do.

Where was I? Hugo Wolf.

Wolf wrote beautiful religious songs that put people from Scriptures into a context that is very loving and human. He was sometimes inspired by paintings and it was as if he could take a picture and put you in it, so you can feel what the people felt and sense what they sensed. One Wolf song I love and keep going back to over the years is "Nun Wandre, Maria," about Mary on the way to Bethlehem. You can feel how tired she and St. Joseph are getting. Not to mention the donkey she is riding on! I bet the donkey is getting pretty tired too.

I can't find that song on YouTube. I looked and looked. Alas!

So here is "Schlafendes Jesuskind," or "sleeping Christ child." I love how the song ends, with a kind of tender question.

Once I visited Hugo Wolf's grave in Vienna. It is surprisingly erotic. Most people do not warrant a gravestone like this! Here is a picture.


Hugo Wolf wrote a song called "Anakreon's Grave." In the song you kind of stumble on the grave, you wonder whose it is and oh, it is Anakreon's.

Winter, summer and fall the happy poet enjoyed
Now finally this stone protects him from winter.

That is my own translation of the last few lines. Isn't it beautiful? The poem is by Goethe. The author Robert Gutman used that quote to preface his biography of Mozart.

This is such a beautiful thing to be doing on an autumn night.

Listening to Hugo Wolf.