I want to call reader’s attention to a lovely comment from Harriet Gedge, daughter of conductor David Gedge. I’m so happy to hear that David is coming along in his march to recovery, but it sounds like a truly arduous process.
Other news today- over at oboeinsight, we have the revelation that not all classical musicians are smart. Patricia’s post was inspired by a rather silly news piece about a cellist robbing a bank, but there are plenty of other examples. One of my favorite moments was on tour in France with one of the IU orchestras as a student. We’d just had a long, frustrating rehearsal of a Mozart concerto under a not-very-good conductor. One of my roommates, also a cellist, and I were bemoaning the lack of style and general elegance in our orchestra’s Mozart and I said something really deep like “Mozart’s music is really hard.” At this point, our third roommate chimed in with this one-
“Mozart is easy, you just count the rests and play the notes.”
Trust me, he wasn’t being ironic or making a sly point. No worries, though- he’s gone on to be principal _______ at one major orchestra and associate principal at another. Lack of brains or interest in music doesn’t have to be a handicap as long as you can get your fingers around the first page of Don Juan.
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