The Symphony, a Ritual?

It bothers me when I attend a symphony concert. So many people come out to see the NACOrchestra play Mozart, the Boston Pops, or whatever’s on that week. NACO seems to get a large crowd for their 2000-or-so seat hall and on a bad day they might still get about a thousand in there. The program booklet has a full page of corporate donors written in small print (although the donations are made to the Arts Centre itself and not to the orchestra), and people see it as a ‘valid’ or ‘proper’ thing to be doing if your were to go out one evening.

Cazzati’s Ciaconna

The examples I am posting are two of my favourite performances ever. It just so happens they are of the same piece – I don’t think it is my favourite piece of music ever, but it is very pleasant to listen to.
The first example is of a live performance taped for a video by L’arpeggiata, lead by Christina Pluhar.

Maurizio Cazzati’s Ciaconna by L’arpeggiata

To Begin With

A month ago or so, my friend Alice sent me a link to a page on Indiana University’s website. I decided that it would be a good idea for my future music career to read some of the books that were recommended there. Boy was that a good idea.