Music Quotes and Thoughts – Feb 2010
Feb 22 2010
“After playing Chopin, I feel as if I had been weeping over sins that I had never committed, and mourning over tragedies that were not my own.” - Oscar Wilde
Yiyi’s thoughts: beautiful words. After hearing Chopin, one feels as if one has heard that beautiful melody before; it sounds so familiar yet distant, so simple yet profound. Today is Chopin’s official birthday on record, although he himself and his family referred to March 1 as his actual birthday. Since there is no way of proving which date is the true birthday, in Warsaw, they are giving him a week-long birthday celebration, with a marathon 171-hour non-stop concert, featuring more than 250 musicians and singers playing day and night from Feb 22 till March 1!
Feb 19 2010
“Schumann loved and admired Chopin, but Chopin didn’t care for Schumann. After Chopin’s death it is reported they found the Schumann Concerto wrapped up just as Schumann had sent it. Chopin hadn’t even had the time or curiosity to look at it!” - Guiomar Novaes (1895–1979) – Brazilian pianist
Yiyi’s thoughts: the piano was Chopin’s one and only love besides himself. He never married. Schumann, on the other hand, was happily married to Clara Wieck, the daughter of his former piano teacher. This year is the 200th anniversary of both of these two great composers’ birth.
Feb 17 2010
“From a very young age I was fond of Chopin, and especially his mazurkas. At that time inexpensive editions did not exist, my parents’ means were very limited (my father was a French teacher in the Vilnius high school), and I personally copied all the mazurkas of Chopin, and not on music paper, but on plain paper that I made lines on.” - César Antonovich Cui (1835–1918) – Russian composer - quote found on YouTube user Beckmesser2‘s channel.
Yiyi’s thoughts: the things people do for love – in this case, love of music. I am assuming Cui is referring to the 58 published Mazurkas, which total something like 180 pages! Even if one was to copy all the notes onto pre-printed manuscript paper it would take a LONG TIME! How lucky are we that today most of the Mazurkas are in public domain and anyone can download them for free on the internet. I for one am inspired by this quote to learn a couple new ones!
