Friday Miscellanea

Here is an article about how both birds and humans make vocalizations: "A common mechanism for human and bird sound production." The way it is written is slightly confusing, but what they are saying is that both birds and humans use a physical mechanism called "myoelastic-aerodynamics" to produce sound. In humans this oscillation of vocal cords occurs in the larynx, but in birds it is located in the syrinx, located deep inside their bodies, so difficult to study. Different organs, located in different places, but they seem to be saying that the actual mechanism is very similar. Sadly, no illustrations!

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Here is something rather interesting: Kirill Gerstein writes about pianist Radu Lupu in the New York Review of Books. It is a pretty good article, given the usual journalistic blind spots: no technical vocabulary or description which forces the writer to utter things like:

Motivic repetitions become perceptible as rhymes, the structurally important is differentiated from the ornamental, the stretching and contracting of musical time acquires an internal logic and a living, breathing musical structure emerges.

Well sure, but all good performers do this. Also, it is deliciously ironic that this article is about Radu Lupu who, for the past two decades, as is noted in the first paragraph:

has chosen not to record any music. He does not allow radio broadcasts of his playing, he does not give press interviews, and he has almost no social media presence.

And of course the article embeds two recordings of his performances. Were they just not paying attention? By the end of the article we realize that the occasion for the writing was the issuance of the complete catalog of Lupu's recordings up to 1996 when he stopped recording. So it's a kind of record review. Of a guy who has forsworn making records. Ironic.

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If I have inadvertently micro-agressed anyone in the course of this miscellanea I would like to offer a micro-apology:

I'm sorry.

And now back to our regularly-scheduled program.

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Here is a rarity, both the piece and the performer: Grigory Sokolov playing the Geistervariationen by Robert Schumann.

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Cultural appropriation of the week: Luna doing John Lee Hooker on double-tracked kotos:

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I'm not a big fan of Slipped Disc which often seems to merely sensationalize classical music news. But here is one interesting and amusing item. Norman Lebrecht summarizes recent reviews of Lang Lang in London, which seem to remove all doubt about his strengths and weaknesses. My favorite line: "what should be filigree seems more like shrapnel" in his Chopin. Wish I had said that!

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This blog likes to talk about philosophy in connection with music, but I suspect a lot of musicians are not terribly fond of philosophy. I think that this brief interview with philosopher Lydia Goehr might be an example of why. It seems as if she is on the verge of offering some really interesting insights, but ends up by beating around the bush and polishing up a couple of half-truths. Yes, if you reduce music to the way it is often used, it doesn't seem very mysterious. But that is a bit like saying you understand how internal combustion engines work by watching a drag race.

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I suppose the logical envoi today would be to once more violate Radu Lupu's choice not to record by, yes, posting a recording of him playing. This is Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Piano Concerto No 23 in A major K 488; Radu Lupu, piano; Sándor Végh conducts Wiener Philamoniker:

Oh no, nothing mysterious there... Well, except that Maestro Végh seems to be conducting from a minature score.