(Program)
London ffrr Recording. Printed in Canada // Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) // Symphony No.3 ‘Scotch’
London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Claudio Abbado
Symphony No.3
- Andante con monto
- Vivace non troppo
- Adagio; Allegro
- Vivacissimo
the experience of one symphony across three different orchestras and formats is exactly the kinda thing i had in mind when i started this journal: a performance of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No.3 by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra earlier this week, the London Symphony Orchestra’s recording of it on vinyl, and the Tehran Symphony Orchestra’s live recording above. moving from a whole week of haydn’s Quartets to this particular symphony is a jump that serves to accentuate the breadth and depth of the symphonic format. all i remember from when i first heard the Scottish Symphony in 2018 was how loud and heavy this symphony is, and as part of this blog is to continuously train my attention to musical detail, it helps to occasionally return to the same piece after an extended period to hear it as if for the first time. this time around it’s not the size of in entirety but particular stretches that grabs my attention: in particular the Scherzo—the specialty of which was highlighted by the TSO performance—and the Coda that caps the finale. in both instances mendelssohn’s talent as a melodist is front and center. the first movement is what gives the work its scale, a near 18 minute passage of themes, motif and development that i still find more confusing than entertaining; the Scherzo revives my attention with what appears to be an unidentifiable scottish folk song, a very catchy tune in the catchy style of beethoven’s Highland Harry. the third movement is much more listenable that the first, long and drawn out, but at least at a pace that seems to follow and decipherable trajectory. the final movement starts, much like the second, with a startle: another folk tune lurks in the material, reminiscent of the theme played on woodwind in the second half on the first movement, but in a major key. It goes on and on without quite establishing a satisfying resolution, at least until a short breath carries right into a coda that might have well been written as the Scherzo to a similarly sluggish movement. it’s theme of the coda i was whistling after the concert on thursday—but after the first four notes, it kept morphing into the theme from the main theme from the first movement of tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto. eerie how similarly inclined the two are…
this whole week has of course been cast in the horrible shadow of Kobe’s death. it still feels surreal every time it comes to mind, but its an unthinkable thing that the grief felt by the friends and family of the nine victims of that helicopter crash isn’t the intermittent kind that the rest of us feel. the legend of Kobe was a story the basketball world only began to tell with his final season, a farewell tour that ended with an exclamatory finale of 60 points—the highest point total by anyone in their final NBA game. the next chapter in the celebration of his career would have been at his induction to the NBA Hall of Fame, and from thereon his would’ve been a figure like that of bill russell or jerry west—men in their old age presenting awards and championship trophies to generations of players, the league’s subtle reminder of the giants on whose shoulders they are making a living. that’s gone, and the loss is incomprehensible. like the many people who never met Kobe, the intimacy of the sense of loss also feels incomprehensible. his career was and is the gold standard to anyone whoever picked up a basketball and felt and instant click in the logic of the game, a hidden grace in its balletic movements. his work ethic became a frame of reference for people who didn’t even watch basketball. i think for me it was his devotion to the game that i had and affinity for. raised in an ultra-religious household, religion was my first devotion; and even as the strength of that particular obsession waned, my capacity for devotion grew and merely looked for a host. i found basketball and poured all of that obsession into it. and as far as deities go, Kobe was exactly that in the basketball world, his name a short bi-syllabic prayer you would say as you launched your shot—be it with a basketball or a crumpled up piece of recycling. (one of the more heartbreaking things i’ve read on the internet in the last week was someone’s confession of the godlike idea he’d always had of Kobe, that he had never thought of Kobe and just a regular guy, and half-expected to see him walking away from the crash, carrying his daughter).
the farthest my attempts at introspection has managed over the years was the realization that i have a talent for devotion, the object of which is nearly irrelevant: by the end of high school, my devotion to basketball eventually moved on to continental philosophy, and thereon to music. for myself and many, Kobe was a personification of that peculiar talent, and to that end he worked harder than anyone is his profession. he was braggadocious about his work ethic, and that was the essence of his ‘mamba mentality’: no matter how hard you work, i’ll always work harder. of course that rubs people the wrong way, but it was always with a dose of admiration because he was often right. and because your work ethic is the only thing that is truly yours. the only thing you can take credit for, everything else is under the auspices of privilege. most biographies of classical composers i come across often reads like a listicle of privileges that i’ll never have the access to, but the other constant motif across their biographies is a sisyphean work ethic on top of whatever class and status has afforded them. it’s the latter that we can connect with, be it in beethoven or in Kobe. so it came as no surprise when, merely months after Kobe said ‘mamba out’ to a packed and grateful house at Staples Centre, he was slapped with an Academy Award for his short film Dear Basketball. of course he kept on working, of course he never stopped, of course that tremendous talent for devotion in him had only merely moved on to its next object. i remember that pang of fear, mixed with awe, when i heard of his nomination for that award: that i might never be able work as hard as he did. perhaps that might be true, but mamba mentality says try nevertheless.
(song of the week: Kobe Bryant plays Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata)
speaking of Kobe and beethoven, i’ll wrap this up with a video that’s been making the rounds since last sunday. that of Kobe playing the latter’s ‘Moonlight Sonata’, which was allegedly his wife’s favourite and he learned by his own ear and tutelage, at the refusal of a professional teacher. watching it is again a mix of awe and grief. grief for obvious reasons, but awe at the sight of a restless force of nature. to the families of the nine victims, i hope you once again find something close to the joy that these people brought to you.
Throwback to: Year 2, Week26
Click here for the full 2019/2020 roster