My introduction of Boston Mayor Michelle Wu at New England Conservatory’s Commencement ceremony on Sunday May 18, 2025. She received an honorary degree. Michelle Wu was a musician, a pianist, before she was a politician—and she remains a musician today. You might have heard her play George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue across the street at Symphony Hall with the Boston Pops, or music by Mozart with the Boston … [Read more...]
Russell Sherman (1930-2023)
At a memorial event in Jordan Hall in Boston on September 29, 2024, these were my remarks: This concert hall, this space, the vibrating air in here, the music that’s been heard, those sounds. The piano playing done on this stage... In 1907, Ferruccio Busoni played the piano right about ... here. Arthur … [Read more...]
Eno Piano
The album Eno Piano will be released by InFiné on November 10, 2023. Additional tracks will be released in 2024. My new album got started with a question: Is it possible to play Music for Airports on the piano? Brian Eno’s original studio recording contains a lot of piano sounds, but they are manipulated, redistributed, dehumanized, or rehumanized. And then there are long, long sustained tones. The … [Read more...]
“Gifted”
In the world of music conservatories, in the classical music community, exceptional musical talent is usually considered to be the ability to quickly recognize pitches by ear, the possession of reliable musical memory, and the athleticism and dexterity to navigate complex patterns on an instrument. We have not considered imagination, or artistic idea-making. Perhaps these are difficult to recognize? Perhaps it's assumed that with fine skills will … [Read more...]
A Way Forward
My opening remarks in the discussion "A Way Forward: Toward Greater Musical Diversity," at New England Conservatory, in conjunction with three concerts of piano music by musicians who studied or taught at the Conservatory. Those of us educated in conservatories and schools of music in the United States must recognize and acknowledge our privilege. In the 19th and 20th centuries, conservatory communities did not provide cultural equity, or … [Read more...]
Evidence
My introduction of Emanuel Ax in May in Boston, as he received an honorary doctorate from New England Conservatory. "For a long time the listeners of the world have admired -- for a long time, the listeners in the world have loved Emanuel Ax. Hearing him play Century Rolls, the piano concerto written in 1997 by John Adams for him, first played by Mr. Ax and the Cleveland Orchestra, I was thrilled. As I was thrilled hearing him play Brahms’ … [Read more...]
Filtered
As I hear my student playing the piano through Zoom, just for a moment, I think I am hearing Paderewski in 1912. The sound is imperfect. At moments it drops out. There are distortions of speed and rhythm. Yet, my ear, my mind is hearing music: completing and linking together the aural information that is there. As an adolescent, and thanks to the public library, I listened to a lot of recordings made by pianists of the early 20th … [Read more...]
All in
During 2020, at New England Conservatory, it happened -- every piano piece by Ludwig van Beethoven was performed. There was a series of 12 concerts involving 73 different NEC students. All 36 piano sonatas were played, 21 sets of variations, and every other piano piece! Six of the concerts were played live during February and March. After the pandemic arrived, the rest of the programs were streamed during the fall. Studying remotely, many … [Read more...]
Everest
Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay climb Mount Everest, 1953 excerpts from my remarks as part of the webinar “ResiliArt: Classical Music’s New World” presented by the Global Foundation for the Performing Arts and UNESCO, June 22, 2020 “…Now, we need to be living music so that it matters, so that it’s useful. We are in an intense period of artistic interaction — technologically enabled. Music is a group activity. "Music and … [Read more...]
Stand-Up Guy
My remarks at the beginning of the second of 13 concerts of Beethoven’s complete piano music played by New England Conservatory students during 2020. Let me tell you... I almost never do stand-up comedy on a Thursday night. Friday is better. Sometimes even Tuesday can be good. I mean not a Thursday though... tonight is a Thursday right — and you see what I mean. You can see how this is going, … [Read more...]
Raggin’ the Classics
To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, to throw a perfume on the violet..."William Shakespeare: King John Electronica artist Max Cooper and I launch a new project this spring, a collaboration called “Glassforms.” It’s a commission from the Philharmonie de Paris and we will play it as part of their Philip Glass weekend in May. Shows follow in London, Barcelona, and Bordeaux. We overlay electronic sounds — onto … [Read more...]
“I have cap and bells”
After a prospective student played Maurice Ravel's "Alborada del gracioso," I asked the not-so-simple question: "What's the melody? Ravel: "Alborada del gracioso," (1905) from Miroirs The student did not have a ready answer; after a moment suggesting the opening melody might be the music played by the pianist's left hand: It seems to me that "Alborada" utilizes the technique (seen in Franz Liszt's piano music) of dividing a musical line between … [Read more...]
Dispatched
Dispatched from the Audition Room (mit Bolzano auch dabei) After the third day of piano auditions at New England Conservatory, I attended an evening recital given at the school by one of my piano faculty colleagues. Backstage, he said that while he was playing he imagined my stern voice from the audition room. Making a fairly unpleasant face, he told me, "You know when you say, 'Mmmmm, not really good...'" The cold fact is that from about … [Read more...]
Piano Sonata as Video Game: Anomalies in My Reception of Beethoven’s Music
A transcript of my spoken remarks at Boston University last week, as part of a symposium on piano sonatas by Beethoven. “I’d like to talk about what I would call anomalies in my own reception of Beethoven’s piano sonatas. “I can certainly remember -- as I’m sure many of you can remember -- a time when I first played through a piano sonata by Beethoven from beginning to end, in a kind of performance. It was in my living room, I think I was … [Read more...]
Digging to France
When I tell a U.S. colleague about several concerts I'm playing in France he says: "You're Jerry Lewis!" The French, it's true, have a long tradition of appreciating U.S culture, and yes, that silly American comedian/auteur was highly venerated in France, perhaps more so than in the U.S. The French public have had a great love of jazz from America, and American movies. Earlier, there was a taste for ragtime, and minstrelsy. Today, American-style … [Read more...]