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Scott Timberg on Creative Destruction

Brilliant Chamber Music Series

September 7, 2012 by Scott Timberg

SINCE I first fell hard for classical music in my mid-20s, my favorite style to see live is chamber music. Early on, I think that came from my love of seeing rock n roll and small-combo jazz in small clubs. The intimacy of a string quartet in, say, an old stone church had some of the same energy and directness.

In recent years, perhaps the best venue for chamber music I’ve found is the Clark Library which is and isn’t part of UCLA. (Okay, it’s part of the university but on an archipelago closer to USC’s campus than to Westwood.) I’ll probably always remember the performance by the Takacs Quartet, especially their Janacek.

The Clark itself is a long and fascinating story — lovely old Italianate building, built by local eccentric, now known for its holdings of 17th/18th c. British materials as well as more stuff on St. Oscar (Wilde) than you can believe. It’s worth strolling the grounds, checking out the architectural details, and staying after for the receptions with the musicians.

But go for the music (and the acoustics.) The release and schedule is here. (NOT easy to get into — there’s a lottery.)

I’m especially pleased to see the series commitment this year to Shostakovich, one of my favorite composers and one who could turn pain into beauty and perhaps vice versa. (The Russians have a knack for that.)

And here is a video on youtube.

See ya there, gang.

Filed Under: chamber music, classical music, Los Angeles, ucla, west coast, Wilde

Comments

  1. anum harryson says

    October 14, 2012 at 10:56 pm

    Nice goals! simple and attainable. I havnt set any goals for my blog yet – but I know I should.

Scott Timberg

I'm a longtime culture writer and editor based in Los Angeles; my book "CULTURE CRASH: The Killing of the Creative Class" came out in 2015. My stories have appeared in The New York Times, Salon and Los Angeles magazine, and I was an LA Times staff writer for six years. I'm also an enthusiastic if middling jazz and indie-rock guitarist. (Photo by Sara Scribner) Read More…

Culture Crash, the Book

My book came out in 2015, and won the National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Award. The New Yorker called it "a quietly radical rethinking of the very nature of art in modern life"

I urge you to buy it at your favorite independent bookstore or order it from Portland's Powell's.

Culture Crash

Here is some information on my book, which Yale University Press published in 2015. (Buy it from Powell's, here.) Some advance praise: With coolness and equanimity, Scott Timberg tells what in less-skilled hands could have been an overwrought horror story: the end of culture as we have known … [Read More...]

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