{"id":349,"date":"2009-04-20T05:36:06","date_gmt":"2009-04-20T05:36:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp\/2009\/04\/life_and_death\/"},"modified":"2012-01-18T15:44:08","modified_gmt":"2012-01-18T20:44:08","slug":"life_and_death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/2009\/04\/life_and_death.html","title":{"rendered":"Life and Death"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a seminar, I ask each of a group of young pianists to talk very briefly about a piece they know &#8212; as they might speak to an audience before performing. I urge them to be pithy, personal, compelling. I don&#8217;t like the &#8220;Beethoven-was-born-in-1770 approach,&#8221; I tell them. Music is important. It engages with the big questions, I say.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nOne seminar participant asks me to give an example of the sort of commentary I want. So, I say: &#8220;Imagine I&#8217;m about to play Liszt&#8217;s B-Minor Sonata for an audience. I&#8217;d go to the piano and say, &#8216;<em>This<\/em> is a piece about death.'&#8221;\n<\/p>\n<p>\nSomeone blurts out: &#8220;How do you know that?&#8221;\n<\/p>\n<p>\nAlmost as quickly, I retort: &#8220;I know that, because it&#8217;s a piece in the key of B Minor. And all pieces in B Minor are pieces about Death.&#8221;\n<\/p>\n<p>\n<span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\" style=\"display: inline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/MunchDeath.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"MunchDeath.jpg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/assets_c\/2009\/04\/MunchDeath-thumb-300x273-4480.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"273\" class=\"mt-image-center\" style=\"text-align: center; display: block; margin: 8px auto 20px;\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a seminar, I ask each of a group of young pianists to talk very briefly about a piece they know &#8212; as they might speak to an audience before performing. I urge them to be pithy, personal, compelling. I don&#8217;t like the &#8220;Beethoven-was-born-in-1770 approach,&#8221; I tell them. Music is important. It engages with the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1560,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[528,527,47,171,26,530,529],"class_list":{"0":"post-349","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-audience","9":"tag-b-minor","10":"tag-beethoven","11":"tag-death","12":"tag-liszt","13":"tag-musical-signification","14":"tag-performer-speaks","15":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/pianomorphosis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}