This Week in Classical Music: January 25, 2021.Calendar Quirks.Why couldn’t Fate be more even-handed?She, the Greek goddess of Time, is responsible for our lives, the moments we are born and die, so why couldn’t she spread geniuses more evenly?Take 52 of them – and there have been at least that many since the time of Josquin – and just deliver them once a week!But no, she’s capricious or doesn’t pay enough attention to these things.So, four days after Mozart’s birth on January 27thshe gives us Schubert!And even that is not enough for her: just next to them she places two important composers of the 20th century: the Polish Witold Lutoslawski and Luigi Nono, an Italian.And then Édouard Lalo of the Symphonie espagnole fame and John Tavener, the Brit made popular by his minimalist Orthodox music. Clearly, she wasn’t done with this week, as, for good measure, she placed two great pianists, Arthur Rubinstein and John Ogdon within it too.And she seems to be keen on the cello because Jacqueline du Pré and Lynn Harrell, who unfortunately left us last year, were also born this week.And just to top it off, she decided that Wilhelm Furtwängler, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century, should also be born this week.
There is not much we could say about this cornucopia, but we can play some music.Here is one pair: the 1961 recording of Arthur Rubinstein playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 20 with Alfred Wallenstein conducting the RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra. And here is another: Wilhelm Furtwängler conducts Schubert’s "Unfinished" symphony.The recording, with Furtwängler’s Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, was made live in 1953. We would’ve loved to play Franz Schubert's Piano Sonata in C minor, D.958 in John Ogdon’s performance – we know that he made that recording in 1972 – but we don’t have access to it.We’d love to share it with you some day.
Calendar, 2020
This Week in Classical Music: January 25, 2021. Calendar Quirks. Why couldn’t Fate be more even-handed? She, the Greek goddess of Time, is responsible for our lives, the moments we
are born and die, so why couldn’t she spread geniuses more evenly? Take 52 of them – and there have been at least that many since the time of Josquin – and just deliver them once a week! But no, she’s capricious or doesn’t pay enough attention to these things. So, four days after Mozart’s birth on January 27th she gives us Schubert! And even that is not enough for her: just next to them she places two important composers of the 20th century: the Polish Witold Lutoslawski and Luigi Nono, an Italian. And then Édouard Lalo of the Symphonie espagnole fame and John Tavener, the Brit made popular by his minimalist Orthodox music. Clearly, she wasn’t done with this week, as, for good measure, she placed two great pianists, Arthur Rubinstein and John Ogdon within it too. And she seems to be keen on the cello because Jacqueline du Pré and Lynn Harrell, who unfortunately left us last year, were also born this week. And
just to top it off, she decided that Wilhelm Furtwängler, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century, should also be born this week.
There is not much we could say about this cornucopia, but we can play some music. Here is one pair: the 1961 recording of Arthur Rubinstein playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 20 with Alfred Wallenstein conducting the RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra. And here is another: Wilhelm Furtwängler conducts Schubert’s "Unfinished" symphony. The recording, with Furtwängler’s Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, was made live in 1953. We would’ve loved to play Franz Schubert's Piano Sonata in C minor, D.958 in John Ogdon’s performance – we know that he made that recording in 1972 – but we don’t have access to it. We’d love to share it with you some day.