This year I sent a large contribution to Chicago's classical radio station, WFMT. It is, as far as I know, the best classical music station in the country. You can give them a listen online, and tell me if I'm wrong.
Anyway, they were so grateful for my enormous gift, which could only be described as philanthropic, that they sent me two CD collections: The Complete Works of Mozart and The Complete Works of Beethoven. I've enjoyed CD's from both sets, though I'm not sure I'll make my way all the way through either of them. (Did I mention that it was a large contribution? I could have bought a congressman!)
There was something about the collections that got my attention, even before I played the first CD. Can you guess what it was?
Beethoven lived for 56½ years, Mozart for almost 36. Making no statement on the relative quality (as if I could), the surviving body of Mozart's work is almost exactly twice as large.
"Too many notes," indeed.
And there could be no better time to recall Tom Lehrer's profound observation, many years ago now, that, "It is a sobering thought that when Mozart was my age, he had been dead for 2 years."
I might have exaggerated the size of my contribution a little bit. Except for the part about buying a Congressman.
1 comment:
Don't forget the story of Beethoven's lost 10th Symphony: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beethoven%27s_Last_Night
It was his best...
On a more serious note, Amazon was selling Mozart's 99 best works for .99 a while back, so I bought that. It's amazing how much classical music I picked up as a kid without knowing it.
Post a Comment