The Piano

Russian composer Nicolai Medtner had it all; he was a brilliant pianist who was a musical intellectual, and while he could have made a comfortable living playing the classics, he was devoted to his composition.

On The Piano this Sunday, three aspects of Medtner.

I first present the lyrical genius of the composer, then his love of structure and complexity with his theme and variations, and the program concludes with his grand expression of lyricism in the Ballade Concerto in e minor.

In pop music, pieces featuring the "original artists" are usually big sellers. These are the performances we heard first and are used to -- not the cover songs performed by other artists years later. Some pieces are so familiar that we mentally hear the scratches and pops on the 45's that we had at home back in the day.

When I sit back and think upon my youth my thoughts often turn to television; I am an American after all. One program that gripped me in those days was "In Search of…" where Leonard Nimoy would explore various topics; everything from Bigfoot to the mysterious underwater monoliths thought to be the foundations of Atlantis.

Think back to how families used to celebrate the Holidays. For some of us, it was sitting in front of the TV watching a Charlie Brown special, and going back another twenty years, Dad would play disc-jockey, keeping the records spinning on the Hi-Fi. Back another generation, families grouped around the piano with someone, who hopefully spent some time practicing, played Christmas carols for the mini-multitude to sing along.

On "The Piano" this Sunday, a collection of riveting pieces that have Slavonic roots. First, Sergei Rachmaninoff and his new, modular approach to music; whether he consciously or unconsciously chose tolling bell patterns as a basis for his 2nd piano sonata, the effect is the same as a great festival in which, at the conclusion, all the church bells get involved.

Then there is Mily Balakirev, who explored the height of piano virtuosity with his "Islamey," featuring a soloist who was never known to rein in his power and audacity - Vladimir Horowitz.

Franz Schubert had great friends, and he needed them. His father wanted him to teach school, but Franz was built to compose music, and what started as a family hobby turned into an all consuming passion. Giving up his teaching job, Schubert turned to his friends, and with their help he was allowed, slowly and painfully, to become the artist he knew himself to be.

This country is always in motion, or as one shipping company calls it "moving at the speed of business." Before the question of slavery became a civil war, American's enjoyed their minstrel shows, and after the conflagration, touring minstrel shows were once again one of this country's favorite pastimes.

This Sunday on "The Piano," music that has many fathers, music that comes together, ferments a bit and becomes something new - different and distinctly American.

Arrogant, willful and brusque, not paying attention to how he dressed or even to combing his hair, Ludwig van Beethoven wasn't a man cut out for high society. Luckily in Vienna, the upper crust loved and understood music, and with that introduction, Beethoven was exactly in the right place.