Thought Picnic: That vulnerable sight of myself

Was and now

Sometimes, I have that strength that beyond reason of what I have lived and experienced is almost impossible to fathom.

My stride is determined, my appearance is probably debonair and my voice conveys authority and awareness of who I am and what I believe.

However, I am in many cases a little man, great affliction draws resources of power, faith and hope; I just believe I will not go under.

Gifts I hate

Then, something seemingly ordinary, an irritation in the throat, a cough and a cold follow like a caboose of the three unwise men of the Orient bearing gifts of tiredness, lethargy and weakness – my gait slows, my strides shorten, my voice fades, my speech cannot keep up with my thoughts and basically I am ill.

My mind works strenuously giving my spirit verve that I need to shake it off to return to my normal self but for all the willingness of the spirit, the flesh revels in weakness tardy at doing what I will to do.

I become a feeble shade of myself, my visage attaining legendary pallor with colour draining away that from afar they know that things are not so right.

Sleep to rise

One can still put up a show but a feeble “I” is not the most comfortable sight if you have aforetime known who I am.

I wish to just fall asleep and wake up rejuvenated but this condition sometimes comes with restlessness that puts sleep out of reach – I have sworn to myself never to succumb to drug-induced sleep.

Maybe some soft classical music and sweet thoughts of inner strength that revives will just be the tonic – I just hate being a very vulnerable sight of myself.

Viewing Vienna through New Year's music

Compelling entertainment

One tradition I try to maintain at the New Year is watching the Das Neujahrskonzert der Wiener Philharmoniker [1] which translates from German to the New Year’s Concert performed by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

The music is traditionally classical and mainly features the compositions of the Strauss family, however, this year [2] is the 200^th anniversary of Joseph Haydn’s [3] death and so some of his pieces were performed.

Conducting for peace

The orchestra usually has a guest conductor and the maestro for 2009 was Daniel Barenboim [4] an Argentine-Israeli with additional citizenships of Palestine and Spain who has worked tirelessly for the unified purpose of getting Israelis and Palestinians to work together especially through music.

He conducted one piece in the second session where one-by-one the orchestra left till he only had one player to conduct – interesting how the music maintained its context through what looked like a walk-out predicated by a strike.

The ticket

Tickets for these concerts are like gold dust and only be applied for [5] over a period of three weeks in January for the concert taking place the next year.

Prices could range up to 930 Euros, I just find a good television from where to watch it, and it is just as engaging until I befriend one of those aristocratic Austrian families who might invite me to their box.

Although not included in the programme [6, PDF], the traditional Blue Danube [7] and the participatory Radetzky March [8] were performed to great aplomb at the end.

They say the DVD would be out by the 12^th of January, I should be entertaining myself to one very soon.

Sources

[1] Vienna New Year's Concert - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[2] Barenboim and Haydn to premiere at Vienna New Year's concert

[3] Joseph Haydn - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[4] Daniel Barenboim - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[5] Drawing for Tickets for the New Year's Concert 2010

[6] Neujahrskonzert 2009 [PDF]

[7] YouTube - Herbert von Karajan conducts The Blue Danube Waltz

[8] YouTube - Johann Strauss - Radetzky March - Abbado Vienna 1991

The music of dead white men

What the Poles gave the world

Having written about the Polish brain drain yesterday, the list of notable Poles reads like a civilisation of ideas, talent, ability and genius better exploited in other lands and this is a shame.

In fact, I was not aware that Mikołaj Kopernik (Nicolaus Copernicus) the father of Astronomy was a Pole, even though when the Nazis occupied Poland they tagged his statue in front of the Academy of Sciences in Warsaw as German, a young teenager chiseled that usurpation of citizenry off one night, legend has it, he only suffered a night or two in a dungeon.

I was however, determined to see something about Maria Skłodowska (Marie Curie) who discovered radium and polonium which was named for the land of her birth when it was still under occupation and seeking self-determination through turbulent times. She was also the first to win the Nobel Prize twice for radiography and the isolation of pure radium, her family received five in all – however, there is only one museum that celebrates her in Poland and it was not even open 75 minutes before its stated closing time.

Fryderyk Chopin however is better acknowledged and celebrated, every Sunday in summer time cultural Warsaw gathers in the Royal Łazienki Park for free piano recitals under the grand statue of Chopin who sits gaze averted in the direction of Poland that he loves or from the occasional pong the wafts from the circular pond at the bottom of the plinth.

Both recitals at 12:00 and 16:00 were well attended and the performances were excellent, definitely of the highest professional quality from Professor Kazimierz Gierzod who won first prize at the Festival of Young Musicians in Gdansk in 1964 and Joanna Marcinkowska whose biography of pianist excellence reads volumes.

She played in the afternoon session and as her performance reached a climax the clouds rolled in but held their waters till we had applauded her extraordinary talent.

In the end, the music of dead white men has its enduring quality and this time, I am not talking of Elvis Presley whose shrine in Graceland would receive the multitudes remembering his death 30 years ago on the 16^th of August - I am talking classical music.