Yom Kippur is when we Jews face up to the way we lead our lives. The cantor uses the liturgy to break open our hearts and try to pry open God’s. But if there were going to be a secular soundtrack, it would have to be Bach’s Cello Suites.
Continue reading...113: J.S. Bach, ‘Prelude to Suite #2 for Unaccompanied Cello’ (Casals)
084: Dmitri Shostakovich, Prelude & Fugue No 16 in B-flat Minor (Tatiana Nikolaeva)
As our hearts weep with the innocent Ukrainian victims of Russian aggression, our thoughts turn to Dmitri Shostakovich, a courageous human being and a great composer who lived and worked under the shadow of Soviet oppression.
Continue reading...077: J.S. Bach, ‘The Art of The Fugue’ (The Emerson Quartet, ‘Contrapunctus 9’)
Listening to Bach isn’t so different from prayer. They are both human attempts to impose an artificial order upon an inherently chaotic world.
Continue reading...005: Glenn Gould, Toccata in Cm (J.S. Bach)
Why do I so respect Glenn Gould? Because his playing is willful, extreme, eccentric. Because it’s utterly engaged.
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