I know I am, so I’m heading to the theatre tonight. Here’s a little Bartok to tide you (me) over. The Ammadeus Quartet plays Bartok’s String Quartet number four, fourth movement.

Since I’m on a YouTube faves kick, here’s a movement from one of my favorite string quartets. The Hugo Wolf Quartet plays Bartok’s fourth string quartet, first part, Allegro, with a little cinematic treatment. (Sorry, the clip kind of cuts off at the end.)

One of my favorite alto players, showing his range as a musician and band leader. Paquito D’Rivera!

One of my favorite songs from one of my favorite movies… The Band with the Staple Singers, for your enjoyment.

Before I had kids and became obsessive about school politics and hockey, I used to play music. The last group I played with before laying down my saxophone was Poli Chavez y Sus Coronados. The Coronados were an innovator of the “Tex Mex” sound in San Diego, and Poli brought the band’s cumbia, ranchera and conjunto rhythms with him to Portland in 1978.

I met Poli through his son in 1996 or 1997, and played a few Quinceañeras, weddings and anniversary parties with the band. Poli’s book was thick; there were probably a hundred or more well-worn charts in the alto sax book he handed me at my first rehearsal. Most of the songs were standards, but I’d never played any of them. After one rehearsal and one gig basically sight reading, I begged him to let me take the alto book out of his sight and photocopy some of the songs I really needed to practice, like the classic Rico Mambo. He grudgingly let me take it, and I still have my copies.

The Portland version of the Coronados was a family band. I replaced his son on alto sax. Another son played tenor sax, and his son-in-law played trumpet.

Though Poli was something of a legend in the world of Tex Mex music, few in the Portland Anglo community knew about him. Their best chance to have heard him was the annual Cinco de Mayo festival at Waterfront Park, where he was a mainstay. The last time I worked with him was on the main stage there in 1997.

Napoleon “Poli” Chavez passed away in 2003. I missed it at the time, and only found out when searching for some of his recordings online the other day. My sincerest condolences go out to his large extended family, especially the guys I worked with. Poli was a larger-than-life figure, and touched the lives of many people, myself included.

After the break, there’s a photo montage tribute, featuring songs from his 1976 LP “Mi Nueva Ilucion.”
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And why not a little Poncho Sanchez to liven things up…

Thelonious Monk “Rythm-a-ning”, 1961

I’m working on a post about school equity, and a map of closed public schools, charter schools and private schools in north and northeast Portland. While you’re waiting for that, listen to this.

It takes great chutzpah to choose Rachmaninoff’s infamous 3rd Piano Concerto as an 18 year old. It takes even more chutzpah — and raw talent and sheer dedication — to pull it off with aplomb.

Judy Park did both Saturday with the Portland Youth Philharmonic. Park led off the PYP’s final concert of the season, also the final Portland concert with Mei-Ann Chen as Conductor.

As chance would have it, Wacky Mommy and I put off buying tickets until just before the show, and chose seats I normally wouldn’t consider from the few that were remaining. Front row, keyboard side, with a perfect view of Chen, Park (and her hands!) and the first violins. Park nailed Rach 3 technically, with strong backing from the orchestra. It was an audacious choice of material. Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote it to show off his own virtuosic piano skills, and many seasoned professionals shy away from it. It’s considered the most difficult concerto in the classical piano repertoire.

Despite all these warning signs, the young Ms. Park plunged ahead and pulled off not only a stunning technical display, but also a nuanced, emotional and powerful rendering of the beast. It left me wanting to hear more of Park, and I have a feeling we will have the chance to hear much more from her as she matures as an artist and enters the professional world.

After the intermission, the brass section took up two opposing formations for a brief antiphonal fanfare by self-taught Japanese Composer Toru Takemitsu, from his Signals from Heaven. Takemitsu claimed Debussy as his “teacher”, and Chen followed his sleepy fanfare with a Debussy Nocturne.

The evening was capped off with Béla Bartók‘s Concerto for Orchestra. I’m kind of a Bartók nut, so this was a great capper for the evening. There is nothing on this Earth that compares to sitting in the front row with your eyes closed, enveloped with the three dimensional world of sound sketching the ethereal outlines of Bartók’s soul onto your psyche.

I’m ashamed to say that this is the first PYP concert I’ve been too. I’m very sad to have missed Mei-Ann Chen’s tenure here. Judging from her final concert, she is something of an undiscovered genius. She had an obvious rapport with the musicians (several of them presented her with flowers and touching tributes at the end of the evening). But she is also an obvious task master, a stickler for details, and forceful, emotive and sure in her conducting. She had this band of teenagers playing together in ways many (ahem) professional orchestras don’t pull off on a typical night.

You still have one last chance to hear Chen lead the PYP, May 27, 2007, 4:00 PM at the Resort at the Mountain in Welches, Ore., featuring highlights from the ’06-’07 season.

Those who know me off-line (and some who have only read about me here) know that before I developed a mid-life obsession with playing hockey, I had an avocation as a musician. I’ve played out on alto sax, clarinet, bass guitar, string bass and guitar. Music is thus very evocative to me in terms of moods, times and spaces. I once had an argument with a writer friend of mine who insisted that language is more specific than music. My response is that music is every bit as precise; in fact more so.

Anyway, without any more rambling, here are Thirteen Pieces of Music You Should Take The Time to Really Hear:

1. Beethoven’s 9th Symphony I know this is totally cliche to say, but this really is about as close to perfect as you can get with a musical work. As Homer J. Simpson would say, “This show has everything!” It was my favorite record when I was eight, and I still get goose bumps when I hear it. Wacky Mommy got me a nice CD of it by the Cleveland Symphony for x-mas.
2. Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 13 A.K.A. “Pathetique”. I’m listening to it now, recorded by Glenn Gould in either 1980 or 1983 (stupid liner notes aren’t specific) on CBS Odyssey. Ludwig van and Glenn Gould are a formidable combination.
3. I’ve often thought it would have been nice to have started out on strings instead of winds (my first instrument was cornet) and have become a cellist. Maybe that’s why I’m so fond of chamber music, especially string quartets and trios and piano trios and such. You can’t go wrong with Any Beethoven String Quartet. Pick one and listen to it uninterrupted. Then listen to it again.
4. Any Brahms String Quartet. See above. Pay attention to form.
5. A composer friend turned me on to Bartok’s string quartets when I was working in a sheet music store in Beaverton, Ore. I special ordered the score to read along with, but the best way to listen to his quartets is with the lights off, sitting perfectly centered between your speakers. I recommend Bartok’s String Quartet No. 5 Sz 102. Bela was writing rock ‘n’ roll in 1935. Then there’s Bartok’s String Quartet No. 3 Sz 85 which you shouldn’t listen to if you’re feeling anxious or touched. Old Bela wrote some choice cello lines in this one. (Note: If you’re not already comfortable with the string quartet, you should start with some Brahms and Beethoven, and turn on with Bartok when you’re ready to blow the doors off. Seriously. Work up to these.) I’ve got a nice recording of Bartok’s three, four and five recorded by the Chilingirian Quartet in 1988 on Chandos.
6. I never appreciated Bach until I played Bach, first on clarinet, then on guitar, and finally on piano. There is a mathmetical precision to his rhythms and harmonies that are best understood and felt from the inside. With two voices, he could weave a tapestry with richly implied harmonies. With four voices he can lose all but the most intrepid listener. I can’t get enough of his simpler works, like the Two- and Three-Part Inventions, BWV 772-801. I have a recording by Glenn Gould, in which he reorders the pieces to better fit his interpretation. I’m so used to hearing them in this order, it sounds odd to hear them in the order in which they were written. This recording by Gould is on Sony Classical, recorded 1964. My wife requested that we play this CD for the birth of both our children.
7. One final classical entry. If you like the two-part inventions, and the three-part inventions left you wanting more, take the next step to Bach’s The Art of the Fugue.
8. But enough of the old stuff. Let’s move into the second half of the 20th century at least. Get right into it with Thelonius Monk’s Brilliant Corners (Riverside, 1956) featuring Sonny Rollins on tenor sax.
9. Keep that inimitable Monk groove going with Monk’s Music (Riverside, 1957) to get a sense of the places the 32-bar popular song form can go. Deceptively cute melodies are backed by jagged swing rhythms and complex harmonies both sublime and strident, and give way to solos by Ray Copeland on trumpet, Gigi Gryce on alto sax and both Coleman Hawkins and John Coltrane on tenor sax. Ruby my Dear alone is a clinic by Hawkins in playing the hell out of a ballad on the tenor sax. (Somewhere I think there’s an outtake of Coltrane playing the lead on this at the same session, but the CD I have today does not have that as a bonus track.)
10. Moving up a couple years to 1958, you’ve got to get cool with Miles Davis Kind of Blue. Featuring Cannonball Adderly, my favorite alto player, trading solos with Coltrane, this record is so well worn that Davis’ solo on So What has become as important in recognizing the song as the head itself.
11. Speaking of Coltrane, let’s move right up to 1960, put on a sweater and listen to some of his own compositions. John Coltrane’s Giant Steps, that is. A mind-blowing record in 1960, it can still open your eyes.
12. Almost done, and it’s tough to figure what I’ll leave off… Definitely not Mingus Ah Um/Charles Mingus. Absolutely one of the most important jazz albums in my collection.
13. Finally I leave you with a Latin jazz selection, Poncho Sanchez Cambios (Concord Picante, 1991). Go ahead and get up and dance to this one, featuring Freddie Hubbard on trumpet and flugelhorn. This is some of the funnest music I can think of to listen to. I’ve heard Poncho live a few times, and he puts on a hell of a show. These guys tour like mad, and there’s fairly high turnover. This is his band at a peak, anchored by the incredible bass and timbale combo of the Banda brothers, Tony and Ramon. There is nothing locked-in like the rhythm of brothers playing bass and drums (think Aston and Carlton Barret). If I ever got back into the music world, it would be playing (or composing/arranging) music like this.

No, seriously, if you take the view (as I do) that everything in life is metaphor, you can learn valuable life lessons in anything you do.

For instance, in a previous avocation as a musician, I played bass. In hockey, I play defense. (I’ve come to realize that I spent the first half of my adult life living “This is Spinal Tap.” Now as I enter the middle of life I’m living “Slap Shot.” In the words of Reggie Dunlop, “Fuck ’em.”)

If you’re not familiar with music and hockey, here are the similarities between bass players and defensemen:

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