# Memories of music



## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I thought I'd start a thread devoted to personal stories and anecdotes about experiences we have had that relate to classical music somehow and those memories which we hold on to dearly as classical music lovers. 

So, if you have any stories about the most incredible concerts you've been too, musicians or composers you've met, or perhaps a piece of music that brings back feelings of nostalgia for a time in your life that you associate the piece with in some way or another, feel free to share your memories here!


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I may as well start off with two instances which really inspired my learning as a music lover and student composer.

The first one was when I bought my first box set of Beethoven's symphonies. It was an Australian recording by Porcelijn and the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, interpretation partially inspired by the HIP trend. Seeing as I already owned a recording of Kleiber's 5th and 7th _plus_ owning the score to the 5th I found myself really paying attention to differences in interpretation for the first time after a while of listening to various symphonies. On the first time round I listened to every symphony in one afternoon and what a great afternoon that was! The 4th symphony has been my favourite ever since that moment.

The second memory I wish to share was of a concert I went to back in 2010. It was put on by students at the Australian National Academy of Music and it featured an array of tape, electro-acoustic and purely acoustic music by various composers from the 1930s to 2010 (the present at the time). Some truly remarkable early tape/electronic works were presented to us via speakers, some later works purely for acoustic instrumental ensembles were also very interesting to hear, but one work in particular has never left my memory: "Chromatophore" for amplified string octet (2 each of violins, violas, cellos, double basses) by Anthony Pateras, which employed dazzling effects and material which at the time drew me into contemporary music more than any other piece had previously. It was actually the piece of music which made me decide to stop writing 3rd rate classical period imitation symphonies and sonatas and focus on trying to find a sound which came purely from myself.


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## scratchgolf (Nov 15, 2013)

Slightly off topic but can you provide a link to some of your compositions? I'd love to hear your works. Here or PM is fine. Your choice.


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

scratchgolf said:


> Slightly off topic but can you provide a link to some of your compositions? I'd love to hear your works. Here or PM is fine. Your choice.


Seconded........


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Memory:

I was at a Mostly Mozart concert one summer at Lincoln Center in New York City and the concert was interrupted, a TV screen was brought on the stage and a tape of Richard Nixon resigning the United States presidency was shown to the audience.
I will never forget that!


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Thought I'd rate this thread 5 stars, even though there are lots of threads rated five stars. I like it.

One of my earliest associations with classical music is something I really wish I could remember, but I don't because perhaps it didn't mean as much to me as it did to my parents and particularly, my grandmother. 

When I was two years old, I was kind of a temperamental child and I could throw serious fits. My parents were taking a big risk in bringing me to this organ concert by where we lived in Washington D.C. Supposedly, the music started and I was quiet the whole time. At the end, before the applause started, I said aloud, "that was awesome!" and many people around me laughed. 

What I do remember is an impression of how it used to help me get to sleep for my naps to have classical music playing. Otherwise I would never sleep and would hate naps. 

When I was in fourth grade, my passion for classical music had been deepening, and my family was on a long road trip across country. I figured out that CDs could be played on our primitive portable DVD player and listened to Brahms Hungarian Dances, Johann Strauss Waltzes, and Tchaikovsky Ballets(which I enjoyed the most, perhaps) for much of the ride. Then I remember having all kinds of questions and wanting to lug my parents to the CD store to purchase more music. 

We did the same road trip when I was 17 and I was more troubled then, but I remembered that road trip 8 years from then, and it helped me to get aquainted with the CDs I had chosen to bring along then, Beethoven's 7th and late Haydn symphonies.

I remember when I first started going to symphony concerts when I was in 3rd grade. And then when I started up again, but on my own at adult concerts, when I was 17.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I remember when I was living in New York City some years ago waiting, seemingly forever, to buy a ticket to an Artur Rubinstein solo recital at Carnegie Hall.

Sitting in my seat, the anticipation and excitement were palpable, waiting for the entrance of this great man. My heart was racing!

I never heard Debussy played with such poetic delicacy and beauty of tone!

As an encore, Rubinstein launched into chopin's Heroic Polonaise, his trademark piece and everybody in the hall was shouting at its conclusion. I have never heard anything like it.

One of the greatest two hours of my life!!


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## senza sordino (Oct 20, 2013)

As a young child I remember my mother playing Chopin on the piano. And my uncle and cousin playing a Handel duet on their piano. 

I remember being taked to my first classical music concert as a late teen - Pictures at an Exhibition. 

Ten yrs ago, I saw a violin busker in Florence play the entire Bach Dm Chaconne from memory, and fairly well.


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## Dave Whitmore (Oct 3, 2014)

The only story I can share really is being entranced as a teenager by a piece of music on a television commercial for bread. It was a nostalgic sort of ad and the music really suited it. I never could ignore that ad when it came on, I would always listen to that music. It was February this year when I finally found out what that music was after listening to the 2nd movement of Dvorak's 9th Symphony. Hell, if I'd known then where that music came from I might have gotten into classical much earlier!


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## trazom (Apr 13, 2009)

Grew up listening to rock music my family liked: The Doors, Pink Floyd and "How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat!?" The Beatles, Queen, The Who, Ozzie and some other stuff I don't remember. Then I got into film music when I was in elementary school.

I went with my 5th grade class to the Orange County Performing Arts Center where they played the Nutcracker Suite.

Next year: Seeing Handel's G minor oboe concerto followed by selections from The Messiah. My grandpa went with us and made it through the oboe concerto at least, but fell asleep sometime during _He Was Despised_ most likely even earlier.

Spent the next three years playing the flute but not 'getting' or appreciating most of the music(except the duet renditions I'd play of Mozart symphony #40, the adagio from Eine Kleine nachtmusik, and the flute transcription of his violin sonata k.378). Though I had this Christmas CD and was struck by Tchaikovsky's music again.

-My passion for music and to learn to play piano started when I just started high school and saw a piano concerto by Mozart played along with an overture of his and the Jupiter symphony. I still have the program with me, but I memorized it anyway, and I've been playing piano and going to concerts ever since. So it was obviously a huge blow to me when I found out the pianist who played that Mozart concerto and whose career I'd been following died so suddenly, and at such a young age, just a couple years ago and it was only 4 or 5 months after I saw them perform Beethoven's c major concerto..

Nice thread, by the way.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

senza sordino said:


> As a young child I remember my mother playing Chopin on the piano. And my uncle and cousin playing a Handel duet on their piano.
> 
> I remember being taked to my first classical music concert as a late teen - Pictures at an Exhibition.
> 
> Ten yrs ago, I saw a violin busker in Florence play the entire Bach Dm Chaconne from memory, and fairly well.


That busker sounds incredible! I wish I saw that! 
In terms of busking, I once saw a busker playing Vivaldi's Winter concerto (accompanied by a CD of just the orchestra) which was pretty awesome.


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## QuietGuy (Mar 1, 2014)

It was Dvorak's Symphony #9, second movement ("Goin' Home"). My mother had cancer, and was in Hospice by then. I came to see her, and someone had put a CD on and she fell asleep. As I sat there watching her, I realized I had no business trying to will her to stay. The next night I told her that if she wanted to leave, I'd be alright. She died the next morning.

Later on, we spread her ashes in a meadow overlooking the Pacific. We prepared a little service for her, and brought along a boom box with the same Dvorak piece on it and listened to that as we spread her ashes. Obviously, that piece will now and forever be associated in my mind with my mother. It's very comforting and uplifting music.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

When I was a preadolescent I was already playing some bits of piano and guitar, and also listening to classical music (mainly Bach, Beethoven, and Chopin). Then I went to a concert. The program was Schumann's and Chopin's Piano Concerti (can't remember which of the Chopin). After that, I was so blown away that I decided I wanted to study piano and classical music more seriously.

Oh, the interpreter in that life-changing concert? Martha Argerich


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

aleazk said:


> When I was a preadolescent I was already playing some bits of piano and guitar, and also listening to classical music (mainly Bach, Beethoven, and Chopin). Then I went to a concert. The program was Schumann's and Chopin's Piano Concerti (can't remember which of the Chopin). After that, I was so blown away that I decided I wanted to study piano and classical music more seriously.
> 
> Oh, the interpreter in that life-changing concert? Martha Argerich


Man, you are so lucky! The closest we have in Australia is.....wait, we don't really have anyone remotely like Argerich here!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Man, you are so lucky! The closest we have in Australia is.....wait, we don't really have anyone remotely like Argerich here!


OTOH you have (or had) Sculthorpe. Enough to be thankful for, I think.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

KenOC said:


> OTOH you have (or had) Sculthorpe. Enough to be thankful for, I think.


Very true, but his music was already sounding a little twee by the time I was born. His _Sun Music_ series of composition are, imho, his best works.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Very true, but his music was already sounding a little twee by the time I was born. His _Sun Music_ series of composition are, imho, his best works.


I only discovered Sculthorpe recently, after his death in fact, and at an advanced age. There is a considerably broader range of his works I enjoy.


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