Piano by Beethoven at the Houston Symphony

Taken from the vantage point of a 5 year old ... LOL

After tonight’s performance I was literally speechless and totally blown away. I went to the Houston Symphony for the second week in a row while feeling rather under the weather, still suffering from one sickness after another. My friend Anna and I split a package this season and each picked half of the concerts we’ll see together. Tonight’s performance was one of Anna’s picks, and although I was fully aware that I am a huge fan of piano music and of Beethoven, I was not expecting to hear two of my very favorite pieces in the same night. The second movement of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto #5 (Emperor) has been one of my favorite pieces for as long as I can remember, and although I know every note backwards and forwards, I couldn’t put a name to the piece.

The first piece we heard was great … although it wasn’t a piece I have listened to very often it was very enjoyable. The second piece (which was a modern composition by a local composer) was something of a train wreck. The composer explained that his intention was to convey the resilience of humanity … however Anna and I wondered if he was trying to make his point by testing our resilience to suffer through 25 minutes of dissonance and cacophony. In all honesty, a few fleeting moments in his work were nice but then the music would suddenly go sideways and fall completely apart.

The surprise was after not really recognizing the first movement of Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto, that I was dropped to my knees by the wonderfully familiar, perfectly memorized, intensely beautiful second movement. Big fat tears cascaded down my cheeks while every note was so soothing, so tender, aching and lovely. It seems hard to imagine that I could love a piece so completely and know it so exactly, yet not remember its title. The pieces of music I am drawn to are the ones that draw out my emotions, and this is one that tenderly, patiently draws out pure love and elation. It’s so odd how one piece can be mere notes in your ears and another can be so much more than just the music that you hear.

To completely push me over the edge, the pianist delighted us to an encore of another of my very favorite and completely memorized pieces by Beethoven … “Pathetique.” My dad actually gave me a recording of this piece what feels like a lifetime ago. It is one that I have depended on through the years as “comfort music,” as people refer to comfort food. It is so plodding and calming and reassuring. The slow tempo forces me to slow down and calm down and then it’s like the music says out loud to me “everything is going to be okay” and reassures me that everything is right with the world.

Thank goodness I had the foresight to pack lots of Kleenex!