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JAMES RHODES
Instrumental
Published in Great Britain in 2015 by Canongate Books Ltd,
14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE
This digital edition first published in 2014 by Canongate Books
Copyright © James Rhodes 2015
Quote from ‘A Poet’s Advice to Children’ from E. E. Cummings, a Miscellany, edited by George James Firmage. Published by Liveright Publishing Corporation.
Quote from ‘After War, a Failure of Imagination‘ by Phil Klay © 2014,
Phil Klay and The New York Times.
The moral right of the author has been asserted
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 78211 337 9
Export ISBN 978 1 78211 534 2
eISBN: 9781782113386
Typeset in Bembo STD by Palimpsest Book Production Ltd,
Falkirk, Stirlingshire
For my son
‘If we fetishise trauma as incommunicable then survivors are trapped – unable to feel truly known . . . You don’t honour someone by telling them, “I can never imagine what you’ve been through.” Instead, listen to their story and try to imagine being in it, no matter how hard or uncomfortable that feels.’
– Phil Klay, veteran, US Marine Corps
CONTENTS
Track One: Bach, ‘Goldberg Variations’, Aria (Glenn Gould, Piano)
Track Two: Prokofiev, Piano Concerto No. 2, Finale (Evgeny Kissin, Piano)
Track Four: Bach-Busoni, Chaconne (James Rhodes, Piano)
Track Five: Beethoven, Piano Sonata No. 32, Op. 111, Second Movement (Garrick Ohlsson, Piano)
Track Six: Scriabin, Piano Concerto, Last Movement (Vladimir Ashkenazy, Piano)
Track Seven: Ravel, Piano Trio (Vladimir Ashkenazy, Itzhak Perlman, Lynn Harrell)
Track Eight: Shostakovich, Piano Concerto No. 2, Second Movement (Elisabeth Leonskaja, Piano)
Track Nine: Bruckner Symphony No. 7, Second Movement (Herbert von Karajan, Conductor)
Track Ten: Liszt, ‘Totentanz’ (Sergio Tiempo, Piano)
Track Eleven: Brahms, ‘German Requiem’, First Movement (Herbert von Karajan, Conductor)
Track Thirteen: Chopin Étude in C major, Op. 10/1 (Maurizio Pollini, Piano)
Track Fourteen: Chopin, Fantasie in F minor, Op. 49 (Krystian Zimerman, Piano)
Track Fifteen: Ravel, Piano Concerto in G, Second Movement (Krystian Zimerman, Piano)
Track Sixteen: Schumann, ‘Geister Variations’ for Piano (Jean-Marc Luisada, Piano)
Track Seventeen: Schubert, Sonata No. 20, D959, Second Movement (Alexander Lonquich, Piano)
Track Eighteen: Beethoven, Piano Concerto No. 5 (‘Emperor’), Second Movement (Radu Lupu, Piano)
Track Nineteen: Rachmaninov, ‘Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini’ (Zoltán Kocsis, Piano)
Track Twenty: Bach, ‘Goldberg Variations’, Aria da capo (Glenn Gould, Piano)
All of these pieces of music are available to listen to for free at http://bit.do/instrumental
PRELUDE
CLASSICAL MUSIC MAKES ME HARD.
I know that’s not a hugely promising opening sentence for some people. But if you scratch the word ‘classical’, perhaps it’s not quite so bad. Maybe it even becomes understandable. Because now, with the word ‘music’, we have something universal, something exciting, something intangible and immortal.
You and I are instantly connected through music. I listen to music. You listen to music. Music has infiltrated and influenced our lives as much as nature, literature, art, sport, religion, philosophy and television. It is the great unifier, the drug of choice for teenagers around the world. It provides solace, wisdom, hope and warmth and has done so for thousands of years. It is medicine for the soul. There are eighty-eight keys on a piano and within that, an entire universe.
And yet . . .
My job description is ‘concert pianist’, and so there is, inevitably, a lot written about classical music in this book. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if some of the press around its launch will try as hard as possible to ignore that fact. They’ll do that because core classical music doesn’t sell anything, ever, and is seen by many as utterly irrelevant. And because everything about classical music, from the musicians themselves to the presentation of its product, the record labels, management – the whole industry ethos and ethics surrounding it – is almost totally devoid