1. During her time slot on WUOL public radio today, Colleen Wheelahan played a stirring and memorable 20th century symphony that I didn't know existed and that took me back to May of 1980.
United States composer Alan Hovanhess's Symphony No 50 is also titled Mount Saint Helens.
It's a musical expression of the grandeur and peacefulness of Mount Saint Helens and, in the second movement, of Spirit Lake. These first two movements remind listeners of the mightiness the mountain and the wonder of Spirit Lake, but also of their fragility.
In the third movement, this peacefulness gives way to the chaos of the volcano's eruption on May 18, 1980. The orchestral violence, the sturm and drang especially of the percussion instruments, brought back the terror and awe of that day.
As it turned out, I was safe in Eugene, OR that day, even though Eugene sits only about 150 miles from Mt. St. Helens. The prevailing winds carried the ash in a northeasterly direction. In Eugene, the awe we experience came from watching footage of the eruption and its aftermath on television.
Often, the classical music I play during the day occupies only a fraction of my attention. It's mostly background music, very enjoyable background music.
But when Colleen Wheelahan introduced Alan Hovanhess's Mt. St. Helens symphony, I stopped everything and turned the entirety of my focus on this composition and experienced the contrast between what seemed like the eternal beauty of the mountain and of Spirit Lake, only to have it all blown up in a single morning, a reminder of how all things of the earth are temporary, no matter how mighty and beautiful.
2. My friend from our North Idaho College days, Liz, calls my periods of focus on one source of pleasure my hyperfixation.
I like that word and I am happy to embrace it.
I do get hyperfixated on things.
Right now, within my current hyperfixation on classical music I am having a hyperfixation within my hyperfixation.
It's Johannes Brahm's 4th symphony.
Today, I had a thought.
Yes!
A thought!
I wondered if possibly a knowledgeable person had posted a podcast episode analyzing Brahm's fourth symphony in some detail and I thought it would be really stimulating if the episode included not only talk, but passages from the symphony to illustrate those insights.
I quickly discovered that yes such an episode existed and that a young, apparently tireless conductor named Joshua Weilerstein has had a podcast for about eight years that explores one orchestral composition after another in just the manner I hoped for.
I sense another hyperfixation coming in my near future.
The podcast is called Sticky Notes. Want to take a look at it? Click here.
His hour-long examination of Brahm's 4th symphony is here.
As happens so often when I dig a bit deeper into any work of art, it always seems to take me back to Shakespeare.
Brahm's abrupt opening of this symphony, without introduction (no Once Upon a Time) reminded me of several of Shakespeare's plays, as did Brahm's juxtaposition of opposing emotions, his drive to express complexity, and Brahm's simultaneous adherence to traditional forms and his undoing of them.
Weilerstein's podcast helped me hear for the first time the musical themes of this symphony, helped me understand how Brahm's plays with those themes, and, most of all, Weilerstein helped me connect passages in Brahm's composition with specific emotions, emotions I couldn't have identified on my own.
I'm not done with this particular podcast episode.
Who knows how hyper my fixation on it will be? 😊
3. I don't know what it is about elbow macaroni, but I love it.
A while back, I made a macaroni salad -- I think it was for family dinner -- and it turned me into an elbow macaroni glutton.
I tried not to be a glutton tonight when Debbie told me she had made what she called "Homemade Hamburger Helper".
I asked if she used rice.
"No," she replied. "Macaroni."
Oh.
My.
God.
I dug into this perfect blend of ground beef, tomatoes, summer squash, other ingredients, and macaroni.
My day of music listening and learning bliss was more than matched by this culinary bliss.
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