2006: Year in Review

In reviewing the events of 2006, internationally, artistically, personally, I hope to remember the ups, forget the downs, and propel both myself and my readers to greater heights by examining the intricate, sometimes dark, sometimes dazzling worlds around us and within us, and by using this knowledge and inspiration to create a better, more hopeful new year.

Major world advancements: production of the MacBook; discreet use of Polonium
Major problems generally overlooked: Israel's destruction of Lebanon, particularly Beirut; the falling dollar

Best movie: Sophie Scholl--the Final Days (German)
Best American movies: Munich (was this 2006?), The Constant Gardener (2006?), Little Miss Sunshine
Best TV show: Grey's Anatomy
Best eye-candy: Patrick Dempsey (Dr. McDreamy)
Most interesting article: The Deepest Cut (The New Yorker, July 3)

Best fiction I read this year: Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov); The Idiot (Fyodor Dostoevsky); Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (Susannah Clarke)
Best poetry I read this year: Extravagaria (Pablo Neruda)
Best non-fiction I read this year: The Glenn Gould Reader (Glenn Gould)
Best movie not released in 2006 I saw this year: Camille Claudel (French)

Best performance of the year: Macbeth--Shakespeare in the Park (Central Park, New York, starring Jennifer Ehle in a compelling, frightening, and beautiful performance as Lady Macbeth)
Best music of the year (CDs and concerts): none - altogether a disappointment, though I suppose that the La Scala scandal recently wins for most exciting.  Also, Yoni's debut at Alice Tully was noteworthy.

New skills: horseback-riding; white-water rafting; soldering

Performances of: Bach, Couperin, Schubert, Schumann-Liszt, Wagner-Liszt, Dallapiccola, Brahms, Gershwin, Trapanese, Mahler, Mozart, Barber, improvisations by me at a ballet performance (interesting experience)

New Repertoire: Bach 4th Partita, Couperin Le Gazouillement, Beethoven Sonata Op. 109, Schubert C minor Sonata D958, Schumann Etudes Symphoniques, Dallapiccola Quaderno Musicale di Annalibera, Brahms 1st Violin/Piano Sonata, songs by Mahler and Mozart, Sextet by Joe Trapanese (one can only hope to be better next year...this is dismal...)

Literary output: 1 sonnet, a blog

Major personal accomplishment: graduation from college

Observations from abroad: Germans aren't very nice.  This is why my friends here are American, Italian, French, Korean, and what I like to call "international."

Travels: New York, California, Connecticut; Berlin, Prague, Amsterdam

Life-changing event: International Keyboard Festival at Mannes

Combination most shocking/proudest moment: when Matt won the post in the New York Philharmonic

New Year's Resolution(s):
1. A more intense work ethic focusing on quality, hard work, and a more prolific output of everything in the above categories
2. To complain less and appreciate more

Quote of the Day: "The only way to do something wonderful is to work hard." - a member of the Minnesota Symphony

Quote of the Year: "I'm going to KILL you." (teacher)
no, wait...
"If you don't graduate from MSM, I'm going to KILL you." (mother)
no, wrong again...
"I'm in love with you." (McDreamy)
ok, seriously...
"Think of all the inferior composers.  They weren't bad people." (Dr. Andreacchi, Piano Literature class - I may disagree with this pronouncement)
"Fraternities allow you to get drunk and throw up in an organized way." (Dr. Barone, Early German Romantisicm class)

Why Nabokov is the best writer I've ever read (excerpts from Lolita):

"I could not kill her, of course, as some have thought. You see, I loved her. It was love at first sight, at last sight, at ever and ever sight."

"Somewhere beyond Bill's shack an afterwork radio had begun singing of folly and fate, and there she was with her ruined looks, and her adult, rope-veined narrow hands and her goose-flesh white arms, and her shallow ears, an her unkempt armpits, there she was (my Lolita!), hopelessly worn at seventeen...and I looked and looked at her, and knew as clearly as I know I am to die, that I loved her more than anything I had ever seen or imagined on earth, or hoped for anywhere else."

Serious Quote of the Year:

"I thank you for the gift of life.  If I consider matters properly now, it was nothing other than the road to God.  I am preceding you by a little, to prepare you a splendid reception." - Christoph Probst, Feb. 22, 1943, written in a letter to his mother on the day he was executed by the Nazis for his participation in the German resistance group The White Rose

Remembrance of the Year: A great pianist, my favorite pianist ever:

"My last memory of [Glenn] Gould will always be one from our final meeting, on a chilly August evening in Toronto a little more than a month before he died.  At 3:00 a.m. we drove to a deserted midtown recording studio, where, clad in his usual indoor summer wear--two sweaters, wool shirt, scarf, slouch hat--he relaxed at the keyboard of a Yamaha baby grand and played through his own piano arrangements of Richard Strauss operas.  The Yamaha suddenly became a six-foot-square orchestra: dense contrapuntal lines, translucently clear and perfectly contoured, echoed through the empty room.  Far from the eyes and ears of the curious world, the hungry fans and disapproving critics, the lucrative contracts and percentage deals, Gould played through the night, lost in the sheer joy of creating something beautiful." - Tim Page

Lest we forget, I re-quote something I posted on this blog awhile ago:

"I believe that the justification of art is the internal combustion it ignites in the hearts of men and not its shallow, externalized, public manifestations.  The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of adrenaline but is, rather, the gradual, life-long construction of a state of wonder and serenity."
- Glenn Gould

(this being said (by him, of course), it's very amusing to hear him swear in the recording outtakes)