see my post - on living in the box

I did check out the book by David W. Barber - Bach, Beethoven and the Boys
and would like to share a few vignettes from it with you.

Barber's book is so hilarious that my first reaction is that what he says can't be
true - but I've read most of this stuff in other books so I'm pretty sure that he
didn't make it up.

He does say in the Author's Note - however - that 'one of my music-history
professors gently pulled me aside one day and told me that, although my work
was good, I was too easily distracted by the non-essentials.'


~Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741) - Because of the color of his hair, Vivaldi was
nicknamed Il prete rossa, or 'the red priest.'  Today he might be called 'carrot-
head.'

~George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) - King George I enjoyed Handel's Water
Music so much - composed for him - that he arraged for a special royal outing on the Thames
during which the King and his friends floated down the river eating and drinking on a
barge - while Handel and 50 musicians floated on another barge beside them playng
dance music.

~Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) - Barber suggests that the reason that
Mozart was an overachiever was that his father nagged him, forced him to work
hard, make money and warned him not to hang around other musicians.

~Ludwig von Beethoven (1770-1827) - In his final moments Beethoven roused
himself out of a coma - shook his angry fist at the Heavens - then after a huge
thunderclap and a flash of lightning - the great composer was dead.

~Richard Wagner (1813-1883) - Surely if Wagner lived today he would have
given money to PETA - for he owned dogs all his life - two black poodles,
Speck and Dreck; several Newfoundlands; two spaniels, Peps and Fips; a
few terriers; and a Spitz named Putzi. - but I'm quite sure that Wagner would
also have donated big bucks to the Arts too.

~Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) - Tchaikovsky was always very nervous
and had a morbid fear that his head might fall off in the middle of the piece - while
directing a concert - so he propped it up with his left hand and conducted only with
his right hand.

~Igor Stravinsky (1882 - 1971) - Stravinsky often composed music on whatever
paper was handy:  napkins, envelopes or restaurant menus.  He like to wear a battered
old green beret while he slept and even compared his music to his own nose:  'One
does not criticize anybody or anything that is functioning.  A nose is not manufactured;
a nose just is.  Thus, too, my art.'

~Robert Schumann - (1810-1856) - Schumann seem to have had some difficulty
distinguishing between fantasy and reality.  But - Barber writes - so what if he was
a little bit bonkers sometimes?  We must tolerate a bit of craziness:  it fuels the
Creative Spirit.





Thanks so much David W. Barber for allowing me to use the information from
your really great book - especially the parts I lifted verbatim.







i'm thinkin' what's he gonna do about it anyway