It’s a curious thing about Facebook. People post stuff that drives me nuts. “Eating mofongo at La Fondita de Mofongo!!!!!!” Usually accompanied by a photo.
(Any of you up there who have never eaten mofongo should go immediately online to get your ticket to Puerto Rico. Mmmmmm….)
Which is to say that, no, the world doesn’t need to know that somebody you friended in a weak moment is eating mofongo.
It may be, of course, that food comments are like golf and psychotherapy. Interesting only to the players….
On the other hand, comments about what people are listening to are interesting—to me, at least. And Cousin Brian did pique my interest with his comment about Chopin’s Piano Concerto Number One. Well, although I have it on the iPod (made by Apple!), it’s something I never hear. But if Brian—no slouch whatsoever in the classical music world—likes it, it’s gotta be good. I decide to check it out.
Not before dealing with a very snarky Mr. Fernández, who is busy peering at the cutting board in the kitchen. He holds up a little white part of a hand mixer.
“There used to be a little plastic bag with tiny little screws around here, and I DON’T SEE IT NOW!”
“Good morning, dear,” I say. I’ve been told about emotional hijacking.
“WELL, WHERE IS IT!”
“Slept well, I trust?”
“Well, it better turn up,” he says, and stomps off to the bathroom.
And this is before coffee.
So the opening of the piano concerto pretty well matched my internal emotional landscape. Think New Jersey on Monday….
And Brian also had said that Chopin had written the concerto at age eighteen.
Well, there is some music that only the young can write, I thought today, on the trot. It’s sort of like love—you may experience it many times in your life, but not like the first time.
And this is definitely a young man’s work. And—trademark Chopin—it has a theme that just squeezes your heart.
I was listening to it today since I had decided that the piece was sort of like all of people you really like, whom you kiss (when appropriate / possible), and say “hey, we really gotta get together” and then never do.
Until the next time.
There’s music like that, too. You hear a piece, think ‘wow, that’s great’ and make a promise to yourself. You’re gonna listen to it often.
The next time being when NPR decides to play it.
All right, so what’s the story of the piece? Well, Chopin wrote it in 1830, and performed it in one of his “farewell” concerts.
Where was he going?
Off to Paris. In fact, he never returned to Poland, but became part of the “Great Emigration.”
Hunh?
Ah, the joys of the hyperlink! One click and I know, or rather remember. Poland got sliced up between Austria, Russia and Prussia in the 18th and 19th centuries. Most of the elite packed up and left, so that Polish political and intellectual activity was really mostly French.
Well, something to know! Now then, what’s the skinny on Chopin?
Well, here I commend you to Wikipedia, which has an excellent article on him. But to make it short, it doesn’t seem to have been a very happy life. And it’s definitely not a healthful (in the sense of full of health) life. Sickful, in fact.
His death certificate says tuberculosis, though I prefer the term “consumption” of the 19th century.
And what of his love life? Also not much fun. Yeah, the affair with George Sand that we all know about, but she became more of a nurse than lover, at the end. And they quarreled and separated at the end—she didn’t even attend his funeral.
Any money? Well, he dies poor, though at least not alone.
And there must have been some comforts. A raging intellect, for example, and good friends. One of them the painter Eugène Delacroix, who plays in this little episode, sent by Sand through Wikipedia:
Chopin is at the piano, quite oblivious of the fact that anyone is listening. He embarks on a sort of casual improvisation, then stops. 'Go on, go on,' exclaims Delacroix, 'That's not the end!' 'It's not even a beginning. Nothing will come ... nothing but reflections, shadows, shapes that won't stay fixed. I'm trying to find the right colour, but I can't even get the form ...' 'You won't find the one without the other,' says Delacroix, 'and both will come together.' 'What if I find nothing but moonlight?' 'Then you will have found the reflection of a reflection.' The idea seems to please the divine artist. He begins again, without seeming to, so uncertain is the shape. Gradually quiet colours begin to show, corresponding to the suave modulations sounding in our ears. Suddenly the note of blue sings out, and the night is all around us, azure and transparent. Light clouds take on fantastic shapes and fill the sky. They gather about the moon which casts upon them great opalescent discs, and wakes the sleeping colours. We dream of a summer night, and sit there waiting for the song of the nightingale ..
Hey, that girl can write!
OK—that’s a consolation, having company like that, and an interesting woman, as Sand certainly was. But was it enough?
Here’s a photo of him in the year of his death:
I'm voting no.
