I have periodic obsessions.  If I hear one Beethoven symphony, I am apt
to need to hear all of them.  Or branch out to the quartets, sonatas,
etc.  They take over my life for a few days or weeks.

If I hear a composition I am taken with, but do not know completely, I
must hear it again and again until I can whistle most of it.  When I was
learning the Mahler symphonies I was totally obsessed.  Now I only need
to hear all of them during my self-proclaimed twice-a-year Mahler orgies.

Sometimes particular melodies or specific performances will grab me
(Rachmaninoff symphonic dances has a movement that I needed to listen
to for weeks!  Brahms "Komm Bald" as sung by Fidi knocked me out for
months and still makes me cry.  So does An Die Musik sung by Ameling.
Ditto the first piano quartet of Dvorak played by Josef Suk and three
other guys named Joseph.)

I LOVE to collect all or most of the works of my favorite composers.
Even though I have individual pieces, when Brilliant Classics came out
with boxed collections, I had to have them, too.  (Who could resist at
two bucks a pop from Berkshire?  Or four buck from Pricedrightmusic.com?)
Some of them are great from beginning to end.  Particular favorite: The
Brahms chamber-music box.

Right now, I am going through a Mendelssohn period, which has lasted
for a few days, caused by another Brilliant Classics box: the Choral
Music of Mendelssohn...  there were compositions I had never heard before.
Many of them sounded like my beloved Bach Canatas, and of course M.  came
by that honestly.  Once I started listening to those pieces, I longed
to hear the string quartets, the piano music, the symphonies, the lieder!
But after almost a week, I can feel it winding down.  I can tell, because
I felt a sudden urge for Prokofiev.

Mimi Ezust, back again