Janos writes about Schnitte's Concerto for piano and strings: >Today was a "normal" day, but the Schnittke, opening the concert, still >packed a wallop, it impressed and moved as no other part of the program >did. The 1979 concerto is vintage Schnittke - dark, brooding, with >beautiful harmonies interrupted by violent dissonance. I wasn't in Santa >Rosa on 9/11, but I can imagine the impact of this traumatizing music >in that context. > >The 25-minute concerto is all of one piece, disparate, conflicting >elements melding into an overwhelming coherence that's impossible to put >in words. Some of the dissonance is exaggerated, grotesque, the deliberate >ugliness working as the contrast does in Strauss' "Elektra," good and >evil bouncing off each other, completing the other. Janos has it exactly right- I simply want to add that those not familiar with this composer's Eighth Symphony should seek it out on cd. It is a marvelous work which somehow has a spiritual dimension (IMHO of course !!!) as does the piano concerto. I have no idea how composers endow their music with a spititual dimension. I am even prepared to grant that this is a very subjective state of affairs. I can even now hear a hard headed, hard nosed, analytical, positivistic member of our little group saying - humbug!!!! its just notes on music paper- this guy is getting senile. Can't rule it out. Professor Emeritus Bernard Chasan Physics Department, Boston University