About Classical Music for Dummies :)

Hi- I'm Veggie, a vegetarian violinist. I'm creating this blog to introduce people to the joys of classical music, and to help myself learn and explore more classical music myself. Many young people like myself are very well-versed with popular music, but perhaps not so much with the classical. Since I have started listening to (and playing) classical music, I have found that it sometimes offers much more musical interest than pop. If you have just started exploring classical music, I urge you to exercise some patience, since it is sometimes an acquired taste. You may also find it more enjoyable to sit down and just focus on the music without doing anything else.

When I think of a piece of classical music that almost anyone could love, the first piece that comes to my mind is the Dvorak Cello Concerto. I recently played the first movement of this piece with a youth orchestra I was enrolled in this year. Our orchestra had the honor of performing this piece with a very talented young man featured on the cello- he got accepted to the Juliard school of music for this fall!

Unfortunately, many people write classical music off as boring- this piece is far from boring! The orchestra quickly sets up the stage with drama, and you can feel a sort of emotional tension right away and the strings soon erupt with a loud outburst. Things get quiet again for a short while and the melody gets passed around between the woodwinds and the strings, and things start to sound placid and peaceful- then triumphant. Then the cello comes in, and I'll let Rostropovich take it from there.

The following are links to this piece of music on youtube of Mistislav Rostropovich on cello performing with the London Philharmonic Orchestra led by conductor Carlo Maria Giulini. I find it most enjoyable to watch the musicians playing in the video while I listen.

The concerto has three movements, and while the first movement is quite satisfying by itself, it is part of a complete work.

The first movement is in two parts:
Part A
Part B

The Second movement:
Part A
Part B

The Third movement:
Part A
Part B

Please leave me your comments and opinions on this blog and the music! Thanks ^___^