Chopin kicks all your asses. And so does Vivaldi. And Dvorak.

[Bouncy Ball]

I mean just LOOK at them:

Chopin:


(You did not want to meet him in a dark alley, ok?)

Vivaldi:



He looks ready to beat you with that violin, doesn't he?

Dvorak:



"Do you think I'm gonna take a roundhouse kick wearing THESE badboys? FUHGEDDABOUTIT!"

They were, in short, the Bad Boys of Bad Ass Music, also known as BBBAM!!!!! Wandering the streets, assailing small children and quizzing them on advanced music theory, goosing old ladies with their bows, and I can't even talk about the kind of stuff they did with metronomes, ok? It would get the thread locked.

[saltpoint]

1. Chopin's music is what kicks my ass, BB.

I like my blues and my jazz and my folk and my hard rock etc., but often I need to hear the Etude in E-Minor or one of the Scherzi, and Chopin slays me.

In real life, he was chronically tubercular and at the height of his career weighed only 98 pounds. He died during a two-week "vacation" with an aggressive female novelist, during uhh... an interlude of heightened affection...not to put too fine a point on it.

Loved your post. Thanks.

[Bouncy Ball]

2. Wow. Didn't know that! My daughter just started violin

and her teacher recommended listening to some good CDs a lot. Well, we already do that, but we've upped our daily hours of listening and she's developed quite the fondness for Vivaldi and Dvorak (I love Vivaldi but could do without so much Dvorak) and I've fallen back in love with Chopin from my piano and violin days.

Ahhhhh. The waltzes.....

Do you play piano?

[saltpoint]

5. Yes. From age five. But I didn't get to the Chopin --

-- pieces until quite a bit later.

You play violin and piano! Hat's off to anybody who can do that. if there's ever a DU national convention, I'll volunteer to accompany you on the violin concerto of your choice.

Meanwhile, what a wonderful thing you are doing for your daughter -- what a great present to give her music from so long ago to last so far ahead.

Bravo! BB, Bravo!

[Bouncy Ball]

14. Oh, thanks, but I'm really not sure I can take credit.

The wanting to play violin was all her idea. In fact, she was hardly aware of the fact that I played until she said she wanted to. And she already loved classical. Wish I could take credit there! LOL!

One of my biggest regrets is quitting. I started when I was nine, quit when I was 17. It was just too "dorky" for me and I thought I was cool. Thought orchestra was for losers. (I was mostly self-taught on the piano--my parents had no other place to put it, so they stashed it in my bedroom and when I was grounded, I'd teach myself how to play. I was grounded a lot.)

Meanwhile, I loved all the years of the cutthroat competition for first chair, first violin. I've seen kids burst into near suicidal rages from not having an extra string on hand for a busted one. Seen kids vomit into a trashcan before auditioning. I fainted once before auditioning for all-state orchestra.

I practiced two hours a day (or more) seven days a week. Private lessons. Orchestra camp (can you believe there IS such a thing?) Took advanced music theory, composition, the whole thing. Gave it all up. Can't believe it.

My long-winded way of saying I can't play anymore. Can hardly read music. I will cop to picking up my daughter's 3/4 size violin recently and trying out some stuff. It comes back pretty quickly.

[saltpoint]

24. Yep -- I bet it does all come back when you pick it up again.

Well, those years of hard competition must have given you the ear to listen nowadays to be a discerning listener. Probably your daughter will be in that group too. Sounds like some pretty good parenting going on at your house.

And probably some good music, too.

I say Bravo!

[opiate69]

3. Bouncy Ball = The Great Kat??

:shrug: Enquiring minds wanna know!

[Bouncy Ball]

4. Who is The Great Kat?

[opiate69]

32. She's a violinist/guitarist... total shredder

http://www.greatkat.com/

[Fenris]

6. Hector Berlioz kicks everyone's ass!

For this haircut alone!

[flamingyouth]

10. You could make that a whole new look

Give it a try. Would go well with a puffy shirt.

[Bouncy Ball]

15. HE STOLE MY HAIRDO!!!

Though I must confess, I do not have sideburns.

[Ellen Forradalom]

7. This thread is a Rabrrrr attractant

just waiting for him to show up.

[Bouncy Ball]

11. Is it?

That kind of freaks me out. :scared:

Just kidding!

[tinfoilinfor2005]

8. Do you have any idea how many girls lost their virginity to a Chopin tune?

May have been your great granny! :)

[Bouncy Ball]

12. I'm tellin' ya, I'm listening to a waltz for piano in E flat

and I could see getting jiggy to this. Very passionate stuff.

[Ellen Forradalom]

9. Stravinsky

Go ahead, punk, make my day!

[Bouncy Ball]

13. Now I'm gonna have nightmares about Stravinsky

running hot piano wire through my eyes!

[Aristus]

16. Liszt could kick all their asses!

He used to play the piano in concert so hard that the keys would rip up from the board!

THAT'S ass-kickin'!

[Bouncy Ball]

17. DAMNFUCK I forgot about Liszt

he was like the Godfather of BBBAM!!!!

(And on a more serious note, what I wouldn't pay to be able to go back in time and see him tear it up like that. Wow. Chills.)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. And he was considered an audience heartthrob.

:-)

[Bouncy Ball]

19. He could play my keys.

[Aristus]

20. Yeah. Women in the audience used to scream themselves

hoarse and then faint. Some things never change. :-)

[Bouncy Ball]

21. If he looked anything like that top picture of him I posted,

I can see why.

Brains and looks together are completely irresistable. Totally. Just wave the white flag, you're toast. Jelly.

[Ellen Forradalom]

25. Franz Liszt drove his audiences to such fits of hysteria

that ladies would hurl their jewels at him, shrieking and swooning. Two countesses once staged a wrestling match in order to approach him. (Smithsonian Magazine)

[khashka]

22. I can top your ass kickers

Beethoven. Only thing to be said: Ninth Symphony. The boy rocked.

And Paganinni must have sold his soul to the devil.

(Although, when I look at Chopin I always wonder what George Eliot was thinking. Was she blind?)

Khash.

[Bouncy Ball]

23. Yeah, I hate to say this

because it might seem......weird.....but Chopin looks like he might have been a Tiger with a capital "T" if you know what I mean.

Rowr.

And of course Beethoven! I was just trying to give some props to some badasses who don't normally get mentioned. Their spirits are a bit pissed.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

26. George Sand, not George Eliot

This is George Eliot, real name, Mary Ann Evans, author of Silas Marner



This is George Sand, real name Aurelie Dupre, who wrote a bunch of things in French and was Chopin's lover.

There is a certain superficial resemblance between the two of them. :-)

[khashka]

33. Yes Lydia

and now I feel like a total idiot. I knew that but my mind was elsewhere....

Khash.

[ironflange]

27. Look at my avatar

Ludwig's pissed with you. Yeah, you! He's ready to do some serious damage to your buttocks with his size 12's.

[Bouncy Ball]

28. Huh, yeah if he can SEE me!

No, wait, he was deaf.

Ok, yeah if he can HEAR me running away!

LOL!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

29. My idea of a contemporary classical heartthrob

Composer John Adams (even better in person) shown here with an Australian radio interviewer.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

30. Kodaly was a looker...

[Bouncy Ball]

31. Mmm, agreed. Dark and brooding.

You sure that isn't a picture of Rabrrrrrr?

[Rabrrrrrr]

34. Me?!

I'm only dark and brooding on the inside.

:-)

I don't have furrowed brows like that guy at all. Whew!