A dear friend sent this to us today and the quote made us laugh out loud!

Catch a preview of our 09-10 opening program, music and all silence held, LIVE on WGBH Radio Wednesday, September 30 at 11am. Enjoy interviews with the artists and performances of works by Mozart, Debussy and Toru Takemitsu.

Stream the program at WGBH Radio or tune in to 89.7 FM

The show will also be rebroadcast at 6pm on All-Classical WGBH, on both 89.7-HD2 and the All-Classical internet stream.

Olivier Messiaen was such a unique figure in music history, with so much of his inspiration clearly coming from extra-musical sources, that it is tempting to consider him outside of tradition. But this is far from the truth, really. He was profoundly influenced by two other composers on this program: Mozart, whom he saw as a kindred spirit on the subject of rhythm, and Debussy, his countryman, who freed rich, densely chromatic harmony from its functional purposes, showing that carefully chosen dissonances could be evocative of color and emotion just by their sheer sound.

This marvelous YouTube video captures Messiaen’s enthusiasm for Debussy in the setting of a classroom. What a marvelous teacher! I wish I had an analysis class like this when I was in school!

Also, take a look at his clothes – what a fantastic sense of style!

The musical community has suffered a great loss with the passing of composer Leon Kirchner yesterday morning.  There is a beautiful article on his life in today’s New York Times. He was, without a doubt, one of the greats.

Chameleon will be performing his Piano Trio II on March 27.