A friend recently asked me what symphonic music I think feels of the moment: what music feels like now, as we adjust to a new normal of social distancing and uncertainty. I often use music to change my mood, so I immediately began to list pieces that feel optimistic and joyful, the opposite of the way many of us have been feeling under lockdown. But one of music’s greatest gifts is the solace it can offer when we listen to something that sounds like our feelings, be they contemplative, grief-stricken, lonely or ambivalent. In times of grief, two pieces of music have offered me strength. The first isn’t symphonic, but choral: Rachmaninoff’s Vespers. In just over an hour, Rachmaninoff mixes together ancient Greek and Russian chants

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Courtney Lewis of the Jacksonville Symphony says a Beethoven piano sonata may be the pick-me-up we all could use right about now. I’m sure I speak for many of you when I say it’s been a long time since I had this much time on my hands. The effect of the coronavirus on the performing arts has been devastating. At the Jacksonville Symphony, we are terribly disappointed by the cancellation of the SHIFT Festival at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., at which we would have been performing this week. Like many orchestras around the world, we have canceled our concerts through the beginning of May. It’s a strange thing being a conductor with no concerts. More than an instrumentalist or a singer, you feel

Continue readingTake 20 minutes for Beethoven