Pictures at an Exhibition

My father died a year ago today.  A retired Air Force C-130 pilot, my dad was an artist at heart.   Throughout my life, he was always tinkering around, creating beautiful things.  A gifted painter and sculptor, he built things, too:  furniture, hi-fi equipment, room additions on to the homes in which we lived; even an airplane – from scratch.

I am blessed to have much of his beautiful art work in my home – a daily reminder of a talented, creative man, but more importantly, a good, loving father.

“The artist produces for the liberation of his soul.  It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill.” – W. Somerset Maugham

 

While art was his passion, he also loved music.  A classically trained musician, he could play many instruments:  piano, clarinet, saxophone.  But, never once, in my entire life, did I see him play an instrument.  For whatever reason, after he graduated from college, joined the Air Force and began his career, then started a family with my mother, he never played an instrument again.

But, he played music on his stereo system.  And, we grew up listening to a wide range of music, played full blast on my dad’s stereo.  Every Sunday morning, he would play Russian composer, Modest Mussorgsky’s, Pictures at an Exhibition to wake us up.  Blaring throughout the house, there was no such thing as sleeping in on Sunday morning.

I think, as children, we probably resented it initially – being blasted awake by classical music.  But, over the years, we grew to love it.  And, if he didn’t wake us up that way, we would ask him to play it on Sunday mornings.

 

In fact, I can’t listen to it any other way except full blast.  When I first met my husband, Charlie, and I would play certain things full blast on the radio or stereo, it would drive him crazy.  Now he’s used to it; my father rubbed off on him.

My brother sent me a YouTube video of Jorge Caballero playing Pictures at an Exhibition on the guitar.  I’ve never heard Pictures at an Exhibition played on a single instrument.   Somehow, Jorge Caballero manages to capture the nuances of this classic on a guitar.  I cried.

I cried for my father.

I cried for my loss.  I cried for my mother’s loss.  I cried for my family’s loss.

And, I cried from the sheer beauty of this magical piece of music.

But, even though Mr. Caballero is remarkable, there is nothing like hearing Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition played by a full symphony orchestra.  While Mussorgsky composed his defining work for the piano (it was orchestrated by Maurice Ravel in 1922) and it is beautiful played on the piano, it is majestic, even transcending played by a symphony.

In honor of my father today, I’m including a link to a YouTube video of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition played by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra with an accompanying lecture by Sir Georg Solti.   Fair warning:  this video is an hour long.  If sitting through an entire hour-long lecture/concert is unfathomable, then fast-forward this video to the 26:00 minute mark to listen to the concert performed in full without the accompanying lecture.

In this video, Sir Solti discusses each movement sharing his learned perspective as the Chicago Symphony practices.  My father would have thoroughly enjoyed this video and listening to Sir Solti’s lecture.

There are many parts of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition that move me on a visceral level.  Listen to it at 37:43 for a few minutes if an hour is not something that you can commit to today.  Or, listen to it at 52:30 and imagine the 4 of us kids being blasted out of bed on a Sunday morning {grin}.   But, if nothing else, listen to the last 6 minutes of this concert at 53:16.  It will transport you to a higher plane – I promise.

In spite of the fact that we listened to this symphony every Sunday morning growing up, this wasn’t my father’s favorite piece of work or even his favorite composer.  His favorite composer was Gustav Mahler.  But, I think for my father, Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition was a metaphor for his life.

Mussorgsky wrote the piece to honor an artist friend, who tragically died at 39 years of age.  Meant as an imaginary “tour” of an art exhibit, each of the 10 movements evoke a specific mood, tracing the visitor’s steps while touring an art exhibit from painting to painting.  I imagine each of these 10 movements represent a moment in my father’s life, striking a chord with him (no pun intended) that only he understood.

 

So, today I remember and mourn my father by playing Mussorgsky’s/Ravel’s Pictures at an Exhibition at full blast, over and over and over again.

While my heart breaks, it sings too.

Until Next Time,

Related Posts:

(other posts about my father)

• Perspective:  December 8, 1941
• High Flight
• Dance Me to the End of Love
• Remembering Grandpa
• The Family Man
• Daddy’s Girl
• Sons of My Father
• In the Arms of Love
• HeART and Soul
• Requiem for My Father
• Love Begins at Home
• Veterans Day 2013