Absolutely on Music
Conversations with Seiji Ozawa
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- £7.99
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- £7.99
Publisher Description
An intimate conversation about music and creativity, between the internationally bestselling writer Haruki Murakami and world-class conductor, Seiji Ozawa.
Haruki Murakami's passion for music runs deep. Before turning his hand to writing, he ran a jazz club in Tokyo, and the aesthetic and emotional power of music permeates every one of his much-loved books. Now, in Absolutely on Music, Murakami fulfills a personal dream, sitting down with his friend, acclaimed conductor Seiji Ozawa, to talk about their shared interest.
They discuss everything from Brahms to Beethoven, from Leonard Bernstein to Glenn Gould, from record collecting to pop-up orchestras, and much more.
'Absolutely on Music is an unprecedented treasure... Talking about music is like dancing about architecture, it's often said, but what joy to watch these two friends dance.' Guardian
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
These chats between novelist Murakami and Ozawa, former conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, contain intriguing insights about the nature of music. Over a two-year period (2010 2011), Murakami and Ozawa sat down to listen to and reflect upon matters as diverse as various recordings of Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, Brahms's First Symphony, the music of Gustav Mahler, and the joys of conducting with Leonard Bernstein, whom Ozawa worked under in the 1960s. Ozawa reflects on the role of the conductor: "One of the distinguishing features of the conductor's profession: the work itself changes you; the one thing a conductor has to do is to get sounds out of the orchestra; I read the score and create a piece of music in my mind, after which I work with the orchestra members to turn that into actual sounds, and that process gives rise to all kinds of things." In response to Murakami's question about the emotions a Japanese conductor feels when conducting the music of Gustav Mahler, an Austrian Jew, Ozawa reflects that when an Easterner performs music written by a Westerner, it can have its own special meaning. Ozawa admits that he doesn't approach conducting with preconceived ideas about how a score should sound or be played: "I don't have anything to say until I've got a musician right in front of me." The tone of the book is deliberate and contemplative. In some ways, these conversations are High Fidelity for classical music fans.
