Professor Carol
Have you participated in the time-honored ritual of the spring ballet recital? This past Saturday marked our granddaughter’s first foray into the world of sequined tutus, hair-sprayed topknots, and stage make-up. Overall, her little band of four-year olds did pretty well. But the recital left … Read more
My refrigerator is covered with oblong magnets stamped with art. I buy these after museum visits and, yes, I know: they are kitschy. Plus they are overpriced and the paintings aren’t well reproduced. Still, I get a kick out them, particularly watching them migrate while … Read more
I intended to write about something totally different–children’s-book illustrators, to be specific. But that will have to wait. Right now I’m upset about corn. Yesterday, in one of our nicest grocery stores (Sprouts), I got mad. The free-standing table holding ears of corn was abuzz … Read more
Even after all these years, William Ernest Henley’s Invictus remains the one poem memorized in school that won’t leave my mind. It’s not that I don’t enjoy it being there. But, seriously, why has it lingered while so many others left? Partly I know the … Read more
Let me take you back to the place where I became acquainted with Haydn’s Seven Last Words on the Cross (Die Sieben Letzen Worte unseres Erlösers am Kreuze). Picture, if you will, a low-ceilinged room in a slightly musky academic building. For many decades, this … Read more
What do Christmas and the season of educational conferences have in common? First, both sneak up on you. One day it’s August, and, the next thing you know, it’s time to launch the Advent calendar. So, too, with the conferences. Wasn’t it just Christmas? How … Read more
Why do I recommend La Bohème as a first opera? Well, for starters, it’s not long. (That matters, especially for kids.) It runs about two hours, with four short acts between that last about 30 minutes each. It boasts several “hit tunes” that are likely … Read more
“Mimi dies,” a Metropolitan Opera representative whispered to me over the phone. I was making an inquiry into the appropriateness for young people of one of the Met’s upcoming HD satellite transmissions, in this case, their February 24 Saturday matinee performance of Giacomo Puccini’s La … Read more
The word counterpoint literally means juxtaposing one point against another. In the case of music, it means sounding one set of pitches (such as a melody) against, or in simultaneity with, another set of pitches. Most of us first experience counterpoint early when we sing … Read more
Nothing is sweeter to me than the rhythm of the academic year. A new syllabus, a stack of new books, and a blank notebook all symbolize an ideal: a fresh start with unlimited possibilities. As part of our celebrating that “fresh start,” we’ve put everything … Read more