Some Traveling Music, Please

This afternoon the choir of First United Church here in Bloomington, Indiana, presented a special concert, titled “Viva Vivaldi!” Accompanied by a chamber orchestra, the choir sang Vivaldi’s “Gloria” and “Magnificat,” The “Gloria” is Vivaldi’s most familiar piece of sacred music.

Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741), a Venetian priest and violin virtuoso, was a popular baroque composer. He is probably best known for a series of four violin concerti, “The Four Seasons.” Decades ago (I don’t remember precisely when) I adopted “The Four Seasons” as my traveling music. Whenever our family or I alone embarked on a long car trip, we took up the tradition of inserting an audio tape of the concerti into the car stereo and set off to the magnificent strains of Vivaldi’s violin masterpiece.

My late wife was the musical one, as is my current partner; I’ll lay claim to some better knowledge of the other arts. But my musical sensibilities, though broad, are not deep. Nonetheless, even I could discern that “The Four Seasons” as performed on our original audio tape sounded “muddy.” I have mercifully forgotten the artists. In any case, my wife subsequently surprised me with a recording on which violin virtuoso Itzhak Perlman (whom I would later see in performance) played. The difference was astonishing! Such crispness, such liveliness — it was a world apart. It is the Perlman tape that I still play today whenever I set out on a long car trip, though I should soon replace it with a CD or simply download it to an iPod.

I cannot claim that “Viva Vivaldi!” today was as thrilling as Itzhak Perlman’s concert at the Indiana University Auditorium a few years ago. But it was a sumptuous feast for the ears and a fine way to cap All Saints Day, despite the small audience. Those who missed it should be envious.