The Music & All It Contains

   

—Poetry by Neil Fulwood, Nottingham, UK

—Photos Courtesy of Public Domain

FURTWÄNGLER

From the outset it is evident
that this man facing him,
this uniformed American

will not understand, just as
generations (could he see
ahead) will not understand

or choose not to understand
that the point was neither
collaboration or appeasement

that the only ideology
was High German culture,
its protection from within.

 

 

 

 

 

SOLTI

This steely city, hymned by Rat Pack crooners
(“the Wrigley Building … the Union Stockyard”)
is where he has reached the zenith of his career:

a city now defined by its orchestra. Big,
brassy, blazing. A city that dares Vienna,
Salzburg, London to match it. In other words:

his kind of town. They should have twinned it
with Budapest. Too long itinerant, the idea of itthon
defined by music, geography a game of chance,

he is home now, the ring closed, the circle squared.


("itthon" is a Hungarian word roughly equating to “home”)

 

 

 

 

PREVIN

Mr Hollywood, suave sultan
of the soundtrack; jazz
pianist par excellence; now
maestro, music night popular 

career unfolding as a preview
of coming attractions

all the right moves made,
by anybody’s definition,
in absolutely the right order.

 

 

 

 

 

MEHTA

Regard the still-active octogenarian:
pull back. Regard the maestro helming
the watched-by-millions spectacular
that made football chant of grand opera:
pull back. Regard the flamboyant showman
reinventing the core repertoire
as Hollywood Bowl swagger: pull back.
Regard the twenty-something with talent to burn—
demoniac, almost, in his brilliance: pull back. 

Stop here: the music student who put together
orchestra and concert, played for refugees.

 

 

 

 

 

BOULT

So perfectly English
he could have been born
with the knighthood,

Victorian in the most distilled
sense of the word. Upright.
A stranger to histrionics.

The stick technique immaculate,
everything given the proper degree
of weight and heft, baton

the size of a billiards cue
deployed with a slight
supple turn of the wrist.

 

 

 

 

 

PINNOCK

Nimbly, he has sidestepped
all the nonsense: not for him
the partisan entrenchment,

not for him the grizzled tedium
of academic point-scoring, music
as a purely intellectual exercise.

This is period performance
embraced by an ensemble
in concert with his only agenda:

the big-hearted exuberance
of the music and all it contains.

____________________

Today’s LittleNip:

And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.

―Friedrich Nietzsche

____________________

Neil Fulwood writes: “I’m currently working on a project which has already become pamphlet-length and may end up being a full collection. The working title is The Great Conductors and each of the poems—there are 17 so far—seeks to distill the essence of one of the great maestri, either by capturing their personality or focusing on a formative moment in their life or career. The last two here are about British conductors.” Thanks for these, Neil, and good luck with your project!

____________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

 Neil Fulwood


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A reminder that Clare Frank will read
from her new book,
BURNT: A Memoir of Fighting Fire
in Placerville tonight, 6pm.
For details about this and other
upcoming poetry happenings in
Northern California and otherwheres,
click on
UPCOMING NORCAL EVENTS
(http://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/p/wtf.html)
in the links at the top of this page.

Photos in this column can be enlarged by
clicking on them once, then clicking on the x
in the top right corner to come back to Medusa.

Would you like to be a SnakePal?
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that which was previously published—
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Just remember:
the snakes of Medusa are always hungry—
for poetry, of course!