Ireland is a country that has long loomed large in my imagination, both as a place of tremendous natural beauty and a hotspot of fiddle music. Of course, many places in the world have folk music traditions worth studying, but it would be difficult to overstate the impact this island has had on many…
Tag: beauty
Music in time of oppression
Creative musicians and artists, in their desires for freedom of expression, often respond to totalitarian regimes with suspicion if not contempt. These oppressive states have likewise censored and even persecuted artists unwilling to advance the government propaganda. Just ask Dmitri Shostakovich (a composer censored and threated by Soviet Union for creating supposedly “pro-Western” music), Victor…
every note is alive
Basho was a poet who lived 17th century Japan, considered one of the greatest haiku writers of all time. It was said that Basho was once with a student, and they saw a dragonfly, and the student attempted to compose his thoughts on the experience: A red dragonfly If you would but pluck its wings…
Violin Lessons with Michael Fox 