Counterpoint

A Memoir of Bach and Mourning

De: Philip Kennicott

Narrado por: Paul Heitsch

A Pulitzer Prize-winning critic reflects on the meaning and emotional impact of a Bach masterwork.

As his mother was dying, Philip Kennicott began to listen to the music of Bach obsessively. It was the only music that didn't seem trivial or irrelevant, and it enabled him to both experience her death and remove himself from it. For him, Bach's music held the elements of both joy and despair, life and its inevitable end. He spent the next five years trying to learn one of the composer's greatest keyboard masterpieces, the Goldberg Variations. In Counterpoint, he recounts his efforts to rise to the challenge, and to fight through his grief by coming to terms with his memories of a difficult, complicated childhood.

He describes the joys of mastering some of the piano pieces, the frustrations that plague his understanding of others, the technical challenges they pose, and the surpassing beauty of the melodies, harmonies, and counterpoint that distinguish them. While exploring Bach's compositions he sketches a cultural history of playing the piano in the 20th century. And he raises two questions that become increasingly interrelated, not unlike a contrapuntal passage in one of the variations itself: What does it mean to know a piece of music? What does it mean to know another human being?

©2020 Philip Kennicott (P)2020 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Excellent for musicians and music appreciators!

Philosophical musings about Bach's Goldberg Variations, life, and death. I enjoyed this book for the history is discussed and the connections to something meaningful in the author's life.

Bach, to ease grief? Why Note

I enjoyed this very much. We all lose our parents, friends, dogs, so why not consult the greatest music ever written to help with grief, to find purpose, and perhaps for a bit, discover aspects of life that will appear meaningful. A sad story, a sad ending. Like Gilgamesh, we are all search for meaning when a life ends, the author pursued his passion to play the Goldberg variations to soothe his grief and to find in Bach's chaconne the hidden messages that could help him figure out his mom and his relationship to her. To play bach is to live, love, and know lost.