Peaceful Pastimes

A view of the Kammergericht building at the Kleistpark (nearly across the street from us)

It's the height of the lunch break (Mittagspause) here, which is why I'm not playing the piano now. When we were very little, living on our grandparents' property in Victoria, we always had to go up to the attic for at least an hour at noon, so that we wouldn't play outside and be noisy. It was dreadfully boring, though we played games, and I was highly rebellious. This same sense of boredom and of being careful not to disturb others is coming back to me now that we're living in an apartment and can't be as loud as we want any more (in university I wasn't so bothered because I either couldn't or didn't feel like doing anything noisy). But now I'm taking it more philosophically and trying to make good use of the time. I've already read all the articles I wanted to read in the Berliner Zeitung, so I'm temporarily at a loss for things to do.

This morning I already played the Haydn trio, technical exercises, and a study; the G major scales; Le Coucou (The Cuckoo) by Claude Daquin, and the Prélude, Allemande and Courante of the Händel suite. My programme is going splendidly, and I was finally able to play a lot yesterday. Among other pieces I played Schubert's accompaniments to "Das Wandern" (from the Schöne Müllerin) as well as "Das Heidenröslein." I sang along, too, because the piano accompaniments aren't that exciting and, quite honestly, because I wanted to see if I could sing the pieces decently. It turns out that I really do have a quiet voice and that I often hit the wrong note, but that made it all the more fun. I was rather horrified by the sentimentality or otherwise excessive emotion of the lyrics of some other Schubert songs.

The advantage of playing the piano is that there are so many different components to the music, which prevent it from being too unrelievedly emotional. The melody may be really simple and sentimental, and very natural, but then you have the accompaniment (sometimes with more than one voice), which is more elaborated and which usually provides an intriguing contrast to the melody. Take, for instance, the Moonlight Sonata. It can, of course, be played so that it is very boring and very sappy. But the low, rumbly Beethovenian chords in the left hand make it more than just pretty, and the equally rumbly shifting of the melody to the left hand gives it a greater variety. Also, the constant flowing broken triads can be very funny if they are played too loudly and irregularly (as I, of course, have never done . . . (c; ). Another example is the sostenuto prélude by Chopin; there, deep Beethovenian chords also prevent it from being too boring. I often like it, too, if I play the wrong notes -- as long as they don't greatly detract from the music -- because that makes the music much more interesting.

Yesterday evening I began (again) to translate the war volume of my paternal grandfather's memoirs. I'm not translating that volume out of sensational interest, but because he hadn't translated it yet himself. Today I should search for our German-English dictionaries so that my English is more accurate; I should probably even do some reading up on World War II (so that I understand what "Abteilung" means in the military, for example). The main reason I'm doing this is that I want to practise translating; I think I should only seriously translate the memoirs (if no one else has) when I'm older, at which point I'll have more life experience and can understand more things. It's also very difficult getting the proper tone in the translation, because Opapa tended to speak clearly and simply, but his writing is more complex, and so it's hard to hit the right balance of informality and formality in the English.

Before I went to sleep I decided to read in the Bible. I innocently opened it at random. First I read in the Old Testament that no one who is malformed should bring food to the altar of God; thenI flipped to the New Testament, and read how someone (perhaps Jesus) was threatening to lay waste to a city so as to make the destruction of Sodom pale in comparison. ! Not wanting to go to sleep on that note, I turned to the poems of Tennyson (which embodied the Christian ideals much better), where I browsed through "In Memoriam" and, as usual, the more sentimental narrative poetry. This time the calibre of the poetry (not necessarily the sentimental poetry) really struck me, and made me feel very humble. Anyway, I eventually went to sleep comforted.

My brother Ge. and my father are at the airport, where Ge. is having another flight lesson. My mother is unpacking boxes and generally clearing things up. My eldest brother Gi. and youngest brother J. are at their computers, and my sister T. is playing the flute -- the Telemann suite in A major, I think -- to the accompaniment of Mama's whistling.

Anyway, I'll just finish with an update on my considerations regarding a job, piano lessons, university, etc. I did a lot of research a few days ago, but came up essentially empty-handed. At least I have a better idea now what kinds of jobs are available. As for the piano lessons, I've decided only to look for a teacher in the last week of August or even September, when the holidays are over. I should still research college admissions guidelines, but I especially want to look into the possibility of studying music at the Universität der Künste. In my ideal next year I would have a nice part-time job (pay doesn't matter -- perhaps translating, or carrying papers), attend a college, and have music lessons. The year after that I would still have a job, and go to the Freie Universität to study comparative literature or to the Universität der Künste to study the piano. In the meantime I would go on long bike excursions, go to museums and art galleries, and go to concerts; in the holidays I would alternately travel and just relax at home.