Flights: Time to read…
On my flight back and forth to the DC Amb Conference and the CEC 2006 I spend my time on the plane reading books. You can find the list on my “old and traditional” web-presence at http://www.pfuetzner.de/matthias/Further.html. This time it was Steven Isserlis’ book for children on some great composers, the title of the book is: “Why Beethoven Threw the Stew” (I read the german translation “Warum Beethoven mit Gulasch um sich warf”). He describes, starting with Bach, finishing with Strawinski, in every single one of the seven chapters what kind of person the composer was, what type of music he wrote, and with which pieces to start listening to. The intent is to make it easy for children to get an understanding of the surroundings, that led the composers to compose the way they did compose, and then to get an easy entry point into listening to the various styles and pieces of each of the seven composers covered in this small book.
I enjoyed it, but have to admit, that it might be influenced in it’s selection of topics by the fact, that Steven is a renowned player of the violoncello, so he focuses on composers that did also write pieces (the important ones) for cello… ;-)
The second book on my round-trip was “Cross Bones” by Kathy Reichs. Although I did enjoy her earlier books more than this one, it still is a good read. My only caveat: I didn’t like the “up to date” topic on Christ’s bones (remember: That sadly, cruely, un-skilled book: The Davinci Code?), because it seems to me as just following a trend. She doesn’t need that, so that was, what makes me select this one as one of her less good ones… ;-)
The third book I started going back, and have not yet finished, is Patricia Cornwell’s “Predator”. She’s no longer as good a read as she was in her earlier books, but I might be caught by the fact, that I read this book directly after Reichs’. The problem I now have is, that Reichs writes in the first person, having the “I” perspective of the hero, whereas Cornwell is more distant in using the third person, writing “she does” instead of “I do”, which draws you less into the action… Review to follow… ;-)
tags: cec2006
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