Sometimes I listen to classical music when I get up in the morning. The station I listen to is called VPR Classical and it is 95.1FM out of Sunderland, VT. I don’t really listen to it on the radio anymore unless I am in my car. The digital age is replacing the radio as well and now I ask Alexa to “Play WVTQ!” or I plug it into my Google Chrome.
I always kind of wanted to be a classical music fan. I’m not sure why. Maybe for the same reason that I wanted to be a fan of art. Maybe I thought it would make me seem smarter than I am. Maybe it would bring some culture and help me when I am at a cocktail party where I can discuss Franz Shubert’s String Quartet: finale in C D 956. Of course I haven’t been to a cocktail party in years and I don’t recall any person within shouting distance at any of the cocktail parties I have been to discussing Shubert. Maybe Shubert was playing on the stereo but that was about it.
I will say that I am enjoying the music even if I can’t pick out the certain songs (are they called songs?) or specific artists the way I can pick out the Beastie Boys or a Pearl Jam song. The music does relax me and it is a nice companion to my first cup of coffee as I get started with my day. I even find myself occasionally flipping onto the station when I am in the car to see if the music catches my attention. Sometimes it does and sometimes I flip to another station.
The host in the morning in a woman named Helen Lyons. She is great. I love her enthusiasm for the music and her descriptions of each piece as she introduces them. The other day she invited the listeners under the velvet rope to a concert hall in the 1930’s for a swinging tune. Yesterday she described the heroine in an opera bit as being coquettish and it made me want to meet the heroine after listening. Her eagerness as she talks about what is coming up in “Eight O’clock Bach” gets me straining to listen to the opening of Prelude and Fugue in c minor.
I try and celebrate someone like Helen Lyons. The way that her personality comes though and the way she has made me get excited for the music is a good thing for me. It has helped me open up a new door in my life and when I walk through that door I am finding that I really enjoy what is on the other side. It is a reminder to myself that I need to keep my mind open to other things because I might just like some of those other things. Now I am going to be back to enjoying the music- the Russian Easter Festival Overture is now playing (I had to look that one up!)
