Beethoven’s 5th Symphony in C Minor, Op, 67. The first two bars, –” I love you mum – I love you mom”. I love you ma etc. etc. etc.
Beethoven’s 5th Symphony is my favorite symphony. It was my first LP, I bought it at record shop in Republic St, next to the band club in Valletta, Malta. After that I bought Bach’s, Toccata and Fugue in D minor, organ. Also, I love Wagner’s The Ring.
Then switched to Deep Purple, Black Sabbat and other British Bands. The most impressive was David Bowe, and then Rick Wakeman. Jethro Tull with their album Passion Play was the future.
Mass music, I find it very rewarding. Gioachino Rossini is special, because on certain recordings, I could (imaginatively) hear the fireworks going off. In Malta fireworks were a very big thing. So, the theatre of it all. The festivities, the mass and parishioners, the church buildings, the music and songs, the smell of the incense and the weather all together creates a very dynamic atmosphere.
The Requiems of Brahms, Mozart and Verdi’s. Also, Missa Solemnis by Beethoven and Schubert Mass in G Major and many others.
J. S. Bach’s St Matthew Passion, is well beyond. However, for me, most of Bach’s religious works don’t feel religious at all, but neither are they secular. They simply not this or that, just are a category on their own. There are different theories to this, but that’s for another time.
You hear these Masses not purely as religious works of art, rather something deeper and humane. Its more of something deep into the abyss of self, not out of despair but rather out of light of humanity that can reach to such heights. The reason why Gothic architecture works so well, looking from one depth to the heavens.
