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Our motto: "Critical thinking in the cheap seats." Unbiased, honest classical music and opera opinions, occasional obituaries and classical news reporting, since 2007. All written content © 2019 by Paul J. Pelkonen. For more about Superconductor, visit this link. For advertising rates, click this link. Follow us on Facebook.

Saturday, July 28, 2012

The Blog of Five Rings

Superconductor goes to the 2012 Olympics. 
(well, not really.)
by Paul J. Pelkonen
Most definitely not the five rings of the Olympics.
Like much of the world, I have a deep and abiding fascination with the Olympic Games. From watching the Miracle on Ice at the tender age of 6 (I wasn't even going to the opera yet) to the Herculean efforts of Carl Lewis and Michael Johnson, the Olympics are regularly part of my life (with a pronounced preference for winter sports to summer).

In honor of the just started Thirtieth Olympiad, I'm going to try to theme the 16 days with posts relating works of musical art to Olympic events. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to do all of this, but I thought of tying certain events to operas or compositions. It would also allow me to write about some of the back-log of recordings I have piling up.

Some ideas:

Basketball: All-star recordings ("The Dream Team!")
Archery: William Tell
Weight-lifting: Bruckner's (weighty) Ninth Symphony.
Pole Vault: Vintage Chopin recordings
Synchronized Swimming: Music for Piano Four Hands
Marathon: Der Ring des Nibelungen. (that one seems obvious.)
Cycling: A complete Beethoven or Brahms symphony set.

And somewhere in there I'm going to write about the Philippe Herrweghe recording of Szenen aus Goethes Faust that I bought at Academy the other week.

I'm not quite sure how this will all work out, but I hope you continue to enjoy the blog, regular features and reviews, and quality content including our upcoming Metropolitan Opera Preview, now launching once the Olympics are over.

Happy Olympics!

Paul Pelkonen
Editor, Superconductor

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Critical Thinking in the Cheap Seats