Luckily I’ve now managed to work around some stupid file size upload limits, and can now provide, for your listening pleasure, a recording of Also Spracht Zarathustra, by Richard Strauss, as performed by me (and 90 or so other people) at Jack Singer Hall in Calgary.
The first minute is immediately recognizable to anybody who watches movies, but very few have listened to the remaining half hour, which is just as good, and worth sitting through. The story it tells is of man’s ascension from beast to overman, but of course we’ve all read our Nietzsche so we know that.
My fondest memory playing this piece occurred at Toronto’s Roy Thompson Hall. It’s a very nice hall, and was fairly new when we played it in 1994. Of particular interest was the organ, which as organs go is considered to be “beefy.” Some of the string players ganged up on the organist after the dress rehearsal and convinced her to see what it could do in the performance. So, when the performance came along she cranked that sucker up to 11 and absolutely let loose during the first massive 2001-esque crescendo. That thing shook the entire hall, leaving a few thousand heads exploded, and I bet God himself was trembling at the sound. It was of course a totally unprofessional thing to do, and she was banned from playing the Strauss for the rest of the tour, but holy crap it was amazing.
So, please enjoy, but if you intend to listen I suggest you right click and download, as it’s >30 MB, and I don’t want to kill my server.
]]>As a side note, despite my relative lack of natural vocal talent, I was recently pleased to learn that I am a better singer than both Britney Spears and Enrique Iglesias, which is nice.
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