My Goal This Year :)

IT'S TIME

Happy Birthday, Rubia! :)

Madonna Saved My Life

Perfectly Divine

It seems I have waited the perfect amount of time to write about the wonderful concert I attended at the beginning of March because Eduard Kunz would be once again present in my town to play his glorious piano scores. On the 2nd of April, he will play in a charitable concert whose aim is to raise money for autistic children.

Eduard Kunz is a Russian piano player aged 35 who has been named by the BBC among the 10 tomorrow's great piano players and who has had recitals all over the world. In 2007 he won The Grand prix at George Enescu International Competition of Classical Music. Since then, he has continued to win first prizes in competitions organized in the United States, Italy or Spain.

I first heard Kunz performing one year ago, in May 2015, when he toured with the famous violin player Alexandru Tomescu and his Stradivarius violin and it only took me a few seconds to be mesmerized by both of them. I am not very good with words when it comes to music and emotions, so I will let you enjoy a few minutes of his perfectly divine playing...

My Rebel Heart

23 years of loving her each day even more :)

Happy Birthday, Madonna! 

Music and Social Change

Music has always been a means of expressing oneself and the injustice that occurred all around, but not many musicians dared to express their revolt and take a stand in this regard. I guess speaking up was only for the bravest of them, whether they were called John Lennon, Bono or Madonna.
John Lennon fought for the rights of the common people, while Bono militated for helping the poor African countries and Madonna was one of the first people from the music industry to speak about gay rights and fighting prejudice. With such models, I believe it is quite hard for others to follow in their footsteps ...

My Heart is a Revolver...

Every time It Rains...

22 and counting...

Biolay - la vie, les amours...

Paris in July est la!

To celebrate Paris, France and other lovable things that are related to these, in July, everything turns into French, even the music I listen to ...


On attendra l'hiver
Pour s'écrire qu'on se manque
Que c'était long hier
Que c'est long de s'attendre.

Dance Me Till the End of Time ...

This Girl only Sleeps with Butterflies ...

New album "Unrepentant Geraldines" released TODAY :) Show to be seen from the first row ... in a month :)

No Words, Just Music

Getting better and better...

Let's make this biblical
And hang from our invisible cords...

Finding Company for Your Soul

Love (III) - George Herbert

Love bade me welcome: yet my soul drew back,
Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-ey'd Love, observing me grow slack,
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,
If I lack'd anything.

 It is quite uplifting to discover new writers, even if they were born centuries ago, and new music, even if it may not be the ordinary music you listen to, and all this thanks to your favorite writer, in my case, Jeanette Winterson.

On the 11th of November Jeanette spoke on BBC Radio 4 about George Herbert's poetry and Sir John Tavener's elating music. Herbert's poems attract a new audience mainly because his message states that love must come before God, which seems quite controversial for a 17th century poet.

Taverner, who unfortunately died last month at the age of 69, is famous for his mystical music and the liturgical traditions that influenced his major works. How the two can mix is described in the podcast. You can listen to it here, for more insight on how the two creative minds can be related, but simply listening to "The Protecting Veil" can give you the feeling of having been touched by the wings of an angel :)

A Night at the Opera

While some of you may be busy with Dewey's Read-a-thon, which I couldn't join because of too much work and a lack in reading time, I did find some moments to escape the crazy routine and go see a wonderful show, staged by The National Opera in Cluj Napoca. I am talking about Puccini's mesmerizing "Il Trittico", which premiered last month when the new opera season started.

The three one act operas were directed by the Hungarian director K. Gyorgy and conducted by the Italian conductor David Crescenzi. The operas were sung in Italian, with Romanian translations available and they swayed from tragic love (Il Tabarro) to a tormented soul (Suor Angelica) climaxing with roars of laughter during "Gianni Schicchi". It was incredible to see such a complex performance and also one of my former students in a supporting role during the last act and I am definitely looking forward to seeing "Madame Butterfly" in the next few months.

Vanessa et Benjamin

The most beautiful song of Vanessa's album "Love Songs" is definitely this one, mainly because I also love Benjamin Biolay who produced the entire album and signed eight of its songs. Voici la version live "Le Rempart" and I also recommend "Les Roses Roses" :)

Moi j’ai peur du noir
J’ai peur de la nuit du hasard
J’ai peur ici de n’plus savoir
J’ai peur de me perdre, il est tard
Là sans lumière, j’ai quel espoir ?

If you like it and you want to listen to the whole private concert, then click here :) 

La Musique de Paris en Juillet

I decided to join, for the third year, Paris in July Challenge, which is one of the simplest yet most entertaining challenges, mainly because one can mix books with movies or music, not to mention other fun activities, all related to France and/or Paris. You can read book about France, written by French authors or listen to some French piano bar music... your choice and your delight, since you cannot think about Paris without a smile lingering on your face, but what happens or will happen in Paris stays in Paris, right? :)

The soundtrack for this July will be Patricia Kaas and Vanessa Paradis, whose latest albums are simply beautiful.
Do you have a preference for one of the two? :)