To Lighten Your Load: Music, Beauty and the World

Alma Deutscher, a 17-year-old composer, conducts the Opera San José orchestra during a rehearsal for her opera “Cinderella”. Salgu Wissmath/The Chronicle/Salgu Wissmath / The Chronicle

By Thomas Neuburger

“If the world is so ugly, why make it even uglier with ugly music?” —Alma Deutscher

It’s been a bit heavy here lately, so I thought I’d lighten the load and offer some Friday fun.

Jonathan Coulton

I’ve loved song since forever. I linked to it recently; here it’s offered in full. I’ve chosen a live performance. Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JErs2SLbudE

“Did I say overlords? I mean protectors.” Words to remember.

Alma Deutscher

One more, this by a twenty-one year old musical prodigy, a woman named Alma Deutscher. She was composing at five and already her list of works is quite impressive.

Here she improvises a composition from notes drawn from a hat. Note that she has perfect pitch. She was twenty when this was recorded. A delightful listen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ezs6S1jq6qs

As you’ll notice, she writes in the tuneful romantic style of Mozart, Schubert, Chopin and the like. Responding to those who asked why not write in a modern and frankly more ugly style, she said in a video:

I already know that the world is complex and can be very ugly. If the world is so ugly, then what's the point of making it even uglier with ugly music?”

Not a bad aesthetic. The world’s grown ugly enough. Why add?