Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Washington Post Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

You cannot shame the shameless.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

I like political parties that aren’t owned by foreign adversaries.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

Human rights are not a matter of opinion!

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

People are weird.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

The arc of the moral universe does not bend itself. it is up to us to bend it.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

We’re watching the self-immolation of the leading world power on a level unprecedented in human history.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

American history and black history cannot be separated.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

You are here: Home / Music / Van Cliburn RIP

Reader Interactions

23Comments

  1. 1.

    BGinCHI

    Another one of those moments when you find out news like this and think, “wow, I thought that dude/lady died years ago.”

    I was at MLA one year when I was a grad student and was riding an escalator at the hotel. I came to the top and this very old man was about to go down the wrong side and so I helped him over to the other side. I looked at his name tag and it said “Cleanth Brooks.”

    It was like seeing a ghost.

  2. 2.

    Don

    I recall playing in the orchestra with Cliburn as the soloist, when he was at his prime. He played very well, and was able to deal with the “blue haired ladies” so essential to the arts, then and now. He never forgot his roots, and helped a number of your musicians to take that next step. Peace to his memory.

  4. 4.

    Jewish Steel

    @BGinCHI: Me too! And I’m supposed to know this kind of thing.

    Look at all the rapt ladies swarming around the front of the stage. Pretty typical concert for me.

  10. 10.

    Comrade Mary

    I feel so guilty just reading your comments, guys. I will slink away, rename myself “Seth”, and lust no more.

  11. 11.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Comrade Mary: Oh god, that would be horrible. Why would you do something like that? Have I gained weight – is that it? As soon as the snow goes, I’ll be back on my bike again; until then, I am running when I have a chance.

  13. 13.

    Beauzeaux

    Van Cliburn’s victory in Moscow did not help thaw the cold war. It was viewed as a triumph for USism against the foul Redskis. The coverage at the time was one long neener neener–we beat you at your own game!!

    Cultural exchanges had begun to happen but everything Russian was still viewed with the gravest suspicion.

    I vas der, Sharlie! (Only people older than me will know that reference.)

  14. 14.

    patroclus

    His legacy will live on – the Van Cliburn competition continues every 4 years on the campus of TCU in Ft. Worth and it remains a huge event on the piano prodigy calendar with good attendance and press coverage.

  15. 15.

    handsmile

    @Don:

    Performing with Cliburn at that time in his career must have been a wonderful experience for you, though i expect you played with a number of celebrated soloists. His recording of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Chicago Symphony was one of my first classical music albums (given its acclaim, that was probably the case for a lot of young people in the 1960s).

    As for all you other naughty boys on this thread: behave! or you’ll have to listen to that record when we get home.

  18. 18.

    Anna in PDX

    So sorry to hear about this, he was wonderful, and we so need classical folks to be able to communicate with the outside world…

  21. 21.

    handsmile

    @Ash Can:

    But as I trust you know well, it’s those lines of communication that are becoming increasingly faulty, if not dead already. The professional classical music world is in grave condition.

  22. 22.

    dance around in your bones

    I had a co-worker (ok, she was my superior) whose husband was a classical pianist….we would go to parties at their house where he would play for us and I’d think to myself “I could die and go to heaven listening to this guy play piano – or at least have a mighty O before I died”.

  23. 23.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @patroclus:

    I have no way to prove this, but I may just be the only person in the world, or more likely, one of the very few, to have conducted separate, in-depth interviews with both Van Cliburn and the winner of the very first Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, one Ralph Votapek.

    When I interviewed him for the NPR station I worked for, Cliburn was exceedingly gracious (although not happy with his concert performance — one of his last, I believe). This was in the mid or late ’70s, and his mother, the unique and ineffable Rildia Bee, was present throughout. Wish I had had the presence of mind to interview HER!!

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