February 14, 2022

The highlight of my Sunday was not the Super Bowl, which I had on only for the final hour, mostly in the background while I washed dishes, and only because All Creatures Great and Small doesn't particularly interest me. The highlight of my Sunday was hearing the PSO perform Stravinsky's Firebird Suite at the end of a long, rich program. It had been a few years since I'd heard it, and I'd forgotten how magical the first section, "Dance of the Firebird," is, how beautiful the melancholic throb of the "Berceuse" is, how achingly gorgeous the transition from it to the finale is, and how magnificent the ending is. I succeeded in not weeping -- but it was a close call.