Music Assembly: Ravel's Piano Concerto in G Major, M. 83: II. Adagio assai

In which I continue to haemorrhage readers...

I don't know much about Maurice Ravel, to be honest, aside from the one thing everyone my age knows: Torvill and Dean and Bolero. But this piece has nothing to do with ice dance or Sarajevo or 1984.

Perhaps if I'd paid more attention in actual Music Assembly at school, I might have learnt something else about Ravel. As it is, I learnt about this piece by listening to Stephen Mangan's Desert Island Discs on Radio 4. Stephen talked movingly about sharing it with his father during the latter's last days, and described it as a musical embodiment of living moment to moment. I don't think I can add much to that, really, other than to say I think it is a beautiful thing. Oh, and there's a bit about five minutes in that reminds me of Howard Shore's soundtrack to David Fincher's The Game, a film I absolutely love. So it works, for me at least, on multiple levels.

Adagio assai is a musical direction meaning very slow. It's like being back in Music Assembly after all.

You can hear the lovely Lauren Laverne casting Stephen away right here. And if this piece isn't to your taste, there's always yesterday's post...