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Bomb disposal experts may be the only vocation more terrifying than playing in a classical orchestra. Think about it: A rock musician plays a wrong note and, honestly, nobody cares. Jazz is a bit more exacting. But play a wrong note and, well, it happens. But it seems like the classical folks always are perfect and any misstep is disastrous. Especially the folks in the percussion section.
Here is the beginning of ClassicalNet's profile of the composer commonly (though not entirely accurately) known as Maurice Ravel:
Joseph-Maurice Ravel (March 7, 1875 - December 28, 1937). was born in France near the Spanish border, to Swiss and Basque parents. His father's engineering work soon brought the family to Paris, and the young man entered the Paris Conservatory at age 14. He enrolled as a pianist but switched to composition under Gabriel Fauré and André Gedalge. Ravel was less radical a composer than Claude Debussy but rebellious in his own way. Where Debussy could write pieces to please the Conservatory masters and win a Prix de Rome, Ravel refused to be bound by the school's composition rules. His failure to win prizes did not endear him to his masters, even though he wrote successful pieces early on, including his Violin Sonata (1897) and Shéhérazade (1898). Given those successes, his failure to win the Prix de Rome in 1905 led to a public scandal and a change in the Conservatory directorship. (Continue Reading...)
Here is the start of Wikipedia's description of Ravel's signature piece:
Boléro is a one-movement orchestral piece by Maurice Ravel (1875–1937). Originally composed as a ballet commissioned by Russian actress and dancer Ida Rubinstein, the piece, which premiered in 1928, is Ravel's most famous musical composition.[1] Before Boléro, Ravel had composed large scale ballets (such as Daphnis et Chloé, composed for the Ballets Russes 1909–1912), suites for the ballet (such as the second orchestral version of Ma Mère l'Oye, 1912), and one-movement dance pieces (such as La Valse, 1906–1920). Apart from such compositions intended for a staged dance performance, Ravel had demonstrated an interest in composing re-styled dances, from his earliest successes (the 1895 Menuet and the 1899 Pavane) to his more mature works like Le tombeau de Couperin (which takes the format of a dance suite). (Continue Reading...)
The performance by the Munich Philharmonic obvious has an emotional backstory involving the conductor,
Sergiu Celibidache who died in 1996.