I just got back from a piano concert entitled "Classical Smackdown". It was rather interesting. The pianist, Frederic Chiu, put together a program of music by Prokofiev and Debussy. He paired them up in 4 "rounds" and the point was to see which of each round we enjoyed better. He even gave out ballots and apparently gives this concert often and is tallying up the results. Not only was he a fantastic artist, but I loved the alternation between genres. The music of Debussy and Prokofiev is so different, yet their lives overlapped (Debussy was about 30 years older). Prokofiev has that eastern European coldness that lends itself to excitement and bitter emotion. Debussy explores all the colors and timbres of the piano and is, in my opinion, really beautiful. Because of these differences, it was really hard to decide what I enjoyed more. I somewhat decided that I like listening to Debussy, but I enjoy playing Prokofiev. The process of learning and understanding music like Prokofiev's is rather fun. Hooray!
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