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In the Forum: Musical Discussions
In the Thread: The Yevgeny Mravinsky Film
Post Subject: Re: The Yevgeny Mravinsky FilmPosted by yoshi on: 4/30/2006
I picked up the DVD along with his Tokyo Live CDs when I was in Japan last month. I was most impressed by the scene of him listening to a playback at a recording studio. The agonized expression on his face is almost disturbing. Was it just because he wasn't happy with the performance? Maybe, but it also made me think what music meant to him. I don't want to go into a sentimental speculation here, so would just say that it seems the music was the last retreat for him from the envioronment he was placed in this world, especially toward the end of his life, and that gave me a sense of him as an actual human being who once walked on the earth.
Most of the Tokyo Live CDs were recorded as bootleg (CDs themselves are official releases with the blessing of Mravinsky's widow). You can get them through HMV (Japan). I don't give a shit to the sound (actually not bad), just the performances blew me away.
In a book "Mravinsky and I" by Midori Kawashima (Mravinsky's translater from '73~'79) she wrote as Mravinsky's words when he was about to leave Japan after his first tour in Japan in '73,
"Before, I thought I was going to the end of the world, but now I know it is us who are living in the end of the world."
I felt pround for being a Japanese!
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