Tuesday, October 20

Concerts have not completely died in Helsinki yet. Currently people can run them under very strict conditions, meaning effectively with very few people.

We have managed to get tickets to a concert by the Helsinki Chamber Orchestra, who will spend the evening playing American Four Seasons, the second violin concerto by Phillip Glass, and Appalachian Spring by Aaron Copland to no more than the permitted 120 people.

Every other row remains unoccupied, and every row of twelve spaces seats only four people.

I will notice that the orchestra has chosen to play the final revision of Appalachian Spring, from 1972. I will then notice that the Glass composition premiered in 2009. Copland arrived on Eaath in 1900 (and departed for another appointment in 1990). Glass arrived in 1937, and continues to walk among us.

By what we surely cannot assume coincidence, both composers published tonight’s piece at the age of 72. Once I have noticed this I will spend the rest of the evening wondering if I have spotted a secret clue, some part, perhaps, of a wider conceptual continuity.