Sick Dogs and Beethoven

You see this face? You see how sweet it is? Now imagine this face depressed and sick. That was my poor baby today. He must have eaten something that didn’t agree with him, poor guy. Dan and I were very worried when he didn’t even seem interested in going for a walk…or canned food. He slept for a few hours and now seems to be approaching normal, which is a great relief. A few minutes ago, we went out into the backyard together and he even wagged his tail and scampered a bit. Always a good sign!

I’m watching something I DVR’d this morning - and I find it odd that something like DVR has become a verb. It’s a mini movie about the first performance of Beethoven’s third symphony, “Eroica.” It is my favorite of his symphonies, actually. One I performed when I was in the Flagstaff Symphony many years ago. The show, however, is not at all what I expected. I guess I thought it would be more of a History channel type thing. You know, where they poke around historical documents, read letters of people who knew Beethoven, and generally make assumptions and never say anything concrete.

What it actually is, on the other hand, is a reenactment kind of thing. Like I said earlier, kind of a mini movie. And Jack Davenport from “Coupling” is in it - not playing Beethoven, though. He was also in Pirates of the Caribbean - which really doesn’t relate to what I’m talking about now.

So, the movie…the parts where the orchestra is playing through symphony are both beautiful and, well, weird. It’s just the orchestra playing and the audience watching the reaction of the other people in the room. They all appeared to be in different states of being extremely moved (from what seemed like arousal to fear to disgust). I’m not sure what I think of it. I do know that the orchestra seems to be playing the piece awfully well for sight reading it. Either they are REALLY good at sight reading or I call foul.