Music: Russell & Wittgenstein.
Ken Blackwell, Treasurer of the Bertrand Russell Society, asked, in conjunction with submitting the treasurer’s report, that members provide him with links to their web sites, which he would list on the BSR web site.
This prompted me to think about - to inquire about - Bertrand Russell’s interest in music. There aren’t many references to music in Ray Monk’s two volume Russell. Russell does mention being inspired by a biography of Mozart and the letters of Beethoven. And Wittgenstein, in a letter to Russell, shows his approval of Russell’s interest in Beethoven. However, Russell’s interests in Mozart and Beethoven seems to have been these composers’ lives rather than their music. Brian McGuinness in his Wittgenstein: A Life has a lot to say about Wittgenstein’s musicality, music preferences, and concert-going in Cambridge. His tastes were conservative Viennese tastes - Schubert was his main man.
Fred Sherry String Quartet’s Naxos Schoenberg recording.
Fred Sherry’s recording of Schoenberg’s 3rd and 4th String Quartets along with the Phantasy for Violin and Piano is brilliant. The performances and the recorded sound are thrilling. The latter is something that I’ve become accustomed to not getting from Naxos recordings. I must say the sound quality of recent Naxos recordings - Ligeti, string quartets; Babbit, Soli e Duettini; and Haydn, Stabat Mater - has been excellent.
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