Reviews
Uncommon Measure: A Journey Through Music, Performance, and the Science of Time, by Natalie Hodges
berylbird's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
I loved Natalie Hodges narrative approach in her memoir. As a young girl, all Hodges wanted to be was a violin soloist. Practicing diligently for five and six hours a day, up until the wee hours of the morning, her life was consumed by music. Twenty years later, her professional quest has become unlikely, and she has to cast about for another way to live. In the maelstrom of this decision, Hodges takes up the writing of this memoir.
This book is so tantalizing. Hodges marches through quantum physics and the science of time, suggesting that we may be able to change our relationship with the past by writing about it. I'm willing to consider this as long as the facts stay true. Sometimes what's needed is a new perspective.
She writes about music's connectivity with the flow of time:
<b>"Music sculpts time. Indeed, it is a structuring of time, as a layered arrangement of audible temporal events." </b>
Time and thinking process are some of the greatest challenges Hodges faces during performances. She found herself obsessing over making errors and true to her fears, she often would.
<b> "If you can't get into that flow--if your nerves get the best of you and you're dragged onto the shore of self-consciousness--well, chances are you'll mess up that tricky run . . . The flow is staunched, the fabric rent; you feel punched in the gut, knocked out of the music's time and back into your own. And then, afterward, you can feel the seconds and minutes passing; you trudge through, it's all linera, your just want it to be over, you just want to make it to the end." </b>
Although I'm not a musician, I can sympathize with her performance anxiety. I hate public speaking but have a huge admiration for those composed souls who speak so well in front of groups. Now, I have aI new appreciation for the musician who has put hours and years of practice into their performances. Hodges helped me to understand the interplay of chamber music and how the musicians lean into one another, assisting and enabling each other.
Hodges explores the improvisation of Gabriela Montero, a celebrated pianist, and the brain studies that show her brain is working differently than the brains of those who deliver practiced performances. Incredibly fascinating!
She enlightened me on Bach's Chaconne in D minor, which she describes as one of the most difficult pieces a violinist can play. I listened to it on youtube. I'm not a classical connoisseur. To me, it didn't sound beautiful, but the more I listened, the more compelling it became. Some say Bach wrote this as a memorial for his first wife, Maria Barbara, who died while Bach was away from home. Hodges explains that this has been largely debunked, but still the story persists, perhaps because of the deep emotion, perhaps grief that hangs heavy within the Chaconne.
And her chapter on the tango. Exquisite!
A delightful memoir, Hodges relates her relationship with her Korean mother and her father. The story of her life with her parents and her music is the counterpoint melody throughout this beautiful work. I'm always happy to see beautifully written prose, and whether you're familiar with classical music or quantum physics is of no matter; this is skillful, eloquent prose with clarity of thought that provoked my curiosity at every turn.
This book is so tantalizing. Hodges marches through quantum physics and the science of time, suggesting that we may be able to change our relationship with the past by writing about it. I'm willing to consider this as long as the facts stay true. Sometimes what's needed is a new perspective.
She writes about music's connectivity with the flow of time:
<b>"Music sculpts time. Indeed, it is a structuring of time, as a layered arrangement of audible temporal events." </b>
Time and thinking process are some of the greatest challenges Hodges faces during performances. She found herself obsessing over making errors and true to her fears, she often would.
<b> "If you can't get into that flow--if your nerves get the best of you and you're dragged onto the shore of self-consciousness--well, chances are you'll mess up that tricky run . . . The flow is staunched, the fabric rent; you feel punched in the gut, knocked out of the music's time and back into your own. And then, afterward, you can feel the seconds and minutes passing; you trudge through, it's all linera, your just want it to be over, you just want to make it to the end." </b>
Although I'm not a musician, I can sympathize with her performance anxiety. I hate public speaking but have a huge admiration for those composed souls who speak so well in front of groups. Now, I have aI new appreciation for the musician who has put hours and years of practice into their performances. Hodges helped me to understand the interplay of chamber music and how the musicians lean into one another, assisting and enabling each other.
Hodges explores the improvisation of Gabriela Montero, a celebrated pianist, and the brain studies that show her brain is working differently than the brains of those who deliver practiced performances. Incredibly fascinating!
She enlightened me on Bach's Chaconne in D minor, which she describes as one of the most difficult pieces a violinist can play. I listened to it on youtube. I'm not a classical connoisseur. To me, it didn't sound beautiful, but the more I listened, the more compelling it became. Some say Bach wrote this as a memorial for his first wife, Maria Barbara, who died while Bach was away from home. Hodges explains that this has been largely debunked, but still the story persists, perhaps because of the deep emotion, perhaps grief that hangs heavy within the Chaconne.
And her chapter on the tango. Exquisite!
A delightful memoir, Hodges relates her relationship with her Korean mother and her father. The story of her life with her parents and her music is the counterpoint melody throughout this beautiful work. I'm always happy to see beautifully written prose, and whether you're familiar with classical music or quantum physics is of no matter; this is skillful, eloquent prose with clarity of thought that provoked my curiosity at every turn.
cryptidcucumber's review
5.0
Uncommon Measure was a thrill to read. As we walk through Hodges’ past, her anxieties, and her memories we get to view them from different perspectives. She recounts the moments of her past (performance anxiety, her father leaving, her mother’s immigration hardships) and how she felt when they happened. Then she swiftly brings you to how they make her feel now. This is followed by the science of time, as she figures out what these different emotions mean in relation to her past, present, and future. This book is somehow a hopeful reimagining of perceived regrets and fears. The sense that “time is what we make it” is presented in a way that feels achievable, and is backed by science and experience. We are connected to her through this exploration of time, and what it means to be these particles polarizing to the same tune. Even if our perceptions aren’t exactly the same, even if what we have now isn’t what we originally thought it would be, we can find each other through these stretches of time, and improvise the rest.
jaccarmac's review
emotional
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
3.5
It's a strong debut, the chapter on the Chaconne especially moving, uneven at times seemingly on the sentence level. I can take or leave the pop science, but it ended up being a connecting thread between the essays. Deeply, deeply affecting material, in the same vein as Ullman on programming. It reveals and provokes fundamental feelings about music, encouraging one to sublimate past opportunities in new forms of creation.