Robert P. Commanday, Editor

The musical dog days are upon us. Performances normally waiting upon our pleasure are not there, or have transferred to festivals somewhere else. It's a quiet time, and that's as it should be. Time to reflect and read and perhaps listen to recordings, getting caught up on those we've put aside, waiting for just the concentration they deserve. Maybe even a bit of performing on one's own, those of us that once had a skill at playing this or that, or singing — why not try a tune or two? No one will be listening.

Music needs space and quiet times between. And it needs full attention, minds coming to it clean. Often enough in busy times of working, meeting schedules, music's done the lifting of the spirits that rejuvenates and thrills and keeps us going. Now it's summer time, with leisure to follow up on some of that, to listen in on more of Bach beyond the well-known favorites, a Mozart opera no company manages to produce, Brahms songs that somehow recitalists barely sample. What was that piece that struck me so, the one the Symphony played, last March I think? The library'll have it.

I notice that the book reviewers list recommended summer reading . Why not summer listening, so easy with the pocket CD players, tape machines? Funny how the dynamics of our lives change so easily with the seasons, a cultural biorhythm taking over. Off at a festival, a different setting, removed from routine-associated living, work and chores, commuting, stress, the music offered is not so different, and neither are the players. But we are, and hear it differently. No, we listen better.