Introducing our new classical arts blogger

I’ve known Christian Chalifour professionally and personally for more than 20 years.
Professionally, I’ve covered many of his performances in all kinds of genres. I most recently was blown away hearing him play Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five” on harp at Mango restaurant in Palm Springs, where he plays during the Sunday brunch.
Personally, I watched what he did for my trumpet-playing son, Clay, as music director of the Buddy Rogers Youth Symphony. He gave my son a love of classical music during the five years Clay was in that ensemble and for that I will always be grateful.
Now he’s bringing his love, knowledge and passion for classical music to mydesert.com readers as a regular classical arts blogger. I’m hoping he’ll inspire online readers to love the great music performed by the new conductors of the Coachella Valley Symphony and Buddy Rogers Youth Symphony groups he nurtured. Classical music can’t survive unless it can become a source of conversation among young people through the social media.
I’m confident his blogs will be intelligent, insightful and entertaining. But here’s what Christian has to say about what he wants to accomplish with his blog starting tomorrow among the reader blogs. It will move in January to the mydesert.com home page.

Here’s Christian:

Most of you know me from my work as a freelance harpist, or from my 15 years as music director & conductor for Coachella Valley Symphony and Buddy Rogers Youth Symphony. Having retired from the latter, I am happy to be given the opportunity to preview & review classical arts entertainment events for the new mydesert.com classical arts blog.

As a relative newcomer to the blog experience, I look forward to offering you my personal insight to understanding, and more importantly, to enjoying the myriad of classical arts offerings available here in our wonderful Coachella Valley. From symphony to opera and chamber music, I hope to engage your attention, make it fun and upbeat, and keep it all on a level with something for everybody, from seasoned musicians and patrons to those of you who are perhaps just discovering the joy of classical music.

For me, the greatest advice I ever heard as a young musician, and as a listener, was from the late, great Leonard Bernstein. It was 1960, his “West Side Story” was only three years old, and he was at the pinnacle of his legacy leading the New York Philharmonic. For my 9th birthday, my grandmother took me on the train from Syracuse to New York City to see and hear one of Bernstein’s now famous Young Peoples Concerts at Carnegie Hall. After the performance, I was treated to a 10-minute backstage visit to meet the iconic conductor I had already been watching and listening to for several years. After introducing himself, he invited me to sit down at the piano. It was a 9-foot Steinway concert grand; the first I’d ever seen, and I felt pretty intimidated. Then, pointing to the music, he asked me what I saw. I told him I saw the notes. He asked if I wanted to play for him. Then, sensing my intimidation, he warmly said “It’s a wonderful thing to be able to see, play and hear the music. But if you really want to understand the music, and the composer who wrote the music, you must never be afraid to feel the music.” And with that, he sat down on the bench next to me and ripped off a few boisterous bars of Beethoven, followed with a soft whisper of Brahms.

With that, I understood the importance of learning to hear and to play with contrast. When beginning a musical instrument, whether it be the piano, or a trumpet or a violin, most children want to do two things right away: They want to play fast, and they want to play loud! That part is easy, relatively speaking. Then when faced with the challenge of having to play soft and slow, it takes more work and understanding to develop those skills. But once you catch on, you begin to appreciate the beauty and scope of a composer’s work, and develop a sense of the power of musical dynamics and discover how to use all the colors on the musical palette.

As I continue tomorrow with my “3 Picks for the weekend” I sincerely hope you will not only read my blog previews and reviews, but will actively participate in the blog, build up our blog audience, and then go out and discover for yourself all the great classical music our local venues offer, from our talented local artists & groups, to our visits by the very finest orchestras, chamber groups and classical superstars worldwide. There’s so much out there for everyone, plenty of room for all of it, and not all of it is priced beyond reach.