Today’s features: Sonata Op. 13 “Pathetique,” mvt. 2, by Ludwig van Beethoven; Prelude no. 2 by George Gershwin

This week I’m breaking the blog’s pattern. Last night was the end of our long and difficult presidential election cycle here in the US. It’s an intense time full of intense feelings.

I woke up this morning thinking about how politicians and political cycles come and go, but it’s the rest of us, the people of this country, who live together, who talk to each other, who share the same space. We decide, more than anyone else, what kind of climate we live in. We decide how to treat one another.

Sometimes those of us who work as artists feel marginalized or discouraged. Our work often looks like a luxury. You have to have food, but you don’t have to have music, or paintings, or books.

Today I say we do need all of those things. We need them to keep us human. We need them to help us connect with each other. Right now, in the wake of a long and incredibly divisive time in this country, we need them more than ever, as we look ahead to tomorrow and the coming weeks and years.

Wherever you are, whoever you voted for, today I send this music out to you. Today, tomorrow, and always, the world needs art. It needs beauty. It needs peace. It always has, and it always will, and each and every one of us can help to keep those essentials alive.

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