Thoughts like flotsam, floating by.
Today's Oakland picture: Dave's- it used to be a 24hr diner I would go to with my friends very late at night back in the early 90's. Located on Broadway Ave., it is now closed.
Today's super-mini pianist biography- for more info- see link.
Johann Nepomuk Hummel (1778-1837) - born in Slovakia
He studied under Mozart, Clementi and Haydn.
Notes about Hummel from Harold Schonberg's Great Pianists,
According to Czerny (another g.p. who studied under Beethoven) "Never before had I heard such novel and dazzling difficulties, such clarity and elegance in performance, or such intimate and tender expression, or even good taste in improvisation."
In person, Hummel was anything but elegant. He was course, ungainly, slovenly and his face was pitted by smallpox. Czerny described him as "..a striking young man with an unpleasant common-looking face that constantly twitched", and wore "… utterly tasteless clothing". In late life Hummel grew monstrously stout and when he played he puffed, blew and perspired. But he was a refined musician and, aside from Beethoven, the greatest improviser of his age.
