the violin conspiracy by brendan slocumb

KHALID: So, for example, though, there are some scenes that are really tough, I think, to just deal with for young Ray. SLOCUMB: And it just blew everybody away. (SOUNDBITE OF CLARA CERNAT AND THIERRY HULLIET PERFORMANCE OF MONTI'S 'CSARDAS') And then the comeback he had - after a great lesson with his teacher, he came and played 'Csardas' by Monti. And he wants to quit, and he wants to give up.

(SOUNDBITE OF RUSSIAN NATIONAL ORCHESTRA PERFORMANCE OF KABALEVSKY'S 'CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN AND ORCHESTRA IN C MAJOR, OP.48 - 1. The scene where Ray is performing in front of a convocation of his college classmates and he completely bombs a piece, the Kabalevsky violin concerto. Actually, had someone gotten a hold of me when I was seven or eight years old, I probably would have been able to be at that level. KHALID: So you did not compete in the Tchaikovsky Competition. But for the most part, it's basically the story of my life, minus the Tchaikovsky Competition. SLOCUMB: A lot of what Ray experiences are my own experiences, some of it modified. The book is called 'The Violin Conspiracy,' and I asked author Brendan Slocumb how much of his own life is reflected in Ray's character. But as a Black man in classical music, a missing instrument is not Ray's only problem. KHALID: Today Brendan Slocumb has made a career out of playing and teaching the violin - kind of like the protagonist of his new novel, Ray McMillan, who is about to perform in the International Tchaikovsky Competition when his precious Stradivarius violin is stolen. You know, I hardly knew how to hold my violin at that point when I heard it. SLOCUMB: I said, one day I'm going to play that. (SOUNDBITE OF JERUSALEM STRING QUARTET PERFORMANCE OF DVORAK'S 'STRING QUARTET NO. KHALID: The next piece he fell for was Dvorak's 'String Quartet No. And I just - I fell in love with it that day. SLOCUMB: I was like, what is going on? What kind of music is this? This is totally new. It's a Mozart.Īnd for some reason, that just stuck with me, and I thought that was the greatest thing in the world. SLOCUMB: My music teacher, Miss Holmes (ph) when I was in third grade - she said, you can always tell it's Mozart by this little song. (SOUNDBITE OF ORCHESTRA DA CAMERA FIORENTINA PERFORMANCE OF MOZART'S 'SYMPHONY NO.

Brendan Slocumb remembers that moment that classical music just clicked for him.īRENDAN SLOCUMB: The first piece of classical music that I heard was Mozart's 'Symphony No.

The violin conspiracy by brendan slocumb