When I sit in the morning in my living room reading poetry, I tend to read it aloud. I like the sound of words and find that much poetry benefits from this. Recently I realized that since Edison the cat insists on sitting on my lap in the morning, I’m sort of reading to him.

So he gets nearly daily doses of Homer, Shakespeare, Leonard Cohen, Derek Walcott and others. Quite the erudite cat!

I gave myself yesterday off from composing. I was exhausted anyway. I had an early dentist appointment followed by piano trio rehearsal. The piano trio rehearsal went very well. We have some pretty cool music we are working on (Ravel’s Pavane pour une infante défunte  in transcription, Mozart, Clara Schumann).

I found it particularly rewarding that the trio allowed me to rehearse the Mozart way under tempo. I stopped half way through and made sure I wans’t driving them crazy. Both of my fellow musicians seem to appreciate this kind of rehearsal. We are well matched in that way.

We are also discovering what an excellent composer Clara Schumann was. The first movement of the trio we are working on is stunningly beautiful, a small masterpiece. We also played the second movement which is also excellent. It inspires me to check out more of her work.

I have designated today and tomorrow as work days on my composition. If I can’t get it substantially done by then I don’t see how it will be performed.

In a time of ‘Fake News Awards,’ here are 11 real, imprisoned journalists – The Washington Post

11 out of 262 compiled by the Committee to Protect Journalists in 2017.

Ta-Nehisi Coates on Cornel West’s One-Sided War – The Atlantic

Short article with a video I didn’t look at. I also noticed that West’s comments seemed to show he hadn’t read the book. I’m still reading it. I tend to read it when I treadmill.