Concert and champagne both appreciated

Classical pianist Frederick Moyer gave an excellent concert on Oceanview’s Baldwin grand piano, in the Hilltop Lodge Community Room there, on Monday, Dec. 18. The hall was full, and the concert was much appreciated.

Moyer spoke about the composer and the music before each number. In residencies, from one day to three weeks, he combines major performances, master classes, workshops and school performances. He has been a concert pianist for 25 years ,and has played with renowned orchestras in 41 countries, including Japan, Hong Kong, Brazil, Australia, and even at Windsor Castle, London.

His program choice was varied and interesting. He played sonata in A Major, K. 113, by Domenico Scarlatti, 1685-1757; Prelude and Fuge No. 13 in F-sharp Major, from the Well-Tempered Klavier, Book 1, by Johann Sebastian Bach, 1685-1750; Sonatine in E-Minor, Op. 89, No. 1, by Max Reger, 1873-1916; Rumanian Christmas Carols – Book 1 by Bela Bartok, 1881-1945; and Fantasy in C Major (“Wanderer”) D/760 (Op. 15) by Franz Schubert, 1797-1828.

For an encore, after heavy applause by the audience, he played a piano piece his mother used to play. She was his first teacher. I thought it might be a simple piece, but it was very exciting – Sinding’s (1856-1941) “Rustle of Spring,” from Opus 32. I read in Grove’s Dictionary that it was one of that composer’s well-known compositions.

The champagne reception, in the dining room, was well-attended, too, with a long table there filled with plates of grapes, melon slices, breads, bars, cookies and cakes, and the champagne was served in handsome, tall glass goblets.

I was pleased to talk with friends Doris Chapman and Martha Saunders. Martha and her husband, Dr. Norman Saunders, are now residents at Blueberry Lane there at the retirement community.

I knew all the composers except Max Reger, and I checked his name in Grove’s, too, and found four pages about him. He was named Johann Baptist Joseph Maximilian, and was born in Brand, Bavaria, in 1873. He died in Leipsiz in 1916. He and his father, a schoolmaster, rebuilt a scrapped school organ for use at home. His father, a musical amateur, played the oboe, the clarinet and the double bass, and made sure that his son Max learned to play the piano and string instruments. Even when Max played a military march faultlessly from memory (at the age of 12), his parents refused to take his talent seriously.

Max later began composing, having productive years in Munich. He later became a professor of composition and director of music at Leipzig University, and he soon became known internationally. His enormous production of organ music at around the turn of the century makes Reger the most important German organ composer after Bach.

I am pleased to have discovered Max Reger, thanks to Moyer’s concert.

Unwrapping the bound feet

I have a plaster model of a bound Chinese foot, which I knew little about. It was a possession in my mother’s family, and I now keep it in our china closet. I’ve been shocked by it, and now an article in the Dec. 2 New York Times has clarified it for me.

The caption under the picture of two elderly Chinese ladies, whose feet were bound, and who now are 84 years old, says, “A woman with very small feet was considered a very desirable wife.”

These ladies have outlived their husbands, and also outlived civil war. One of the ladies, Mrs. Wang, said she was married when she was 15. She said, “My feet were wrapped when I was five years old. No one wanted you unless you bound your feet. That is what my mother told me.” She said, “They don’t peel and they don’t hurt, but the bone is broken.

By 1932, she said, the communists took control of the Shenmu region and forbade old customs like bound feet. “When I was 12, they were unwrapped,” she recalled, explaining why her feet are slightly larger than those of other women of her generation. “When Chairman Mao came around, binding wasn’t allowed anymore.”

I think that it must have been very difficult, with the feet bound, to walk any distance. I was pleased to read that description in the New York Times and am thankful that it was put to an end.

But don’t ask about the calories …

I finally have all the ingredients together, to make today’s pie recipe. It is an easy one, using a prepared graham cracker pie crust.

VERA REYNOLDS’ PEANUT BUTTER PIE

4 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature

1 cup confectioner’s sugar

1/3 cup peanut butter (either chunky or smooth)

1/3 cup milk

Put these four ingredients in a bowl and beat until smooth. Stir in a 9 ounce container of Cool Whip (Vera has cut this down, suggesting a 4 ounces for 1 pie or the 9 ounces for 2 pies) .

Pour this mixture into a graham cracker crust. Sprinkle with nuts or graham cracker crumbs over the top. And that’s it!