Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Virtuosity - Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov - Yuja Wang

I was amazed at the skill exhibited in this very short performance of the "Flight of the Bumblebee" arranged for the piano. Yuja Wang is the pianist.



The musical gifts that God has given to some people are simply amazing. Honestly, I am not 100% sure whether the video is edited or not, the pianist's fingers are moving so quickly and yet accurately. Either way, whether as a feat of musical or video-editing skill, this piece illustrates one of the good gifts God has given us: music.

Although we would expect that Adam could sing, instrumental music was developed in the sixth generation of mankind, around 3500 B.C. or so, by Jubal. Scripture tells us:

Genesis 4:21 And his brother's name was Jubal: he was the father of all such as handle the harp and organ.

Jubal was the son of Lamech by Adah. Lamech was the son of Enoch: not the Enoch who was translated, but Enoch the son of Cain and Cain's unnamed wife. As you doubtless recall, Cain was Adam's firstborn son.

This musical gift was handed down beyond the flood and became incorporated into the temple worship. You will recall that David and all of Israel played before the Lord with such instruments. As well, this can be found in Psalm 33:

Psalm 33:2 Praise the LORD with harp: sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings.

May we glorify Him with this gift!

-TurretinFan

UPDATE: As you can see from the URL of this post, I initially ascribed this tune to the wrong composer. That has been fixed, thanks o an attentive reader who chose to remain anonymous.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Never much cared for all the pomp and bowing that surrounded classical performance but I think it makes sense in some ways. We're hard-wired for worship and in the absence of music explicitly directed toward God's glory, we see, hear, and witness it and are left in awe. Our "worship" spills out towards the performer or the perceived "creator" rather than to the Creator.

Thankfully, for music (or other art) that was created for a lower, more lateral purpose, we can redeem it by giving God the glory.