If Oh Hye Won today were one of the 24 piano variations you played yesterday, that picture there could be the theme.
Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini – Stephen Hough
I just posted on the blog @shamrockmom‘s comment and videos from a couple of weeks ago about ep11 and HW playing Schumann’s Toccata in C Major Op.7. So of course I went back and watched the scene. I still don’t understand this line from Prof Jo to SJ. I know it’s been discussed and explained but it’s something I’ve never been able to grasp.
This is so crazy…I was listening to the Rachmaninoff Variations on my way to and from work today, thinking about HW after she gets out of jail as yet another variation….I think what Professor Jo was trying to say to SJ was: OK, here is a picture of HW, young, idealistic, uncorrupted, with a pure love for the music and desire to be the best she could be….that’s the start, the simple beginning of the piece…but later, it turns dark and complex as Rachmaninoff incorporates the Dies Irae (Literally–judgement day. It’s the first part of a Medieval Latin Mass for the Dead) You could take that to mean that HW sort of moves over to the “Dark Side”, bringing a figurative judgement and death of that innocent girl we see…HW gets more complex as the corruption and desire for the money/status drown out that part of her, the simple and uncomplicated girl who loved music. Underneath all the greed and corruption, the innocent and pure HW is still there, like the theme in the music. I think SJ understands this, regardless of his lack of classroom musical theory, he gets it on a gut level.
The first 5 minutes of this video by the British pianist Stephen Hough, (who was included on the 3 CD all-classical OST) is a pretty simple explanation of the theme, how it gets reversed and put into a different key, plus it’s kind of a fun thing to see this orchestra practicing in their everyday clothes, SJ would feel very comfortable with these folks, LOL!
@mdj101 hit the nail on the head here–I think it’s a turning point for SJ, and the drama as a whole; he starts to see the bigger picture, a future he can visualize for the two of them as a couple.
I think something happened when SJ had that little talk with Prof. Jo and saw the picture(and program) of HW at 20 years of age. Prof. Jo basically ponted out that picture as “the theme” of who HW was, explaining how as her friend he can understand what she is /does now. But SJ sees something very different in that young girl, he sees the HW of today and what she should and could become. And he sent that picture to her phone as a reminder, before he met up with her to convince her to quit it all now!
I think that picture matched the HW that SJ saw and loved. And he began planning and taking the steps to make the dream become reality. Right up until the “Madhouse scene”, he persists making his case while HW keeps trying to have it both ways.
But I have another question because I get the theme, although after watching the video, much clearer then before. Are the variations different points in HW’s life? Maybe I’m being too literal. I guess I’m trying to understand Prof Jo’s words – If Oh Hye Won today were one of the 24 piano variations. Are we supposed to know which variation or are they a continuum?
My take on that is that the different variations are HW’s different ways-of-being in the world. Young innocent girl, musician, teacher, friend, hollow shell, manager, criminal… They’re all related to each other, joined by the main theme that is OHW’s core soul essence. I took Jo’s statement as a general metaphor, not necessarily with a one-to-one correspondence with each variation in chronological order of her life; but I love how @shamrockmom identified the Dies Irae with HW’s corruption/dark side, and the increasing complexity of the music with the increasing complexity of her life.
And I’ve thought of the lighter variation — is it #18? the one that Hough says the audience always breathes a sigh of relief when it emerges — which is so loving and romantic, is when LSJ entered her life, bringing hope, inspiration, openness/spaciousness of being along with his love.
And back a ways, @mdj101 here pointed us to serendipity’s SLA review here, where she talked about how the ending, which is so suddenly quiet and calm, and then abruptly over, is like the ending of the show, when HW is in prison, in her suddenly calm, open space, an end that offers space for a new beginning.
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