In a NPR article, Jonathan Biss discussed musical blind spots. He mentioned Brahms vocal Duets, Op. 20. Most people are only familiar with every other genre except his vocal works. Biss was shocked to find out that there were many choral works. After listening to the piece, I was astonished that the work was not a known Brahms piece. It is one of the most beautiful vocal pieces I have heard. What makes the song so beautiful is that it is not elaborate. It is just two voices and piano and is homophonic. I was captivated all five minutes. I’m shocked that this song is not at well know as his other works. This made me wonder how many other musical blind spots are out there.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2012/02/07/146473471/jonathan-biss-uncovers-a-brahms-blind-spot

It made me want to start searching around. Is there Mozart music that is rarely performed? A lot of times with composers like these, their vocal works are under performed. As a singer, I wanted to find vocal music because in music classes have never heard about their vocal works. I looked at CDs my parents used to play as a child of Chopin and Mozart as well as Beethoven. I realized that my search would be harder than it seemed because both CDs had works that are well known. Then I realized that the CDs said “the best of.” That caught my attention. What made these works “the best” or “greatest hits”? Who are the people that determine what the best works of these famous composers are? Did they look at the composition and compare it to other works or was it based on sales? This made me want to search for my musical blind spot.

That is when I began to think of looking at vocal compositions of Mozart. Just out of random curiosity I chose to focus on Mozart. (Before I mention the piece I found let me make a disclaimer. I am no expert when it comes to these composers. I am only familiar with the music learned in previous music classes I have taken and a few greatest hits CDs. This piece may not be a musical blind spot for you as it is for me).

So the search began for a vocal blind spot from Mozart. I knew Mozart wrote operas, but maybe there was a piece, not apart of his greatest hits. That began my search for music that I was not familiar with. There was one piece that stuck out. It was just one page of sheet music called “God is My Refuge”. It is a choral work written for SATB. The text is English and it is polyphonic. The Soprano started the song and the rest echo “God is my refuge” one by one. The piece is very short, but is a lovely piece. I would not have expected a song like that from Mozart. What is so amazing is that Mozart was 9 when he composed this motet.

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After listening to this work it made me think, what else have I been missing out on? What is your musical blind spot?