Christmas Eve Music

For the past 30 years I have been listening to Beethoven's Grosse Fuge on Christmas Eve. Usually I sneak off to a secluded place in the house, late at night, and listen to it alone. I leave the other people in the house to sleep.

Sometimes I will have a fire in the fireplace. And other times I will listen in the cold room. Sometimes I will listen to others of the string quartets also. But usually there is only the Opus 133, the Grosse Fuge.

I don't know why this tradition started. I got the complete set of the string quartets about 40 years ago, I can't remember how. Maybe it was a gift; sometimes I give myself a gift at Christmas.

I do not claim to understand the music. I do not know how a Fuge is constructed, or what it is supposed to demonstrate. But I do enjoy this one each Christmas Eve.

RETURN

Another agony: The music plays as a 'page background', so if you close the page the music will stop. To get around this, right click the link to this page and select 'open in new window'. Then you can select the original page on the task bar and browse as you please while listening to the music, since it's page remains open.