Yesterday the best Danish chessplayer of all times, Bent Larsen (“Larsen”) turned 75.
More on this world-famous star can be fould in this celebration. Congratulations, Larsen !
Oh wow… after six years with zero skiing days I last week enjoyed three PERFECT days in Val d’Isere, France, the resort being the parhaps best and most overall challenging in Europe. Just take a look here, firstly from the very top of the Grande Motte, 3456.
A video from the same area…
… and here we see Goofy on the moguls at Tignes.
Lastly, a picturesque snack from the off-piste near Le Fornet. 
Vestegnsmarathon
Coming home my first run for three weeks – at all – awaited, the much anticipated Vestegnsmarathon just south of Copenhagen, Denmark. We had a great race but was once again troubled with winterly conditions and lots of snow on the route… cross-country skiing had been the better choice of the day.
Despite the lack of training, our hero prevailed, in a very slow time but feeling good !
You can see all the pictures from Val d’Isere and Vestegnsmarathon here
Whilst the Title could easily cover one of my marathons it actually hints to the linked video of the legend conductor Celibidache and the Berliner Philharmonics performing the 7th Symphonie of Anton Bruckner. Do open the video in a new window (music starts at 1.40 minutes), sit back, close your eyes and listen. Listen ! (and ps: the recording is amazing, the 2. satz being the most beautiful… another interpretation is by Furtwängler below).
Both Celibidache, Furtwängler and Brucnker are long gone. Dead. One day we will be too… and all our efforts, experiences, feelings, memories and stories will come to an end, perhaps remembered for a while by a handful of people and then with them turn into forever dust. Gone and absorbed into the great cycle of time and matter. We only pay a short visit, really. But it is a delight to think that this music and these tunes will continue to exist, continue to thrill and enlighten new generations to come, to inspire and to guide.
With the flux of these tunes through the body and out of my arms and hands, I lift my entire life and snapshot every memorable moment against a blue sky and relive eons and eaons again, compressed and contained in a second or two. I dissolve into light and shine so brightly that all History blinds. I become Atlas, carrier of the World, I become the creator and vitness of all times and destinies from birth to grave, lifting villages to Empires and see the rise and fall of Civilizations. All this bursts into one übermoment in Time.
Then all is black.
hydrophobic
hydrophilic
electrostatic attraction
electrostatic repulsion
Repeat
grow
duplicate
grow duplicate grow
drift duplicate drift
Repeat
grow
duplicate
grow munch duplicate grow
swim duplicate munch swim
Repeat
stimulance
response
reproduce eat defend kill
trick kill eat grow
Repeat
eat grow
reproduce hatch
grow defend attack kill
run fly reproduce organize
Repeat
kill
communicate give birth
fear hope socialize love
reproduce repeat reproduce repeat
Repeat
Repeat. For Generations.
So it seems that I have at last passed my two-year long “Bach-phase” and is entering a Bruckner (and perhaps Mahler ?) phase. The Bruckner Symphonies are SO haunting, so powerful and so majestetic that only the tunes themselves justify such words. Listen up !
The long-draggged crescendoes have been snugged into many a motion-picture soundtrack, Avatar being one of the latest on the list, and you could say that these symphonies emulate all big stories in life or each of our lifestories, ups and downs, loveaffairs, tragedies. The beauty and struggles of a marathon could also be told by each of the pieces.. well.. I guess we could make whatever context befitting.
My favorites just now would be Bruckner no. 4, 7 and 8, the latter the by far loudest and perhaps most well-written of all the Symphonies of Bruckner. Go explore yourself !