Happy Birthday, Dad!

The best gifts occasionally blur the line between giver and recipient. When I was a sophomore in college, I gave a gift to my father, and I'm still not sure which one of us enjoyed it more. As a music student in Ohio, I constantly looked for reasons to visit Cleveland to see the city's world-class orchestra. When a program of 20th-century music, a performance by Mitsuko Uchida, and a conducting appearance by Pierre Boulez intersected at Severance Hall during my father's birthday weekend, I knew what I needed to do. I bought a pair of tickets, drove for three and a half hours, and listened to the Cleveland Orchestra with my father.

I don't know many people besides my dad who would be pleased to sit through a program containing music by Marc-Andre Dalbavie, Olivier Messiaen, Maurice Ravel, and Bela Bartok. I definitely don't know any other fathers who would endure a three-and-a-half hour car ride to see symphonic music. I definitely feel fortunate to have such a unique dad. For his birthday today, I assembled a Spotify playlist with all the music we heard in Cleveland. I hope it can remind him of the time we spent together, and I hope it introduces some of my readers to some new music. After all, the person who receives a gift doesn't have to be the only one who enjoys it.