Running with Rachmaninoff

It's the latest thing here at bookofjoe.

Yesterday I was cruising on the old treadmill at my usual and customary stately pace of 0.7 mph (precisely the same pace as the day before — and the day before that...) when I felt a frisson of an urge to get outside and enjoy the beautiful spring day.

But what to listen to on the old Discman?

Prince or the other usual suspects?

Hey — "The Usual Suspects," not a bad name for a group.

Take it, it's yours for the [not-even-having-to]-asking, like everything that appears here.

First come, first serve return.

But I digress.

The penny dropped.

Why not try an experiment and stick my Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 3 CD (top) in the Discman and see what it might be like to run with Vladimir and friends?

So I did.

What a trip — literally.

Totally different from listening to rock music and very entertaining.

I'm gonna do it again today.

Rachmaninoff never sounded better than when accompanied by my burning legs, dripping-with-sweat face and rapid breathing as I made my way up the Barracks Road hill towards my house.

I heard things I'd never heard before, like the insistent drums toward the end of the final movement.

Of course, those could've been aural hallucinations, considering the borderline hypoxic, crazed state I was in toward the end of the run.

And did I mention that Rachmaninoff must have been thinking of me when he composed the piece, because it's just over 43 minutes long and my run lasts 40 minutes?

What with walking for a few minutes before I started while listening to the opening chords, the thundering finale was perfectly timed to the last exhausting moments of my effort.

Must be a sign.

FunFact: David Dubal, the estimable classical music radio commentator (his show is on Saturday mornings from 8-9 a.m. on XM channel 113), who was a personal friend of Vladimir Horowitz, said on one of his shows that among musicians the piece is known as "Rocky 3."

The CD is $16.98 at Amazon.

And I will reiterate what I have said before, namely that listening to the compressed version of music on your iPod is not the same as listening to the notes as recorded on the CD.

Me, I want it all.