Latest news with #Levit
USA Today
4 days ago
- Sport
- USA Today
The case for Dolphins legend Mark Clayton to be in the Pro Football Hall of Fame
The Miami Dolphins' all-time leader in touchdowns and receptions, Mark Clayton, redefined what it meant to be a dominant, go-to wide receiver in the 1980s. Breaking records and bringing a style unseen in the NFL before, his 1984 season marked the beginning of a decade of dominance. That year, Clayton's 18 touchdown receptions set a new NFL record, breaking a mark that had stood for more than four decades. Despite his accomplishments, Clayton has been left out of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He clearly has a case for Canton, and Seth Levit, co-host of the popular The Fish Tank podcast, recently made a compelling case on YouTube. Clayton finished his career with 84 touchdowns on 582 receptions, an elite ratio of one touchdown for every 6.9 catches. As Levit noted, the only Hall of Famers to have 75 or more touchdowns with a better ratio are Paul Warfield, Randy Moss, and Lance Alworth. In the 1980s, "only two players caught more touchdown passes than Mark Clayton; and they were Steve Largent and the GOAT: Jerry Rice,' Levit added. Clayton, who stood just 5'9, defied the long-standing belief that a wide receiver needed to be at least six feet tall to excel in the NFL. "One could argue that Hall of Fame selectors still share similar beliefs, given that Tommy McDonald, who played his last game 57 years ago, is the only one out of 35 Gold Jacket wideouts who was shorter than 5'11,' Levit noted. "The other 34 bronze-busted receivers are 5'11 or taller, and actually, only five of them are 5'11 -- four if you remove Devin Hester from the receiver category.' Clayton's success at less-than-prototypical size helped open the door for receivers such as DeSean Jackson, Steve Smith Sr., Wes Welker, Santana Moss, Antonio Brown, and current Dolphins stars Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle. So why isn't Clayton already in the Hall of Fame? It seems that voters discount his production as merely a product of Dan Marino's prolific success. Yet, other skill-position players haven't been punished for posting big numbers with all-time greats at quarterback. Marino is the only Hall of Fame quarterback without a skill-position teammate enshrined alongside him. '[Joe] Montana had Jerry Rice," Levit said. "[Steve] Young had Rice and Terrell Owens. [Peyton] Manning had Marvin Harrison, not to mention Edgerrin James in the backfield. [John] Elway had Shannon Sharpe and Terrell Davis. [Brett] Favre had Sterling Sharpe. [Johnny] Unitas had Raymond Berry. Jim Kelly had [Andre] Reed and Thurman Thomas. [Bob] Griese had Warfield. [Kurt] Warner had [Isaac] Bruce and [Marshall] Faulk. [Troy] Aikman had [Michael] Irvin and Emmitt [Smith]. [Terry] Bradshaw had [Lynn] Swann and [John] Stallworth.' Now eligible in the senior category, there is every reason to believe Clayton deserves a bust in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Telegraph
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
I listened to 13 hours of live avant-garde music on repeat – here's what happened
The notorious piano work Vexations by the smiling prankster of modern music Erik Satie is aptly named. What could be more vexing than to hear the same solemn procession of chords interspersed with a ghostly melody repeated 840 times, lasting up to 16 hours? More than vexed, I felt some trepidation. I was afraid Satie's ghostly, harmonically wavering piece – which usually takes between one and two minutes to play – would make me want to scream after one hour, let alone 16. I was determined to stick it out to the end, with minimum breaks, but wasn't sure why. Part of me felt I was falling for an elaborate practical joke. Pianist Igor Levit also sees the humour – he joked at one point that he might just round the performance up to a full 1,000 repetitions. Nonetheless he takes it seriously enough to do what no other pianist has ever succeeded in doing – play this piece solo (though teams of a dozen or more have played it many times). I allowed myself several quick tea and food breaks, but Levit is made of sterner stuff. He made two concessions to human frailty. He allowed himself loo-breaks (I counted four, though I may have missed some). And bowls of fruit and bottles of water were placed discreetly near the piano stool. Aside from the sheer physical challenge, there's another motive for tackling the monster. Some say that on the other side of boredom there's a state of spiritual transcendence, which Satie's thin little piece could lead us to. That's certainly the view of the well-known performance artist Marina Abramović, who conceived a theatrical action to accompany Thursday's performance. In the pre-concert chat she gave us a firm talking-to about how we should spiritually prepare ourselves. Don't cross your legs. Don't drink beer. Don't look at your phones. Breathe with me. The Southbank's Queen Elizabeth Hall stage was a dazzling spectacle. The floor area was divided into small white squares, in the middle of which was a raised platform of identically sized gun-metal-coloured cubes. On this sat the grand piano. The whole design was reflected from above in a huge tilted mirror. Levit slipped onstage, flashed us a quick smile, and launched the piece with his typical frowning, concentrated gravity and exquisite touch. Occasionally he would add a touch of pedal or a little crescendo, and later made changes of tempo which in the prevailing glacial calm seemed like high drama. However the performance took a while to settle, thanks to the audience. Free to come and go, and deprived of their phones, many became restive and started to troop out almost immediately – only to return later. I've been in calmer bus terminals. Meanwhile, around Levit a hugely slow ritual action unfolded. Two female 'celebrants' in black-and-white very slowly removed cubes from the edges of the platform and slid them to new positions to form seats. They then accompanied members of the audience to these seats to witness Levit's performance close-up, with that reverent care nurses use with convalescing patients. I was one of them. I was sat right behind Levit, and could see that he was playing repetition 329 out of 840. Discarded sheets of music (one photocopy for each repetition) lay scattered about, as well as grapes and water for the pianist. By then – around 3pm, five hours after it began – Levit's fatigue was showing. He leaned face down on the piano lid, and would occasionally stretch a leg or foot to ward off cramp. Occasionally there was a wrong note. But then he got a second wind, playing the gnomic, angular chord-sequence with an epic gravity for a few renditions, before subsiding back to meditative quiet. Eventually he slipped out for another loo-break. As time wore on, and Levit became wearier, so the tempo of the repetitions increased. Around midnight, as the last of the 13 hours approached, he seemed frankly bored, and the tempo too fast to do justice to the music's strange meandering melancholy. One's interest shifted to Abramović's beautifully realised conception of bringing the audience into the action, performed with tender yet uncanny grace by the two 'celebrants', Sara Maurizi and Jia-Yu Chang Corti. One audience member I met during a tea-break said it made her think of the Fates guiding spirits to the underworld. A very apt image, when given a twist. Instead of finding the god of the underworld, those spirits found a weary Sisyphus of the piano, condemned to repeat a strange, haunted music until the end of time. In all, it was more emotionally suggestive experience than previous performances of Vexations I've attended, though less satisfying musically – this is a piece that really needs a team of pianists. Even so, an hour would have been plenty. After all, mortification of the flesh may lead saints to heaven – but in itself it's no guarantee of a profound musical experience.
The Guardian
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘It is trance-like': pianist Igor Levit performs Erik Satie's Vexations 840 times
Given that he was about to start playing the same piano piece 840 times, for no less than 16 unbroken hours, you could have forgiven Igor Levit for appearing panicked as he walked on stage at London's Queen Elizabeth Hall on Thursday morning. But the German pianist, who this morning began a marathon concert in which he would play Erik Satie's Vexations to hundreds of people for hours on end, simply arranged his sheet music, gave a little laugh – maybe at the absurdity of what he had signed up for – and began to play. About 150 people had paid to stay for the duration of the marathon performance, which is a collaboration between Levit and the Serbian conceptual artist Marina Abramović. It is thought to be the first time the piece will be played in its entirety by the same person live in the UK. Others opted to pop in for hour-long sessions throughout the day and into the evening, with the last slot beginning at 11pm and lasting until the bitter end. Jacob Povey, a 29-year-old nurse, was in it for the long haul. 'It's such a unique, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,' he said as he waited for doors to open. 'I've managed five hours before at Christian Marclay's film installation, The Clock, so I know I've got something like that in me. I'll be in and out, but hopefully I'm here at the end … whenever it does actually end.' Written in 1893 for keyboard, Vexations is between one and two minutes long when played once. But a note from Satie on the manuscript – 'In order to play this motif 840 times in a row, it would be advisable to prepare oneself beforehand, in the deepest silence, through serious immobilities' – has inspired several artists throughout the years to attempt just that. A marathon performance of the piece in 1963, organised by John Cage and played in shifts by various pianists, including Christian Wolff, lasted 19 hours and was called 'musical history' by the New York Times. Levit, whose first performance of the piece was streamed from his Berlin apartment during the Covid-19 lockdown, has done it before in 15 and a half hours. For many visiting, it was less about the music and more about the performance, which featured pieces of the modular stage being taken apart and turned into sculptural chairs. 'One of the things that struck me was how unmemorable that piece of music was,' said Dave Hallberry, 69, who had come along to the performance with his wife, Noreen, and 18-year-old daughter, Sorcha. 'Even now, I don't think I could sing it to you and I've just been listening to it for an hour. There's something about the combination of notes that makes you want to keep listening to it.' Abramović worked with the lighting designer Urs Schönebaum to create a mirror-like effect above the piano. 'I kept switching my view between the mirror and the stage,' said Clare Maleeny, a 24-year-old film editor. 'It was trance-like.' Ruth Davis, a 69-year-old Alexander teacher, was more familiar with the piece than most. 'They said it was the first time that it's been played live in the UK,' she said. 'Which is not true: I played this piece in front of an audience in 1983 for my second-year performance at Leicester Polytechnic and it lasted 11 hours and 43 minutes. I starved myself for two days before. It's really quite a difficult piece to play!' Luckily, Levit had two onstage helpers nearby to provide him with sustenance and mop his brow. And as for the key question on everyone's mind – how he went to the toilet – a screen was on standby to go up around the piano. Many, though, worried about his comfort and wondered whether he'd go the distance. 'The chair wasn't great,' said Hallberry. 'I thought he'd have some sort of comfy office chair or something.' Speaking to the Guardian earlier this year, Abramović said the chair can turn into a bed, 'so that he can lie next to the piano for 10 or 15 minutes if he needs to'. For the audience, as much as for Levit, it will be a test of endurance. 'I will have to leave for toilet break and eating and so on,' said Nick Manrique, a 26-year-old PhD student. 'But I'm stubborn – I'm quite determined to see it through.' Tickets for Igor Levit's performance of Vexations are still available, and can be bought at the Southbank Centre box office.
South China Morning Post
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- South China Morning Post
Marina Abramovic directs pianist Igor Levit in 16-hour marathon Erik Satie performance
Classical pianist Igor Levit takes to a London stage this week for an epic musical endurance test directed by performance artist Marina Abramovic. Advertisement Levit is aiming to be the first person to solo play Vexations, a single sheet of music repeated 840 times, in a public performance expected to last at least 16 hours. The audience at central London's Queen Elizabeth Hall will witness 'silence, endurance, immobility and contemplation, where time ceases to exist', according to Abramovic on the venue's website. Written by Erik Satie in 1893, Vexations' is described as 'one of classical music's most simple, yet arduous and demanding works'. Pianist Igor Levit. He has live-streamed a solo performance of Eirk Satie's Vexations but will be the first person to do so on a concert stage when he plays it in London this week. Photo: Felix Broede for Sony Classical Satie's manuscript included a composer's note instructing that it should be repeated 840 times, a feat which generally takes between 16-20 hours of continuous playing. Advertisement During the Covid-19 pandemic, Levit live-streamed a Vexations performance from a Berlin studio.
eNCA
22-04-2025
- Entertainment
- eNCA
Pianist to perform London musical marathon
LONDON - Classical Russian-German pianist Igor Levit takes to a London stage this week for an epic musical endurance test directed by the world-famous Serbian performance artist Marina Abramovic. Levit is aiming to be the first person to solo play "Vexations", a single sheet of music repeated 840 times, in a public performance expected to last at least 16 hours. The audience at central London's Queen Elizabeth Hall will witness "silence, endurance, immobility and contemplation, where time ceases to exist", according to Abramovic on the venue's website. Written by Erik Satie in 1893, "Vexations" is described as "one of classical music's most simple, yet arduous and demanding works". Satie's manuscript included a composer's note instructing that it should be repeated 840 times, a feat which generally takes between 16-20 hours of continuous playing. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Levit livestreamed a "Vexations" performance from a Berlin studio. He also streamed dozens of "concerts" from his flat in the German city to highlight the challenges faced by artists during lockdown. Although numerous pianists playing in succession have succeeded in performing "Vexations" over the years, it has rarely been completed in its entirety by a single musician. Tickets have been priced from £32 for a one hour slot with others available for the full-length performance. Levit, who is a professor at Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media, has released a dozen albums of classical works including Beethoven's complete piano sonatas and concertos by Brahms. Levit told The Guardian daily he'd "never tell an audience" what they should hope to experience. "But I would encourage people to just literally let it go. There is no agenda in this piece. There is no meaning to it," he said. "It's just empty space, so just dive into that and let go. That would be the dream," he added. Abramovic, 78, an art world icon, has earned worldwide acclaim for her work that has frequently tested her own physical and mental endurance. In one of her best known early works Rhythm O, Abramovic invited audiences to interact with her in any way they chose which resulted in a loaded gun being held to her head.
