Here’s an interesting (if slightly morbid) thing I learned recently: the “Birthday Effect.”
Since there are 365 (or 366) days in a year, you might thinkthat the odds of a person dying on their birthday would be about one in 365, or 0.2%. But statistics reveal that a surprising amount of people – as many as 17 percent more than the expected rate, depending on thestudy – die on their birthday.
A variety of logical explanations have been put forward:people might engage in risky activities; stress levels might be higher; aterminally ill person might “hold on” to reach their birthday, and so on. It’sa strange statistical anomaly that says a lot about us, and our fixation on timeand milestones.
Some famous people who died on their birthdays include Shakespeare,Raphael, “American Gothic” artist Grant Wood, actress Ingrid Bergman, and aninfluential but largely forgotten Italian composer named Antonio Lotti.
Lotti’s work, like that of CPE Bach, bridged the Baroque and Classical eras of Western music. His Missa Sapientiae, from which this piece is taken, was beloved in its time: apparently, Handel, Zelenka, and JS Bach all owned their own hand-written copies before it was even published. Handel liked it so much he, uh, “borrowed” certain passages for some of his own compositions.
Lotti’s birth & death day was just over a week ago, on January 5, so let’s celebrate & mourn by listening to this brief but beautiful piece together.
Whatmakes this a beautiful song:
1. The slow, gentle back-and-forth between the low and highstrings.
2. The constantly crunching and resolving vocal lines.
3. I can’t decide if it feels more like a lullaby or afuneral march.
Recommendedlistening activity:
Blowing up black balloons.