From Phil Hersh's latest column: "Some Olympic Food for Thought"
This is a smart move on her part. Romantic Rhapsody is a piece that she can showcase wonderfully as we have witnessed. She loves the music and exudes joy in performing it. That the judges can relate to better.
Go Rachel and wow them!
Rachael Flatt, likely to be the top U.S. woman at next month’s World Figure Skating Championships, has decided to go back to last year’s free skate music, a wise choice for her and an indictment of the sport. Flatt was skating this season to two Debussy tone poems, "The Sea" and "In a Boat," and interpreting them was too ambitious an exercise for a 16-year-old. More importantly, international judges lacked the musical sense to grasp what they were hearing, accustomed as they are to the "Boleros" and "Romeos" and "Toscas" and movie scores that are used ad nauseum in the sport.
So Flatt will recycle "Romantic Rhapsody," the Andre Mathieu music with which she won the 2008 world junior title -- a Gershwin-esque piano-and-orchestra piece that is less intellectually demanding and more easy listening than the Debussy. Thankfully, it still is a sophisticated choice rather than one of the old warhorses skaters favor.
This is a smart move on her part. Romantic Rhapsody is a piece that she can showcase wonderfully as we have witnessed. She loves the music and exudes joy in performing it. That the judges can relate to better.
Go Rachel and wow them!