The Ensemble made me feel like a kid at the adults table. I was both fascinated by everything being said, and the prose used in saying it, but also totally lacking in enough background to understand the richness of what was being said.
I loved the way this book was written. It was clearly written to feel like a musical movement, and it achieved that aim. I typically take notes while reading my weekly books. A small corner of the page is kept for my favorite quotes. This was the first book that I filled, then over filled the little quote corner.
Aja Gabel flings you into the deep end of the lifestyle, terminology, and relationships of a quartet. There are five main characters: two violinists, a viola player- violist?, and a cellist, the fifth is the quartet itself. Their group is a living, breathing, growing, maturing character in and of itself, and I love that it both was a stand in for life and at the same time was their life.
Though the backdrop may have been foreign, the growing pains of a career, the passage of time going both too slowly and too quickly, were all themes the reader can understand and identify with. Each character is flawed, and each character grows, Gabel managed to juggle all five equally. I appreciated that each music choice fit well with the theme of the group, with the general tone of the chapter.
Despite the characters' very clear thoughts on listening to music while reading being both heinous and an impossibility, I found that reading The Ensemble was much improved while listening to the various pieces the group was practicing, performing, or simply reflecting upon. I learned a lot more about classical music and composers than I expected to when I grabbed this novel off of the shelf, and I don't regret it in the least.
I won't lie, though, with as little as I do know about music and professional musicians, reading this book was like watching a movie through a keyhole. It was a slog to get through some parts, but the parts that were clear were totally worth it, and I enjoyed every chapter once I had picked up the thread or looked up the term that had previously been alphabet soup on the page to me. In an odd way Aja's confidence in her audience to understand this new scene she had thrown them in to reminded me of my first time reading Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian. I understood what was happening, but was reading through the fog that was the forgotten language and foreign ranching terms.
In the end I would recommend this book to anyone who pursues a passion of their own relentlessly, anyone who loves classical music, and any chamber music musician in your life. I also recommend it to anyone who loves delicate prose and deep emotion without dialogue.
That's it for this week, thank you for reading! If you have book suggestions let me know.
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