Scan barcode
A review by abigail_lo
The Sound of Us by Julie Hammerle
5.0
NOTE: I received an ARC of this book for free from the publisher. This did not influence my opinion in any way.Books about classical music are always a hit-or-miss affair for me. Whenever the protagonist plays a piece perfectly without needing to practice at all: please! In your dreams, girl. Or when teenagers who study classical music are portrayed as single-minded, robotic snobs who are either practicing their pieces or dissing non-classical music: really? Just no. Wanna guess what I’m listening to now, as I write this review? No, not Beethoven, not Mozart, and not Chopin. #Hamilton for life guys! (“The Room Where It Happens†absolutely gives me life every time I listen to it!) And do you know how many times my friends and I goofed around during our “practice†time at the Indiana University Piano Academy (IUPA), one of the premier pre-c
ollege summer piano programs in the country? So many authors write about classical music without really understanding it or classical musicians. I can’t really fault them — after all, most of them have probably never been a classical musician themselves! But it’s still disappointing when yet another author fails to capture what’s so amazing about music.Not so with The Sound of Us! Ms. Hammerle must have been to an opera camp in high school. There’s simply no other way she could have written such a detailed & accurate account of exactly what happened to me at IUPA! I went through all the same things as Kiki: realizing how mediocre I was compa
ollege summer piano programs in the country? So many authors write about classical music without really understanding it or classical musicians. I can’t really fault them — after all, most of them have probably never been a classical musician themselves! But it’s still disappointing when yet another author fails to capture what’s so amazing about music.Not so with The Sound of Us! Ms. Hammerle must have been to an opera camp in high school. There’s simply no other way she could have written such a detailed & accurate account of exactly what happened to me at IUPA! I went through all the same things as Kiki: realizing how mediocre I was compa