“This is the second movement, now, andante con moto,” he was saying loudly. Father always called out the names of the movements in a voice that was better suited to the drill hall than to the drawing room. “Means ‘at a walking pace, with motion,’” he added, settling back in his chair as if, for the time being, he’d done his duty. It seemed redundant to me: How could you have a walking pace without motion? It defied the laws of physics, but then, composers are not like the rest of us. Most of them, for instance, are dead.
