As the fall foliage fades and the weather turns colder, change once again is in the air.  The waking mornings are dark and the heat starting to blast, as we transition to warmer clothing, spending time indoors and becoming more inward directed, all hints of an emerging winter.

 And, it’s once more a time to reflect on  Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and its relationship to our evolving finances.

As you know, Vivaldi perfectly captures the seasons in his highly acclaimed work “The Four Seasons”, four violin concertos in which each season gets its own violin concerto. 

Composed in Venice, Italy, at the height of the Baroque era in 1720, this body of work was striking for the time: modern, virtuosic and energetic, reflecting Vivaldi’s vision to use music to paint a scene, tell a story and, in this composition,  evoke different seasonal moods.  Many regard this series of compositions as one of the greatest works in classical music and a timeless work of art.

The texture of each separate movement is varied, each resembling its respective season. “Winter” is peppered with silvery pizzicato notes from the high strings, calling to mind icy rain, whereas “Summer” , the subject of  previous blog, evokes a thunderstorm in its final movement, which is why the movement is often called “Storm” 

Digging deeper into winter, the subject of this blog, the first movement reflects Vivaldi’s brilliant representation of winter: the biting cold, gusting wind, trembling bodies, and chattering teeth on his beloved violin.

The sounds are all a reminder of what lies ahead.

And, although, we are not yet experiencing the seasonal snow plowing, we are already beginning to adjust our lifestyles to the restrictions that winter places on us.

At the same time, after almost two years of COVID challenges, and despite the latest concerns about the Omicron variant, we are also seeing comforting signs of relief ahead.  Vaccinations and boosters are rising, people are once again travelling and meeting with family and friends and year-end holiday celebrations are fast approaching.

We are all probably eager to look ahead to a year in which our lives, although probably forever changed, may return to a greater sense of normalcy without the fears and anxieties that have plagued many of us since March of 2020. As we have discussed in earlier blogs, we may have over the summer and fall months reassessed our values and our commitments to family members and the changes we might want to make to our financial and estate plans.

As part of my “…….

Source: https://www.morganstanley.com/blog/women/money-talk-vivaldi-four-seasons-winter