Everbest, Virgil


Rental Format(s): 16mm film

Piano Sonata No. 2 (1930) by Virgil Thomson, transcribed for the film by Yvar Mikhashoff (1990), performed by the Buffalo New Music Ensemble.

Virgil Thomson composed musical portraits of many people as he viewed them from across a table. Just as an artist uses the various elements of a visual medium, Virgil would sketch personal images employing the palette of musical expression.

EVERBEST, VIRGIL follows in this tradition by setting a film portrait of the composer to his self-portrait composition. In his book "On Musical Portraiture," Virgil writes: "The Second Piano Sonata is curious. ... Not me thinking about myself, but being myself. That's why I couldn't identify it as a self-portrait for many years." I filmed Virgil in his apartment at the Chelsea Hotel in Manhattan shortly before his passing. These are the final images abstracted from the life of a most treasured American composer.

Rental Fees

  Fee  
16mm film $50.00  

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