{"id":3475,"date":"2024-04-03T15:29:43","date_gmt":"2024-04-03T15:29:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=3475"},"modified":"2024-04-03T16:23:59","modified_gmt":"2024-04-03T16:23:59","slug":"shes-shaking-up-classical-music-while-confronting-illness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=3475","title":{"rendered":"She\u2019s Shaking Up Classical Music While Confronting Illness"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The pianist Alice Sara Ott, who makes her New York Philharmonic debut this week, is upending concert culture \u2014 and defying stereotypes about multiple sclerosis.<\/p>\n

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The pianist Alice Sara Ott, barefoot and wearing a silver bracelet, was smiling and singing to herself the other day as she practiced a jazzy passage of Ravel at Steinway Hall in Midtown Manhattan. A Nintendo Switch, which she uses to warm up her hands, was by her side (another favored tool is a Rubik\u2019s Cube). A shot of espresso sat untouched on the floor.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel I have finally found my voice,\u201d Ott said during a break. \u201cI feel I can finally be myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ott, 35, who makes her New York Philharmonic debut<\/a> this week, has built a global career, recording more than a dozen albums and appearing with top ensembles. She has become a force for change in classical music, embracing new approaches (playing Chopin on beat-up pianos in Iceland) and railing against stuffy concert culture (she performs without shoes<\/a>, finding it more comfortable).<\/p>\n

And Ott, who lives in Munich and has roots in Germany and Japan, has done so while grappling with illness. In 2019, when she was 30, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis<\/a>. She says she has not shown any symptoms since starting treatment, but the disorder has made her reflect on the music industry\u2019s grueling work culture.<\/p>\n

\u201cI learned to accept that there is a limit and to not go beyond that,\u201d she said. \u201cEverybody knows how to ignore their body and just go on. But there\u2019s always a payback.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Ott has used her platform to help dispel myths about multiple sclerosis, a disorder of the central nervous system that can cause a wide range of symptoms, including muscle spasms, numbness and vision problems. She has taken to social media to detail her struggles and to challenge those who have suggested that the illness has affected her playing.<\/p>\n

She said she felt she had no choice but to be transparent, saying it was important to show that people with multiple sclerosis could lead full lives.<\/p>\n

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The pianist Alice Sara Ott, who makes her New York Philharmonic debut this week, is upending concert culture \u2014 and defying stereotypes about multiple sclerosis.The pianist Alice Sara Ott, barefoot and wearing a silver bracelet, was smiling and singing to herself the other day as she practiced a jazzy passage of Ravel at Steinway Hall in Midtown Manhattan. A Nintendo Switch, which she uses to warm up her hands, was by her side (another favored tool is a Rubik\u2019s Cube). A shot of espresso sat untouched on the floor.\u201cI feel I have finally found my voice,\u201d Ott said during a break. \u201cI feel I can finally be myself.\u201dOtt, 35, who makes her New York Philharmonic debut this week, has built a global career, recording more than a dozen albums and appearing with top ensembles. She has become a force for change in classical music, embracing new approaches (playing Chopin on beat-up pianos in Iceland) and railing against stuffy concert culture (she performs without shoes, finding it more comfortable).And Ott, who lives in Munich and has roots in Germany and Japan, has done so while grappling with illness. In 2019, when she was 30, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She says she has not shown any symptoms since starting treatment, but the disorder has made her reflect on the music industry\u2019s grueling work culture.\u201cI learned to accept that there is a limit and to not go beyond that,\u201d she said. \u201cEverybody knows how to ignore their body and just go on. But there\u2019s always a payback.\u201dOtt has used her platform to help dispel myths about multiple sclerosis, a disorder of the central nervous system that can cause a wide range of symptoms, including muscle spasms, numbness and vision problems. She has taken to social media to detail her struggles and to challenge those who have suggested that the illness has affected her playing.She said she felt she had no choice but to be transparent, saying it was important to show that people with multiple sclerosis could lead full lives.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3477,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3475"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3475\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3478,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3475\/revisions\/3478"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}