Peter

I've been trying for the past few days to track down a ski helmet with the same designs as the one used by the Steelers in-game but have had little success. Several Google searches have turned out to be fruitless, though I did find this bike helmet:

http://www.teamontop.com/product/Wincraft%20Pittsb...

I'm looking for something just like that bike helmet, but made for skiing. A helmet cover might be a possibility as well. Ideas?

I've been reading through Harold C. Schonberg's "The Great Pianists" recently, and upon reaching the section that discussed Johann Nepomuk Hummel, I was greatly intrigued. Schonberg basically made him out to be Chopin before Chopin was Chopin! Check out the "Influence" section of this article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Nepomuk_Hummel

The article I just linked does a pretty good job of explaining why Hummel's music fell by the wayside over the years, but I'm wondering why it is still relatively unknown. I can understand why in a non-digital world his music may have been tough to track down, but with the connectivity we all enjoy now, everyone has access to his scores and a good number of recordings. Still, I've never heard his music live or even seen one of his works billed for the concert stage.

He didn't write any symphonies, so one might point to that as a factor, but then again neither did Chopin; the concerto was their symphony. Is there some inherent flaw in his compositions that I am overlooking? Are we just so overrun with composers of his style that we can't handle any more? I doubt that!

Am I completely off base here? I am still in the process of becoming a professional musician; I'll begin my masters in the fall. But I've been playing the piano and listening to classical music for 20 years now, and Hummel's name has never been more than mentioned in passing to me. Has anyone felt that his music is as well represented as it should be?

For those of you who haven't even heard one of his compositions (and I'm guessing there's quite a few), here are links to two of his Piano Concertos:

Piano Concerto No. 3 in B Minor, Op. 89

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vihBwt6suqE&feature...

Piano Concerto No. 5 in A-Flat Major, Op. 113

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BuO1gPmVDGI

Scores for some of his music are here, including the B Minor Piano Concerto if you wanted to follow along:

http://imslp.org/wiki/Category:Hummel,_Johann_Nepo...

After listening to those works, I am just in utter disbelief that only a few people seemed to have picked these up and performed or recorded them. So, what do you all think? Is Hummel being given his due, and if not, why?