"The Swan" segment from The Carnival of the Animals (Le Carnaval des Animaux) by Camille Saint-Saëns.
For a long time now I have had a love-hate relationship with this piece. While it is undoubtedly a beautiful, graceful composition, possibly Saint-Saëns' best-known and best-beloved piece ever, nevertheless at some point I had started to feel that it was perhaps too stylishly appealing for its own good -- that is, it had begun to seem to be knowingly and self-consciously designed to be tasteful and elegant. I don't know, is this what's meant by "jaded"? But anyhow, this morning I was listening to the entire Carnival suite (it's less than 25 minutes long), and when, toward the end, "The Swan" at last started to play, I was transfixed; I hadn't listened to it in a longish while, and it felt as though I were rediscovering a long-forgotten treasure. And all of a sudden my eyes teared up. It was beautiful! I had found my old love for it again.
Here it is, courtesy of cellist Yo-Yo Ma:
