On Grammar

Since I'm something of a closet Grammar Nazi, and I don't have much else to do, I thought I'd write about a particularly tortured bit of English. I've had this CD for a few months now, but never really read through the liner notes. For those who don't click on the link, it's a CD of the violin concerti of Sibelius, Glazunov, and Prokofiev, as performed by Jascha Heifetz, but no prior musical knowledge is required. Here's the excerpt discussing the Sibelius concerto, copied verbatim:

It has been said that Sibelius conceived the work as a frustrated virtuoso; Heifetz was the virtuoso Sibelius had wanted to be but may have played it, paradoxically, as a would-be composer: not only do his recorded accounts show enormous care for balance and structure (note the way he cedes prominence to the bassoon at the beginning of the first movement recapitulation), he even makes some improvements in the printed text (for instance, at the end of the third movement--where he begins the final downward plunge a third higher than is written).

It took me about three readings of that whole thing to parse it all and understand it. I get what the writer was trying to convey, and even agree a little with it, but I can't believe it couldn't have been written more clearly.