Accelerando, Accelerating
Episode 5 of Do You Like Brahms begins with Joon-Young sitting in front of the crowd and uncomfortably trying to work out what song to play. Eventually he decides to play Chopin’s Ballade No. 3. After the show, Song-A is called away by the Director leaving Joon-Young to talk with Jung-Kyung privately. She tells him she wanted to hear Traumerei again but Joon-Young simply tells her that song doesn’t matter to him anymore. Jung-Kyung suddenly makes a decision and tells him she’ll leave Hyun-Ho and come to him. He tells her not to though and instead pleads with her to endure it. As she leaves, Joon-Young and Song-A walk and talk on the way home. He contemplates whether things would be better if he wasn’t talented. Song-A stops him and makes the boy see sense; so many people try to be talented but only a few are truly gifted. He doesn’t really know what it’s like to not have that gift. This, of course, comes back to Song-A’s dream of being a violin player and all the obstacles she’s faced along the way. She wonders whether Joon-Young ever really liked his talent to begin with as the two go their separate ways. A performance at the HyunHoo centre that evening gets the Kyunghoo Cultural Foundation reeling, busy getting everything prepped. As they do, Hyun-Hoo and Dong-Yoon discuss Song-A’s passion for playing the piano. Despite not having natural talent, he did his best to try and teach her the violin. This is the reason he quit playing. The evening rolls round and Joon-Young puts on a brave face in the company of the influential people around him. As he does, Hae-Na runs into issues in her role when star violinist Su-An forgets her shoes. Given Song-A is the same shoe size, she offers up her own to save the day. Only, Su-An offers up an underhanded jibe toward her failing the entrance exam as she takes her leave. Things become even more awkward when Joon-Young’s mother dupes him into believing she’s the one joining him in attendance. In actual fact, it’s Jung-Kyung. Joon-Young takes his seat and spies Song-A watching backstage, clearly upset. He races up to meet her in the rehearsal room afterward while she’s forced to watch over Su-An’s violin. He shows up and hands over the CD case – now signed by him. This time it reads “To violinist Song-A”. It’s a beautiful gesture and shows just how much she means to him. Min-Sung shows up at Dong-Yoon’s workshop while Jung-Kyung comes under fire when Su-An mentions she was at the recital in New York. Hyun-Ho overhears this and it immediately causes friction between them. As they sit and drink later that evening, he begs her not to leave him. Jung-Kyung however, refuses to listen and breaks up with him. Elsewhere, we learn more about chamber music and how it’s used as a disguise to hide substandard performances. Among them happens to be Song Jung-Hee. Jung-Kyung meanwhile has issues of her own when her Mother berates Hyun-Ho and tells her he has no spine. While Joon-Young’s Mother does her best to try and get Song-A’s name out there, Song-A and Joon-Young agree to go on a date together. In the midst of this, Joon-Young’s unable to take a loan out the bank and it appears he has financial issues. He doesn’t let that dampen his spirits though as he heads out for a walk with Song-A.
The Episode Review
Do You Like Brahms delivers another pretty good episode that tackles the idea of talent VS hard work. The latter is, of course, incredibly important and almost always trumps talent. Hard work gets you over the finish line when the talent is having a rest day. The episode does well to convey this and it’s backed up by Song-A’s unwavering passion for the violin. The romance angles continue to be the driving force of this one though. With both Min-Sung and Hyun-Ho facing issues, I’d imagine we’ll see more of these problems transpire over time. For now though, episode 5 bows out with a decent episode and lots of promise moving forward.
