tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-751842678097681242024-03-14T04:32:08.219-04:00Fanfare For Aaron CoplandTHESE PAGES ARE DEDICATED TO THE DEAN OF AMERICAN COMPOSERS, AARON COPLAND. NOT INTENDED TO BE A SYSTEMATIC OR COMPLETE SURVEY OF MR. COPLAND'S COMPOSITIONS, THIS SITE IS INSTEAD MEANT TO INTRODUCE LISTENERS TO A BROAD SPECTRUM OF AARON COPLAND'S WORK.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger77125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-56405508466985944872018-09-01T15:54:00.000-04:002016-05-20T22:00:39.138-04:00Welcome to Fanfare For Aaron Copland<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SX8XGXSsyBI/AAAAAAAAC78/n08Zw3xcCXs/s1600-h/phot0024r.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5295977084910094354" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SX8XGXSsyBI/AAAAAAAAC78/n08Zw3xcCXs/s400/phot0024r.jpg" style="float: left; height: 400px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 337px;" /></a><b></b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms";">Aaron Copland has always been one of my personal musical heroes. Mr. Copland cannot be considered one of the major contributors to American music because Aaron Copland <b>IS</b> American music. His influence on two generations of composers in North America (and worldwide) is considerable and the Coplandisms depicting "Americana" he created in his beloved ballet scores and in his globally famous Fanfare For The Common Man are still heard today in film and television music (even in TV commercials!). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms";">Biographical information on Copland is readily available from other sources (see links) so I will not address this on Fanfare For Aaron Copland. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms";">We will instead deal with the glorious music composed by Mr. Copland throughout his lengthy career. A systematic survey of Copland's complete oeuvre will not be conducted but a generous cross-section of his work will be posted. These will include orchestral, chamber, and vocal/choral pieces (many lesser-known compositions will be included). Ocassionally we will hear the same piece in different instrumentation. Sometimes we will feature the same piece interpreted by two different orchestras/conductors.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms";">I hope this site will raise awareness of Aaron Copland's titanic contribution to his field and to the cultural history of the 20th century United States. All postings on this site will be in the lossless FLAC format and will be ripped from original CD's in my personal collection. All artwork included with the CD packaging will be added as image scans, now all done at 300DPI.</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-8654979162460661422016-12-12T11:24:00.000-05:002016-12-12T11:24:44.441-05:00OLIVER KNUSSEN/CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA & LONDON SINFONIETTA: GROHG, HEAR YE! HEAR YE!<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SXuH8tIqtwI/AAAAAAAAC6k/u3Ml59ma--U/s1600-h/a.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5294975263882000130" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SXuH8tIqtwI/AAAAAAAAC6k/u3Ml59ma--U/s400/a.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 393px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 400px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
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The full, revised score of Copland's first ballet Grohg lay miscatalogued, thought lost, in the Library of Congress until the late 1980s. That is when Oliver Knussen found it. Grohg was the most ambitious undertaking of Copland's Paris years, the Nadia Boulanger years, and is an important piece of the Copland jigsaw. Its inspiration was Nosferatu, as portrayed in the 1921 German horror film. But only superficially, only in the sense that it alludes to silent-film melodrama of the macabre. Grohg is a kind of necrophile Svengali of the dance. The dead dance to his tunes, for his pleasure. This is X-rated Petrushka.<br />
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And, of course, the close proximity of Stravinsky can be felt in more than just the motoric rhythmic gyrations of the scene-setting "Dance of the Servitors". An odd mix, this. On the one hand is the puppet-like bassoon of folklore, the Petrushka connection, and on the other, the racy wood-block and xylophone-spiked world of Poulenc. Then there are Copland's own, newly liberated 'Americanisms': the Opium-eater's dance with its 'visions of jazz', slinking in like a kind of oriental blues; or the provocative burlesque variant of the Streetwalker's waltz eerily sexy with piano and muted trumpet emerging from the shadows. The Latinos are in there too—feisty, chilli-hot woodwinds, a vital element in the hallucinatory final scene. Knussen and the Cleveland Orchestra show exactly what they are made of in set-pieces like this, and Argo bring them to your listening room with time-honoured clarity and brilliance. But it's French sensibility which lends Grohg's last moments an unexpected pathos. Petrushka's ghost sensed if not seen.<br />
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By far the best music on the disc, though, is sandwiched between the fledgling ballets. Prelude for chamber orchestra is a re-working of material extracted from Copland's Symphony for organ and orchestra and owes everything to Boulanger's tender, loving care. At least, that is the effect she and her influence would appear to have had on its tactile scoring. And there is more where that came from—albeit fleetingly—in the cool and graceful Apollonesque idyll at the heart of Hear ye! Hear ye!. Now here is a novelty: a courtroom melodrama-cum-burlesque-cum-whodunit; a cabaret of contradictory re-enactments complete with gunshots and the crack of the Judge's gavel. Yet, in truth, it's dance music in search of its choreography. Copland's quirky off-kilter jazz just does not convince in its own right. It is still more of a gimmick than a compulsion. Give the young Copland his due, though: he lays down a band sound that is a formidable blueprint for the future. Leonard Bernstein was to play on it. American urban ballet starts here. First recordings, first-class quality. <strong>ES </strong><br />
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<strong>Grohg - Ballet in One act</strong> (1922-25, revised 1932)<br />
1. Introduction, Cortège and Entrance of Grohg 7:40<br />
2. Dance of the Adolescent 6:27<br />
4. Dance of the Streetwalker 3:42<br />
5. Grohg imagines the Dead are mocking him 4:41<br />
6. Illumination and Disappearance of Grohg 1:59</div>
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7. <strong>Prelude for chamber orchestra</strong> 6:04 (1924, arranged 1934)</div>
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<strong>Hear Ye! Hear Ye! - Ballet in One act</strong> (1934, version for small orchestra, 1935)<br />
8. Scene i (Prelude) 1:36<br />
9. Scenes ii-iv (The Courtroom; Dance of the Prosecuting Attorney; Danse of the Defense Attorney; Quarrel) 4:48<br />
10. Scene v (The Nightclub hostess sworn in) 0:47<br />
11. Scene vi (The Chorus-girls' first dance) 3:31<br />
12. Scene vii (First Pas-de-deux) 2:49<br />
13. Scene viii (Pas-de-deux continued; First murder) 2:54<br />
14. Scenes ix-x (The Courtroom); The Noneymoon Couple sworn in) 1:30<br />
15. Scene xi (The Chorus-girls' dance with doves) 2:18<br />
16. Scene xii (Second Pas-de-deux with murder) 3:45<br />
17. Scenes xiii-xiv (The Courtroom; the Waiter is sworn in) 1:24<br />
18. Scene xv (The Chorus-girls' third dance) 1:29<br />
19. Scene xvi (Third Pas-de-deux and Murder) 3:24<br />
20. Scenes xvii-xviii (The Verdict; The Courtroom) 1:57</div>
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Grohg performed by the Cleveland Orchestra ; other selections performed by the London Sinfonietta. All works conducted by Oliver Knussen.</div>
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Grohg was recorded in Severance Hall, Cleveland, Ohio on May 3, 1993. Other selections were recorded in Walthamstow Assembly Hall, London, UK on June 29-30, 1993</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-36638223126153780542016-12-12T10:58:00.000-05:002016-12-12T10:59:00.589-05:00HARMONIE ENSEMBLE, STEVEN RICHMAN: APPALACHIAN SPRING, MUSIC FOR THE THEATER, EL SALON MEXICO<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VncUe4v-3CU/T3IgJls_eGI/AAAAAAAAFik/pyBGBoc0CuQ/s1600/folder.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5724673425453054050" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VncUe4v-3CU/T3IgJls_eGI/AAAAAAAAFik/pyBGBoc0CuQ/s400/folder.jpg" style="cursor: hand; cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 393px; margin: 0 10px 10px 0; width: 400px;" /></a><span class="bbc_center" style="color: magenta; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 100%;"><b><br /></b></span><br />
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<span class="bbc_center" style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 100%;">What a delightful, refreshing release! For decades Bridge has consistently released superbly engineered recordings of adventurous and enterprisingly chosen repertoire, performed to the highest artistic standards. Indeed, it would be hard to find any other label that does so much for so many contemporary performers and composers who otherwise might never enjoy the chance to reach the record buying public. Even on those occasions that the label ventures into the more popular standard classics, you can almost invariably count on finding some fresh new twist that gives the disc unusual interest. Here's a case in point. Who knew that none other than Arturo Toscanini made a piano-solo arrangement of El Salón México? If that's not a novelty, then what is?<br /><br />And did anyone suspect at this late date that there was any music by Copland, however slight, that remained to be unearthed and recorded? Sure, Two Ballads for Violin and Piano (all that exists of a projected violin concerto for Isaac Stern) and Elegies for Violin and Viola (some of which became Statements for Orchestra) aren't major compositions, though this latter work remains a worthy exemplar of a seldom-exploited medium; but taken together with the Toscanini transcription, what we have here is certainly more than "just another Copland" disc, and everything is marvelously performed by pianist Diane Walsh and the two members of the Emerson String Quartet.<br /><br />Besides, the major works are simply sensational. This recording goes straight to the top of the list for performances of the Appalachian Spring Suite in its original chamber scoring. Conductor Steven Richman's crisp, sprightly tempos in the quicker sections and his perfectly flowing, never-too-sentimental approach to the slow bits wake this music up like a brisk spring shower. No matter how well you know it, this version has the piece sounding like new. Music for the Theatre overflows with sassy, jazzy verve, the ironic wit of the Burlesque is strikingly caught and the Stravinskian snap to the music's rhythms is confident and secure. Through it all the Harmonie Ensemble plays as if it owns the music, and the sonics are simply the last word in naturalism and clarity. Fantastic.--<strong class="bbc">David Hurwitz </strong></span><br />
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<span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;"><strong class="bbc">Music for the Theatre</strong></span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">1 Prologue (05:56)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">2 Dance (03:19)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">3 Interlude (05:16)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">4 Burlesque (03:17)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">5 Epilogue (03:58)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;"><strong class="bbc">Two Ballads for Violin and Piano</strong></span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">6 Andante: Simple and direct (02:22)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">7 Moderato (02:54)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">8 <strong class="bbc">Elegies for Violin and Viola</strong>: Calm, expressive, firm; Piu mosso (06:24)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">9 <strong class="bbc">El Salon Mexico </strong>(10:45)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">10 <strong class="bbc">Appalachian Spring Suite for 13 Instruments </strong>(23:56)</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">Soloists: Emerson String Quartet members: Eugene Drucker, violin; Lawrence Dutton, viola.</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">With Diane Walsh, piano</span><span style="font-size: 100%;"><br /></span><span class="bbc_center" style="font-size: 100%;">Recorded February 11-13. 2002 at the Performing Arts Center, Purchase College, State University of New York</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-76422462680844371562016-11-12T23:56:00.000-05:002016-11-12T23:56:47.477-05:00THE TENDER LAND (AN OPERA IN THREE ACTS)<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SQ8VRVJTiyI/AAAAAAAAB80/9Lct5QtLPW8/s1600-h/scan0063.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5264449876897532706" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SQ8VRVJTiyI/AAAAAAAAB80/9Lct5QtLPW8/s400/scan0063.jpg" style="float: left; height: 338px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 400px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
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Aaron Copland didn't have the theatrical instinct of a George Gershwin or even a Gian Carlo Menotti, but that didn't keep him from writing one of the best operas we have in the "American" vein. The Tender Land was composed in 1953 on a commission from Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II--who since the premiere of Oklahoma! 10 years earlier could afford such largesse--and received its premiere on April 1, 1954 at the City Center in New York. Concerning a girl transformed into a young woman by her first experience of love, The Tender Land is set in the American Midwest during the 1930s. The libretto by Horace Everett (a pseudonym of Erik Johns) was inspired by photographs taken by Walker Evans of a rural, Depression-era mother and her daughter that had appeared in James Agee's book Let Us Now Praise Famous Men.<br />
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The music is cut from the same cloth as that of Appalachian Spring--the melodic, easygoing, folkish vein that Copland could manage about as easily as breathing. Lightly scored (calling for winds and brass in twos) and with spoken dialogue in the style of the musical stage, the score has come to be regarded as one of Copland's finest, as he himself believed it to be. You couldn't get a more authentic cast than the one heard here, consisting entirely of good American singers whose delivery is appropriately nonoperatic, and including Minnesota native Elisabeth Comeaux in the central role of Laurie. Philip Brunelle leads the forces of the Minnesota-based Plymouth Music Series in an idiomatic if slightly underpowered performance that comes from the Heartland and goes straight to the heart. <strong>Ted Libbey</strong><br />
Although the folk-tinged ballet scores that made Copland the quintessential American composer of the early 1940's are outside the scope of this selection, he worked along similar lines well into the 50's. ''The Tender Land,'' his 1956 opera about a girl's coming of age on a Midwest farm, is the culmination of this style, offering both the orchestral warmth and evocativeness of ''Appalachian Spring'' and the homey vocal writing of ''Old American Songs.'' Its attractions include a gorgeous quintet (''The promise of living''), an infectious barn dance (''Stomp your foot'') and a touching finale. The Brunelle recording, with Elisabeth Comeaux as Laurie and Dan Dressen as Martin, does the score full justice. <strong>Allan Kozinn<br /></strong><strong></strong><br />
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<strong>Disc: 1</strong>1. The Tender Land: Prelude<br />
2. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 1: The Front Yard Of The Moss Home<br />
3. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 1: 'Two Little Bits Of Metal'<br />
4. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 1: The Arrival Of The Postman<br />
5. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 2: Opening The Package<br />
6. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 2: 'This Is Like The Dress I Never Had'<br />
7. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 2: Dance And Exit<br />
8. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 3: Laurie's Entrance: 'Once I Thought I'd Never Grow<br />
9. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 3: Ma's Entrance<br />
10. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 3: 'Remember The Boy That Used To Call'; Ma's Exit<br />
11. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 4: Entrance Of Martin And Top<br />
12. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 4: Martin And Top Enter The Farmyard<br />
13. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 4: Duet: 'We've Been North'<br />
14. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 4: Grandpa Meets The Boys<br />
15. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 4: Trio: 'A Stranger May Seem Strange That's True'<br />
16. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 4: Interlude - Martin And Top Make Horseplay<br />
17. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 5: The Invitation<br />
18. The Tender Land: Act One, Scene 5: Quintet - 'The Promise Of Living'<br />
<strong>CD1 Duration: 42:23</strong><br />
<strong>Disc: 2</strong>1. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 1: The Graduation Eve Supper<br />
2. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 1: The Supper Ends<br />
3. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 1: Grandpa's Toast: 'Try Makin' Peace'<br />
4. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 1: Laurie's reply: 'Thank You, Thank You All'<br />
5. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 1: The Invitaition To Dance<br />
6. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 1: The Dance: 'Stomp Your Foot Upon The Floor'<br />
7. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 2: Dance Music And Dialogue<br />
8. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: Party Music Back In The House<br />
9. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: Top's Song: 'Oh, I Was Goin' A-Courtin'<br />
10. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: The Dancing Resumes<br />
11. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: Duet: 'You Dance Real Well'<br />
12. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: 'Laurie...You Know, Laurie'<br />
13. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: Duet: 'In Love? In Love?'<br />
14. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 3: 'The Tender Land'<br />
15. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 4: Grandpa's Confrontation<br />
16. The Tender Land: Act 2, Scene 4: Party Farewell<br />
17. The Tender Land: Act Three: Introduction<br />
18. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 1: Entr'acte<br />
19. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 1: Duet: 'Laurie, Laurie...'<br />
20. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 1: Martin Alone: 'Daylight Will Come In Such Short TIme'<br />
21. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 1: Dialogue<br />
22. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 1: Top's Aria: 'That's Crazy' And Exit Of Martin And Top'<br />
23. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 2: Interlude: Daybreak<br />
24. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 2: 'The Sun Is Coming Up'<br />
25. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 2: Laurie's Farewell<br />
26. The Tender Land: Act Three, Scene 2: 'All Thinking's Done'<br />
<strong>CD2 Duration: 64:12</strong></div>
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Soloists, Chorus and Orchestra of The Plymouth Music Series Minnesota, directed by Philip Brunelle<br />
Recorded October, 1989 at Ordway Music Theatre, St Paul, Minnesota</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-31914920454325854042016-05-20T22:34:00.000-04:002016-05-20T22:34:44.673-04:00THE HEIRESS: ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/Srzld8dU3XI/AAAAAAAADl4/UTlWLCzIN2c/s1600-h/HeiressFrt.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5385431557036367218" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/Srzld8dU3XI/AAAAAAAADl4/UTlWLCzIN2c/s400/HeiressFrt.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 400px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 400px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
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Hello Friends: Today we have a real treat, courtesy of some generous online friends. I have obtained the kind permission of Southview212 to share with you the never-before-released original tracks from Copland's THE HEIRESS score. Please keep in mind that these are rough-sounding recordings taken from the original acetates. They were never intended for release and they are encoded @320kbps, MP3.<br />
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There are 14 untitled tracks, approximately 26 minutes of music. Aside from an eight-minute suite recorded by Leonard Slatkin and The St. Louis Symphony (available here on this blog), this is the only existing source (that I am aware of) of this score, which is truly in need of a complete restoration and recording.<br />
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Thanks also to my friend Jean for allowing me to utilize the "cover art" he designed for this THE HEIRESS. enjoy! <strong>Scoredaddy</strong><br />
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<strong>For a well-researched article on this music, please read <em>"You Have Cheated Me”: Aaron Copland’s Compromised Score to The Heiress</em> which was p</strong><strong>ublished in Film Score Monthly May/June 2005. Written by </strong><strong>James Lochner <a href="http://www.filmscoreclicktrack.com/2009/03/14/you-have-cheated-me/">http://www.filmscoreclicktrack.com/2009/03/14/you-have-cheated-me/</a></strong>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-90932247638732279812016-05-20T21:59:00.000-04:002016-05-20T21:59:46.184-04:00LEONARD BERNSTEIN/NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC: THE SECOND HURRICANE<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SbUUsueT9lI/AAAAAAAAC-c/tO0VAbciHhY/s1600-h/a.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5311174094175336018" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SbUUsueT9lI/AAAAAAAAC-c/tO0VAbciHhY/s400/a.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 400px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 390px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
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Apparently, the Bernstein Century aims to issue every scrap Bernstein recorded for Columbia. Although this will prove invaluable for archivists and fanatics (myself included), Bernstein's wide range of activity produced some pretty marginal stuff. The Second Hurricane was written in 1936 for a high school performance (directed by Orson Welles!) but the painfully trite libretto seems more like one of those grade-school pageants that charm doting parents while their little Jimmy or Suzie is up on the stage, but otherwise is pretty grim. Copland's music, though, is full of fine, unpretentious touches. The dozen musical numbers begin each of the CD tracks, so you can skip most of the stilted dramatic interludes; otherwise, the overall effect is pretty doleful. In the Beginning is a colorful but reverent a cappella setting of scripture, written for the Robert Shaw Chorale in 1947.<br />
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A mono recording, one that hasn't been released until now, is that of Copland's In the Beginning. This is an attractive a cappella work with texts based on the book of Genesis, and it's hard to say why the present recording sat in the can so long. Perhaps it's because the sound is a little muddy, even by 1953 standards. I can't hear any gross deficiencies in the performance, and Lipton is a good singer with clear diction. Furthermore, this is a rare opportunity to hear Bernstein in the role of a choral conductor. The Second Hurricane dates from the Depression era; its first director was Orson Welles. It's a school opera, and in that way it reminds me of Britten's Let's Make an Opera! and Noye's Fludde. It's mostly on that level, musically speaking. The story concerns six high school heroes, their worried parents, and their friends. The heroes have been sent to a hurricane-stricken area to provide disaster relief. (When was FEMA founded?) On the way, their plane develops difficulties, and they are stranded on a hill while the pilot flies off in search of mechanical help. Frustrated and scared, they begin to quarrel, and it's only the threat of a second hurricane that pulls them together. Eventually, they are rescued, and there is the requisite happy ending. Bernstein is the avuncular narrator, and he keeps the action flowing. (Together, the two acts last barely more than 45 minutes.) The young people of the High School of Music and Art carry out their solo and ensemble duties with maturity. There are no texts, but you'll be able to understand the words anyway. The 1960-vintage sound is excellent.<br />
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1. <strong>In The Beginning (1947)</strong></div>
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Martha Lipton, mezzo-soprano with Chorus Pro Musica</div>
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<strong>The Second Hurricane (A Play Opera in Two Acts) 1936</strong></div>
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2. Choral Overture</div>
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3. We Don't Know, We Don't Know</div>
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4. What's Happened, Where Are They?</div>
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5. Gyp's Song</div>
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6. How Childish They Are</div>
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7. Like A Giant Bomb</div>
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8. Introduction</div>
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9. Two Willow Hill</div>
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10. Sextet</div>
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11. Jeff's Song</div>
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12. Queenie's Song</div>
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13. The Capture Of Burgoyne</div>
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14. Finale</div>
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Soloists & Chorus of the High School of Music and Art, New York City</div>
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Leonard Bernstein, narrator</div>
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New York Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Leonard Bernstein</div>
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#1 was recorded on May 27, 1953 in New York City, NY; all others recorded on April 3, 1960 at the Columbia 30th Street Studio, New York City, NY </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-81545699519253791762015-09-13T12:02:00.000-04:002015-09-13T12:02:40.512-04:00CHRISTOPHER BRELLOCHS WITH PAUL COHEN: QUIET CITY AND OTHER MUSIC FOR SAXOPHONE<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-D44X2BS-__Y/UG2cP8dCN8I/AAAAAAAAG-4/ggZcKa327R4/s1600/folder.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="393" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-D44X2BS-__Y/UG2cP8dCN8I/AAAAAAAAG-4/ggZcKa327R4/s400/folder.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center"><span class="bbc"><span class="bbc_center" style="color: red;"><b>new link in comments</b></span></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center"><span class="bbc"><span class="bbc_center"><br /></span></span></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center"><span class="bbc"><span class="bbc_center">Saxophonist Christopher Brellochs breathes new life into forgotten
musical works with the Sono Luminus release of Quiet City. This world
premiere recording resurrects the unpublished score of Aaron Copland’s
incidental music for the Irwin Shaw play Quiet City, in a new adaptation
by Christopher Brellochs.<br />
<br />
During his doctoral studies Brellochs obtained a copy of the unpublished
manuscript to Quiet City from saxophonist and historian Paul Cohen. The
score was handwritten by Copland, included cues and actor’s lines, and
called for a chamber ensemble of trumpet, saxophone (doubling on
clarinet), clarinet (doubling on bass clarinet), and piano. Here was
never before heard music of the highest quality, by an iconic American
composer.<br />
<br />
Brellochs was granted the exclusive right to record and perform his
newly reconstructed chamber adaptation of “Quiet City” by Boosey &
Hawkes and The Aaron Copland Fund for Music. This unique opportunity to
make a world premiere recording has lead to a search for other
unrecorded works by American composers. The results of that search
include the whirlwind composition “Sound Moves Blues” by Robert
Aldridge, the charming “Suite for Trumpet, Alto Saxophone, and Piano” by
Seymour Barab and the invitation to guest artist Paul Cohen to
contribute previously unreleased recordings of works by Leo Ornstein,
Walter Hartley and Lawson Lunde. Every work on Quiet City features world
premiere recordings of prominent American composers.<br />
<br />
Saxophonist, composer and arranger Christopher Brellochs has performed
at Carnegie Hall and in solo recitals throughout the Northeast, as well
as the 32nd International Saxophone Symposium. He was a recent guest
artist and lecturer with the Poné Ensemble at SUNY New Paltz (2010)
performing his new adaptation of Copland’s “Quiet City”.<br />
<br />
Brellochs has lectured at the Manhattan School of Music and a College
Music Society Conference on the topics “Benjamin Britten and the
Saxophone” and “Aaron Copland and the Saxophone”. His article, “Aaron
Copland’s Use of the Saxophone in Wind Band Repertoire,” was published
in the Journal of the World Association for Symphonic Bands and
Ensembles. Paul Cohen (saxophone) has appeared as soloist with the San
Francisco Symphony, Richmond Symphony, New Jersey Symphony, Charleston
Symphony and Philharmonia Virtuosi. Cohen’s recent concerts included an
Artist - in Residency at the Royal College of Music and Dance in
Cardiff, Wales as well as performances at Carnegie Hall, the
Metropolitan Museum of Art and other stages with the New York
Philharmonic, New Hudson Saxophone Quartet and the Manhattan
Sinfonietta.<br />
<br />
This release is sure to be a favorite with fans of the saxophone and new
music, as well as a spectacular addition to the collection of
enthusiasts of the works of Copland.</span></span></span></span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center"><b class="bbc">Performers:</b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Christopher Brellochs, saxophone</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Paul Cohen, saxophone</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Mitchell Krieger, clarinets</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Allison Brewster Franzetti, piano</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Donald Batchelder, trumpet</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Richard Clarke, viola</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Louis Anderson, piano</span></span></div>
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</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
<b class="bbc">Composers:</b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Aaron Copland</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Leo Ornstein</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Robert Aldridge</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Walter S. Hartley</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Lawson Lunde</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
Seymour Barab</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
1. <b class="bbc">Quiet City - Aaron Copland</b>, adapted by Christopher Brellochs</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
2. <b class="bbc">Ballade - Leo Ornstein</b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
3. <b class="bbc">Sound Moves Blues - Robert Aldridge</b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
<b class="bbc">Lyric Suite - Walter S. Hartley </b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
4. I. Prelude</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
5. II. Scherzino</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
6. III. Nocturne</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
7. IV. Gigue</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center"><b class="bbc">
Sonata for Soprano Saxophone and Piano Op.37 (“Alpine”) - Lawson Lunde</b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
8. I. Allegro moderato</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
9. II. Vivo</span></span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
<b class="bbc">Suite for Trumpet, Alto Saxophone and Piano - Seymour Barab</b></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
10. I. Allegro</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
11. II. Slow waltz</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
12. III. Allegro</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
13. IV. Molto lento</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="bbc_center">
14. V. Allegro molto</span></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-53215750035857185532015-07-19T09:02:00.000-04:002015-07-19T09:02:24.555-04:00LEONARD SLATKIN/ST. LOUIS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: MUSIC FOR FILMS<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/Sd3qJGGQEoI/AAAAAAAADG8/66m9y8pOqIw/s1600-h/a.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322667776598348418" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/Sd3qJGGQEoI/AAAAAAAADG8/66m9y8pOqIw/s400/a.jpg" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 400px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 393px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
<br />
There comes a time when you just have to grow up and face the fact that Aaron Copland really was the great American composer of the twentieth century. Everyone knows his music and everyone loves his music. And the more Copland you listen to, the better he gets. Even his film scores have great stuff in them. The big tunes, the populist rhetoric, the brilliant orchestral colors, and the sense of awe and transcendence that are the hallmarks of his best music can be heard in his film music.<br />
<br />
In this recording by Leonard Slatkin and the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Copland's film music gets the full Technicolor treatment. Their music from The Red Pony has its humor, grandeur, and an aching lyricism. Their suite from Our Town has its stoicism and its romanticism. The suite from The Heiress has its pathos and irony. Their Music for Movies has its bathos and bombast. And their closing #Prairie Journal has its epic scope and occasionally trivial tunes. Slatkin leads with energy and conviction. The St. Louis plays with subtleness and strength. RCA's early-'90s digital sound is warm and rich and full. ~ <strong>James Leonard</strong><br />
<br />
An unmissable Copland collection. Though the front cover bears the title "Music for Films", the earliest offering here was written in 1936 following a commission from the CBS radio network. Music for Radio (also known as Saga of the Prairies or Prairie Journal) was one of Copland's first conscious efforts to attain a greater simplicity of utterance and stronger melodic appeal, and its clean-cut, out-of-doors demeanour is relished to the full by these performers. Copland wrote eight film scores in all, the first three of which—The City (1939), Of Mice and Men (1939) and Our Town (1940)—formed the basis for his 1943 concert suite, Music for Movies. Slatkin gauges the differing moods of each of the five tableaux with unerring perception and the playing of his St Louis group easily scores over Copland's New Philharmonia (on a three-disc set) in terms of infectious panache and memorable poise.<br />
<br />
Perhaps Copland's most enduring achievement in this particular field remains his 1948 score for The Red Pony. Again, the new performance is all one could wish, possessing a homespun delicacy ("The Gift"), infinitely touching affection ("Walk to the Bunkhouse") and poignant nostalgia ("Grandfather's Story") that really capture the imagination. There's real swagger, too, in the joyous "Happy Ending" number (such deliciously pointed trombones at 0'32"!) as well as a truly exhilarating sense of wide-screen spectacle. Indeed, neither rival production can match the present display: the composer's own recording is, in all truth, not untainted by a certain stiffness and the hard-edged recording now sounds uncomfortably dated, whilst Sedares's Phoenix account of the film score is just a touch cautious (and his hardworking strings are rather lacking in body and muscle as recorded).<br />
<br />
In addition, Slatkin also gives us the heart-warmingly evocative concert suite Copland compiled from his score for Our Town (more easefully flowing than Copland's occasionally sticky LSO version), as well as a first commercial recording for Arnold Freed's idiomatic 1990 reconstruction of Copland's Academy Award-winning 1948 score for The Heiress, which happily restores the "Prelude" that director William Wyler rejected for the final print. With excitingly full-bodied Powell Hall sonics to match, this compilation is a winner all the way. <strong>AA</strong><br />
<div align="center">
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<strong>The Red Pony (1948)</strong> 23:15<br />
1. Morning on the Ranch [4:30]<br />
2. Gift [4:46]<br />
3. Dream March [2:25]<br />
4. Circus Music [1:43]<br />
5. Walk to the Bunkhouse [2:37]<br />
6. Grandfather's Story [3:41]<br />
7. Happy Ending [3:01] </div>
<div align="center">
<br />
8. <strong>Our Town (1940)</strong> 9:05 </div>
<div align="center">
<br />
9. <strong>Heiress Suite (1948)</strong> 8:06 </div>
<div align="center">
Prelude/Catherine's Engagement/Cherry Red Dress/Depart</div>
<div align="center">
<br />
<strong>Music For The Movies (1943)</strong><br />
10. New England Countryside [5:11]<br />
11. Barley Wagons [2:13]<br />
12. Sunday Traffic [2:28]<br />
13. Grovers Corners [2:20]<br />
14. Threshing Machines [3:01] </div>
<div align="center">
<br />
15. <strong>Prairie Journal [Music for Radio]</strong> <strong>1936 </strong>[11:20] </div>
<div align="center">
<br />
St. Louis Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leonard Slatkin<br />
Recorded November 22, 1991 and April 18, 1992 at Powell Symphony Hall, St. Louis, MO USA</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-38566802696105584492015-04-20T21:50:00.000-04:002015-04-20T21:50:40.483-04:00ORPHEUS CHAMBER ORCHESTRA: APPALACHIAN SPRING, SHORT SYMPHONY, 3 LATIN AMERICAN SKETCHES, QUIET CITY<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SSL_DZwdMvI/AAAAAAAACuo/wd5C6AbytcQ/s1600-h/a+cover.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SSL_DZwdMvI/AAAAAAAACuo/wd5C6AbytcQ/s400/a+cover.jpg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270054947895718642" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 400px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 394px;" /></a><span style="color: red;"><b>new link in comments</b></span><br />
<br />
Copland originally wrote ''Appalachian Spring'' for 13 instruments, all that could fit in the pit for the 1944 premiere of the Martha Graham ballet - a version he suppressed once the suite for full orchestra caught on. With his concise and rhythmically exciting ''Short Symphony'' (1933) he did something of the reverse; since it proved too difficult for many orchestras, he made a sextet setting, which we are likelier to encounter. Here are variants on both originals - the ''Spring'' Suite in a chamber orchestration (the 13 instruments plus extra strings), the symphony in a chamber orchestra reduction devised by Dennis Russell Davies - along with chamber orchestra renditions of ''Quiet City'' and ''Three Latin American Sketches.'' Orpheus plays with verve if not an especially original point of view. In DG's recording, close and striking, the ''Short Symphony'' is a real grabber. <strong>Mark Swed</strong><br />
With exceptionally vivid sound, bright and immediate, giving a realistic sense of presence, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra's collection makes for a very distinctive Copland record of four works in which the composer is at his most approachable. The version of Appalachian Spring recorded here is neither the usual orchestral suite nor the ballet version, but a combination of the two which I cannot remember hearing on record before. In this version, published in 1958, Copland simply makes the same cuts as in the orchestral suite, but keeps the light, transparent scoring of the 13-instrument ballet version, though on his authority the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra augment the string section. The result is a delight, with each instrument cleanly identifiable, underlining the wide-open-spaces freshness of Copland's inspiration. The rhythmic bite is sharpened with the prominent piano giving the texture a distinctive colouring. The extra strings add a degree of sweetness without inflation.<br />
<br />
The scale of performance in the other works, too, is most winning. The jaggedly obvious Stravinskyan echoes in the first movement of the Short Symphony are underlined by the closeness of the performance. Though this work, written between 1931 and 1933, uses triple woodwind, horns, trumpets, piano and strings, the absence of heavy brass and percussion prompted the composer himself to suggest that it is ''an enlarged chamber orchestra''. That is just the impression that a performance on the Orpheus scale conveys, with the relatively intimate acoustic of the Performing Arts Center at New York State University, Purchase, concentrating the sound, adding to the impact, though without aggression.<br />
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The hushed musical city-scape of Quiet city on this scale may not be quite so mistily evocative as with a full orchestra, but the intensity is if anything even greater, particularly when the trumpet and cor anglais soloists are so characterful. The Three Latin American Sketches date from several decades later. The second and third were written for the 1959 Spoleto Festival, and in 1971 Copland added the first to make the present effective triptych of fast, slow, fast, with the Latin-American rhythms of the final ''Danza de Jalisco'' particularly catchy.<br />
<br />
In all this music the cutting edge of Copland's invention is enhanced in performances as immaculately drilled as these. Though there is nothing heartless about them there is a consistent sense of corporate purposefulness, of live communication made the more intense by the realism of the recording. <strong>Edward Greenfield</strong><br />
<br />
<div>
<div align="center">
1. <strong>Appalachian Spring: Suite (1944-1945)</strong> 25:26<br />
<br />
<strong>Symphony No 2 "Short Symphony" (1932-1933)</strong><br />
2. I. Tempo = 144 (incisivo) 4:27<br />
3. II. Tempo = circa 44 5:27<br />
4. III. Tempo = 144 (preciso e ritmico) 5:46<br />
<br />
5. <strong>Quiet City (1939)</strong> 9:26<br />
Stephen Taylor (English Horn), Raymond Mase (Trumpet)<br />
<br />
<strong>Three Latin American Sketches (1972)</strong>6. Estribillo 3:11<br />
7. Paisaje Mexicano 3:30<br />
8. Danza de Jalisco 3:39<br />
<br />
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra<br />
Recorded in March, 1988 at the Performing Arts Center, State University of New York, Purchase, NY USA </div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-50982722367456178782015-03-19T20:40:00.000-04:002015-03-19T20:40:52.541-04:00DENNIS RUSSELL DAVIES, ORCHESTRA OF ST. LUKE'S: DANCE PANELS, EIGHT POEMS OF EMILY DICKINSON, SHORT SYMPHONY<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bKQwfdUmykM/TxA5M_kk5BI/AAAAAAAAFVE/8awzRDk9XDg/s1600/folder.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bKQwfdUmykM/TxA5M_kk5BI/AAAAAAAAFVE/8awzRDk9XDg/s400/folder.jpg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5697116424009737234" style="cursor: pointer; float: right; height: 392px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 400px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
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Aaron Copland, like Cole Porter, reversed his musical course in the 1930s from his earlier, astringent, severe form of classical writing to a more accessible, tonal style. Porter, of course, completely gave up his classical style to become a top popular and Broadway songwriter, while Copland went on to score multiple successes writing classical music for “everyman.” But when you aim for Everyman, you get just that, a blanket homogeneity of style that sounds alike, or very similar, piece after piece after piece, and unfortunately, this is what Copland achieved.<br />
<br />
His best (but not necessarily his most popular) music in this style was the opera The Tender Land, an oft-neglected masterpiece that puts anything John Adams or Jake Heggie wrote to shame; the Clarinet Concerto; El salon Mexico; some of his later chamber works; and two pieces on this disc, the 8 Poems of Emily Dickinson and the “Short Symphony.” Dance Panels, composed in 1959 and revised in 1962, begins with a marvelous introduction, including some foreboding but interesting harmonic clashes, but quickly settles down into the sort of Everyman Generic Classical Sound that was a hallmark of his style. Gerard Schwarz’s recording with the New York Chamber Symphony (EMI 49095) is clean but glib, though exciting in the fast movements. Copland’s own recording with the London Symphony (Sony SM2K 47236) is a little slower but considerably warmer, with more legato phrasing that makes the slow passages more attractive. Davies’ performance here is similar in approach to Copland’s, but recorded in a cleaner, less warm acoustic. It’s very, very fine, but none of the three performances convince me that the music is anything but functional.<br />
<br />
The “Short Symphony” is given an outstanding reading by Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony (RCA 68541) that I found both thrilling and able to project the very best qualities of the music, contrasting its quirky motor rhythms (the opening of the first movement always puts me in mind of the “Rocky and Bullwinkle” theme song) with the more lyrical sections brilliantly. The Orpheus Chamber Orchestra (DG 427335) also does a fine job but, as is often the case with Orpheus, there is a certain clinical sound in slow passages that disturbs me. Davies takes it somewhere in between, but plays the entire symphony—short though it is—quite a bit slower than written. The opening movement, for instance, clearly indicated in the score as quarter note = 144, is taken by Davies at quarter note = 138. In a sense, this helps alleviate the slightly “cartoony” quality of the rhythms, but I found the last movement, taken at the same tempo (hey, at least he’s consistent!), less exciting and invigorating than Tilson Thomas.<br />
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The Dickinson songs are among Copland’s finest achievements, not a page, not a phrase, sounding mechanical or merely functional to my ears, but as I am really fussy about singers I didn’t know how Helene Schneiderman, whom I had never heard of before, would sound in them. As it turns out, she is simply wonderful. Her light, airy, sweet high mezzo voice, sounding very soprano-ish to my ears, interprets the words with wry humor and fine clarity of diction. She is not only finer than Dawn Upsaw (Teldec 28169), but I can pay her no higher compliment than to say that she equals or surpasses the 1982 recording by the legendary Marni Nixon (Reference Recordings 22) with Keith Clark and the Pacific Symphony, though this may be because Davies is a finer and more emotionally responsive conductor. In toto, then, a fine performance of Dance Panels, a first-rate version of the Dickinson songs, and a very good if not scintillating “Short Symphony.” If you don’t have the Nixon recording of the Dickinson, you’ll definitely want this disc. <span style="font-weight: bold;">FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley</span><br />
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Dance Panels (1959, rev 1962)</span><br />
1. Introduction: Moderato 4:45<br />
2. Allegretto con tenerezza 5:06<br />
3. Scherzando 3:16<br />
4. Pas de trois: Lento 5:12<br />
5. Con brio 3:32<br />
6. Con moto 1:55<br />
7. Molto ritmico 5:08<br />
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Eight Poems of Emily Dickenson (1949/1950)</span><br />
8. Nature, the Gentlest Mother<br />
9. There Came a Wind Like a Bugle<br />
10. The World Feels Dusty<br />
11. Heart, We Will Forget Him<br />
12. Dear March, Come In!<br />
13. Sleep Is Supposed to Be<br />
14. Going to Heaven!<br />
15. The Chariot<br />
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Helene Schneiderman (mezzo-soprano)<br />
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Symphony No 2 "Short Symphony" (1932-1933)</span><br />
16. I. Tempo = 144 (incisivo) 4:41<br />
17. II. Tempo = circa 44 5:25<br />
18. III. Tempo = 144 (preciso e ritmico) 5:49<br />
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Orchestra of St. Luke's<br />
Dennis Russell Davies (conductor)</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-73010662281538046132015-01-18T09:30:00.000-05:002015-01-18T09:30:00.373-05:00LEONARD SLATKIN/ST. LOUIS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: APPALACHIAN SPRING (COMPLETE)<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SWc_nwgvcMI/AAAAAAAAC1c/5P1Sq5C6e1E/s1600-h/a.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SWc_nwgvcMI/AAAAAAAAC1c/5P1Sq5C6e1E/s400/a.jpg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5289266239639613634" style="cursor: hand; float: right; height: 400px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 397px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments by request</span></b><br />
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It was Eugene Ormandy who persuaded Copland to reinstate and re-orchestrate those pages of music that he had omitted from the orchestral suite. In contention are several minutes of music leading up to the final tutti statement of the Shaker hymn Simple gifts; by no means the most inspired or accomplished music in the score, perhaps—and particularly when divorced from the physical drama on stage—but a substantial and dramatic sequence building from under a cloud of anxiety, with driving, stuttering ostinatos and the urgent summons of brass and alarm bell. Moments of consolation and repose come and go—one senses the hopes and fears of the settlers—until confidence is fully restored with the Shaker hymn emerging affirmatively from the crisis, its effect to my mind greatly heightened by the uncertainty of what has gone before. At least those were my thoughts at the close of Slatkin's persuasive and big-hearted reading. And I can see why he should have chosen Copland's full orchestral garb in preference to the pithier chamber original. I don't recall these contentious 'extra' pages making anything like such an impression in the composer's complete CBS recording of the original version.<br />
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Grohg (the 'h' inserted "to avoid alcoholic connotation!"), Copland's earliest ballet, a 'vampire ballet' inspired by the German expressionist movie Nosferatu, was never staged or even choreographed. Some of its music was later recycled for the Dance Symphony, but "Cortege macabre" was one of two sections salvaged for concert purposes. It was Copland's first orchestral score and the second to be performed. And it is very much as the title would suggest: a grisly processional, disrupted briefly by the energetic "Servitors' Dance" (echoes of Barber's Medea—Slatkin himself has pointed to the similarities) and building to a resplendent trill and glissando-laden entrance for Grohg himself.<br />
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Of the two remaining pieces, Letter from home was commissioned by Paul Whiteman and the American Broadcasting Company and premiered on radio less than two weeks before the Washington premiere of Appalachian Spring. It belongs very much within that nostalgic, rather homely rural America context. As does John Henry— originally designated "A railroad ballet for small orchestra" but later revised for this larger orchestra some years later. The folk-hero/construction worker of the title was said to have pitted his manual skills against a steam hammer—and won, "at the cost of his own life". And Copland's energetic little tone-poem, another radio commission, is replete with the strains of steel and steam trains and one of those very heroic, prairiefied outdoor themes. All three of these shorter pieces might be deemed curio rather than vintage Copland, but anyone at all interested in the development of his music will want to hear them—at least once. Slatkin and his orchestra do them proud. Warm, sumptuous recording.<b> E.S.</b><br />
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1. <b>Appalachian Spring</b> (complete ballet) (1945) 36:33<br />
2. <b>Cortége macabre from “Grohg”</b> (1922-25, revised 1932) 13:43<br />
3. <b>Letter from Home</b> (1943-1944) 6:39<br />
4. <b>John Henry</b> (1940) 3:45<br />
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St. Louis Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leonard Slatkin<br />
Recorded at Powell Symphony Hall, St. Louis, MO USA</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-60530608934414987722014-12-30T00:17:00.000-05:002014-12-30T00:17:45.397-05:00THE RED PONY - ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK<a href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/R2aJGrq_HKI/AAAAAAAABYc/Vpzw7uGdfmM/s1600-h/coverart.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/R2aJGrq_HKI/AAAAAAAABYc/Vpzw7uGdfmM/s400/coverart.jpg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5144950372212612258" style="cursor: hand; float: right; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px;" /></a><b>new link in comments</b><br />
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FROM THE LINER NOTES:<br />
I wish more audiences could have the experience of watching the movie without any music and then seeing it the second time with music added. I think that would give them a full sense of what music does for making the cold movie screen seem more humane, more touching, and more civilized. -<strong>Aaron Copland </strong><strong><br /></strong><br />
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Aaron Copland (with William Walton and Sergei Prokofiev) has had to put up with the critics' stubborn notions that movie music and concert music are mutually exclusive; the former being, somehow, not quite worthy of the snob's time ... especially in concert! <br />
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According to composer, conductor, writer, educator Aaron Copland (who ought to know), 'I fail to see why, if successful suites like Grieg's Peer Gynt can be made from nineteenth-century incidental stage music, a twentieth-century composer can't be expected to do as well with a film score." (from WHAT TO LISTEN FOR IN MUSIC, McGraw-Hill). </div>
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Copland scored less than 10 films. He arranged three Suites from these: MUSIC FOR A GREAT CITY (pulled from Something Wild,196l); 1943's MUSIC FOR MOVIES (from The City, Of Mice And Men, and Our Town); and the most famous, THE RED PONY SUITE, a case where a good soundtrack is perfect for film, and (with a bit of tinkering) just as effective in the concert hall.<br />
THE RED PONY was finished at the beginning of 1948. Efrem Kurtz requested a Suite be made for performance. Copland obliged and Kurtz conducted the Houston Symphony Orchestra for the first performance in October of the same year. It readily stands next to Copland's other, 'populist' pieces; buckaroo ballets like BILLY THE KID (1938) and RODEO (1942); Martha Graham's APPAlACHIAN SPRING (1944); A LINCOLN PORTRAIT (1942); the opera, THE TENDER LAND (1944), and A FANFARE FOR THE COMMON MAN (1943). </div>
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There's no need to have read Steinbeck's novel or seen the picture; the music doesn't need visual cues to make sense. It survives solely on the composer's ability to combine touching melodies, kinetic rhythms, and dramatic harmonies into a powerful whole. </div>
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Those familiar with the Suite will hear a good deal of music never before on record. There are fresh thematic treatments; extended sequences (some which were not in the film or the Suite); and some segments which could have easily been lifted right out of the score and added to the Suite (an inspiration to some future arranger, perhaps). As marvelous as THE RED PONY SUITE is, it could have been much, much longer. </div>
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1. "Tom's Theme/The Ringmaster (chickens into horses)": Tom Tiflin's (Peter Miles) Theme is the exuberant, naive melody based on a C triad, alternating between dominant and tonic chords in F. The original Ringmaster music (called "Circus Music" in the Suite) is about three times longer than that which appears in the film, suggesting that quite a few chickens ended up on the cutting room floor. </div>
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2. "The Clipping/Walk To The Bunkhouse": Tom idolizes and idealizes Billy Buck (Robert Mitchum), the glib, horse-smart cowboy who works for Tom's father. Copland's music for "The Clipping" (the title referring to a news article about Billy's horse, Rosie) is a series of Thirds, airily sprinkled around the key of C. The music uses mellow winds and strings. There is a sincerity and warmth which shows the true relationship between Tom and Billy.<br />
Walk To The Bunkhouse, conversely, is musical shorthand for Tom's idealization of Billy, the consummate cowpoke. Copland uses a three against-two syncopation, relaxed, masculine trumpet and even more relaxed strings. This gives a feel of wide-open-spaciness that has been much copied by Copland successors like Elmer Bernstein and Jerry Goldsmith. The section closes with Tom's Theme and a variant ending of Ringmaster. </div>
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3. "Tom And The Pony/The Storm": A different variation of "Tom's Theme" segues into "The Storm", a quick, expressive, marcato gyration of dry strings, woodwinds and horns. </div>
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4. "The Gift/The Red Pony Debuts-Tom's School Friends/Homecoming": The section starts with a dreamy, evening mood, the orchestration perfectly capturing the emotions of a young boy whose wish for a pony has been fulfilled. Copland used instrumention and structure as delicate as the foal's first steps. </div>
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"Tom's Schoolfriends" has a reedy, brisk, staccato theme in C#; there is a taunting, prankish bounce to this music, depicting the kind of 'friends' who tend to come around just when their prying isn't needed.<br />
"Homecoming" is an anguished undercurrent to the icy reunion of Tom's parents (Myrna Loy and Shepperd Strudwick). Copland's score defines the emotional tension and turmoil of the scene, a cinematic dimension which only music can express. </div>
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5. "The Knights At Arms": As Tom makes his dusty way to school, his mind turns the dirty trail into Medieval mists; the trees behind him become castles, and his beating of a stick against his lunchpail swells into a powerful, soul-stirring march. Copland matched the crystallizing fantasy of Knights on Horseback by modulating his March into an orchestral tutti that gleamed like so much Hollywood armour. The splendor is shattered by yells from Tom's chums. The end is buffoonish, a tuba solo taking over the musical masses. </div>
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6. "Shall We Gather At The River": Robert Lowry's beautiful hymn is given the finger-clunk treatment by Tom's mother, This is an excellent example of source music adding the appropriate touch, Mrs, Tiflin's piano playing illustrating that all is not right with the family. </div>
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7. "Moth 'Round A Flame": This is where the Tiflin troubles began. Grandfather (Louis Calhern), an old saw who once trekked the West when men were men (etcetera), is telling a story at the dinner table. It soon becomes apparent that everyone has heard these stories ... over ... and ... over ... and ... over! Copland creates a dissonant, monotonous dirge which makes us feel like we, too, have heard Grandfather's ramblings before. A moth soon gains everyone's attention. Flitting flutes and tremulo strings illustrate that it is a mere insect, not Grandfather's umpteenth telling of tougher times, which holds the family's interest. </div>
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8. "Night/Grandfather's Story-Westerin'": Low reeds signal disaster. The Pony, already sick, runs off into the night and dies. </div>
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In "Grandfather's Story", Tom, the only Tiflin to enjoy Grandpa's retellings, is told the real reason Grandfather clings to the past. There was once a pioneering push to the sea, a thrill of exploring, the exhilaration of conquest. When people like Grandpa met the Pacific, it was allover. Now his breed was dying out, ''westerin' isn't a hunger any more." There is an encompassing, rich passion to Copland's music. As effectively as he made Grandfather's first stories tedious, he makes this new confession sound courageous, but distant. It builds to a harsh, drum-beaten march, with trumpets sounding like the last, lonely vestiges of "Westerin'." </div>
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9. "The Pony Gets Sick/Rosie At The Pond": This sequence begins with a painful, two-note motif, thrown from strings to winds, and back again, finally descending to the lowest depths of the clarinet. It ends with a sequence for Tom sitting sadly by the water, being playfully nudged by Billy's horse, Rosie. </div>
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10. "After The Vulture Fight-He Let Him Die": Throbbing strings and cold clarinets accompany Billy as he carries the slashed Tom home after the boy's fight to ward buzzards off the Pony's body. Tom blames Billy for the Pony's death. </div>
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11. "Tom's Theme/I Want Rosie's Colt": Billy offers Tom Rosie's Colt. After getting over the death of his own horse (and his grudge against Billy), he accepts. Even though this sequence happens at the end of the film, Copland introduces new material to show Tom's changing attitude and maturity. -<strong>Thomas J. Clement</strong></div>
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<strong><br />About This Recording</strong>This album has been produced from the original Republic Pictures 78rpm disc masters at the soundtrack recording sessions in 1948. Because these records were not made with commercial release in mind, the monaural sound quality varies. Surface noise due to age and condition of the acetate originals has been minimized as much as possible in making the transfer to the tape from which this album was produced.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-32338941533389692682014-12-17T23:40:00.000-05:002014-12-17T23:40:30.687-05:00SOMETHING WILD - ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK (1961)<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SSqZPRGrzuI/AAAAAAAACvo/JI8PvhyuFyE/s1600-h/a+cover.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SSqZPRGrzuI/AAAAAAAACvo/JI8PvhyuFyE/s400/a+cover.jpg" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5272194801359113954" style="cursor: hand; float: left; height: 400px; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 398px;" /></a><b><span style="color: red;">new link in comments</span></b><br />
Who would have guessed that Aaron Copland's last film score would receive its first commercial release 42 years after it was recorded?<br />
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Something Wild, a 1961 film starring Carroll Baker, was a box-office flop, so distributor United Artists nixed a proposed soundtrack album despite its composer's fame.<br />
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New York film-music buff Mark Leneker, doing research into Copland's music four years ago, discovered that Copland had assembled a 35-minute album mockup and that a handful of copies were privately pressed and given to friends.<br />
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Leneker contacted the film's director, Jack Garfein, who now lives in Paris (and who, at the time of the film, was Carroll Baker's husband). It turned out that Garfein's current wife had discovered a mint, sealed copy of the LP in the family attic.<br />
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Copland conducted a 55-piece orchestra in the music, which is stylistically different from his earlier, more familiar Americana scores like Of Mice and Men (1939) and The Red Pony (1949). Because the film's subject matter is grim and violent (Baker plays a suicidal rape victim in New York City), the composer's idiom is more contemporary, incorporating jazz influences, serialism and occasional dissonance.<br />
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Copland adapted the score into a concert work, Music for a Great City, which was premiered in 1964. For those who prefer this suite, Music for a Great City is available in two recorded versions: Copland's own, with the London Symphony Orchestra (Sony 47236), and Leonard Slatkin's, with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (RCA 60149).<br />
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Something Wild is a welcome addition to the recent resurgence of interest in Copland's film music. Jonathan Sheffer's 2000 collection (Telarc 80583) of obscure Copland includes suites from The City (a documentary presented at the 1939 World's Fair), The Cummington Story (documentary short, 1945) and The North Star (1943).<br />
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More familiar to many listeners will be the Americana classics – Of Mice and Men, Our Town (1940) and The Red Pony – which are regularly performed in concert and have been the subject of multiple recordings over the years. Slatkin's Music for Films collection (RCA 61699) is comprised of a seven-movement suite from The Red Pony, nine minutes from Our Town and the five-movement Music for Movies, which includes two pieces from The City, two from Of Mice and Men – the barley-wagon and threshing sequences – and one from Our Town.<br />
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What caps the Slatkin CD is an eight-minute suite from The Heiress, Copland's Oscar-winning 1949 score – including the composer’s Prelude that director William Wyler dropped in post-production in favor of an orchestral arrangement of the plot-specific chanson, "Plaisir d'Amour." <strong>Jon Burlingame</strong><br />
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Track listing<br />
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1. New York Profile (02:48)<br />
2. Park At Night (01:27)<br />
3. Subway Jam (02:16)<br />
4. Mary Ann Resigned (02:01)<br />
5. Incarceration and Nightmares (07:06)<br />
6. Escape Through The City (07:23)<br />
7. Love Music (01:57)<br />
8. Walk Downtown (03:11)<br />
9. Episode On The Bridge (04:51)<br />
10. Mother Alone (00:57)<br />
11. Reunion (01:05)<br />
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Total Duration: 00:35:02</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-11042297534971775862014-07-05T08:39:00.000-04:002014-07-05T08:39:03.409-04:00JOSEPH LEVINE & BALLET THEATRE ORCHESTRA: BILLY THE KID/BERNSTEIN: FACSIMILE/GOULD: FALL RIVER LEGEND<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The name of conductor Joseph Levine hasn't survived, nor that of Ballet Theatre, the most important and innovative dance company in NY (along with Martha Graham) particularly in the Forties. This CD is a memorial to both, and it turns out to be delightful. Three classics of American ballet are included: Copland's Billy the Kid, Bernstein's Facsimile, and a lesser work, Morton Gould's Fall River Legend.<br />
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The recordings date from 1953 and 1955; all are in good mono (originally billed by Capitol Records as "full dimensional sound"), although noticeably thin and wiry at full volume. The important thing is how lively and imaginative the interpretations are. The Ballet Theatre orchestra wasn't ful of virtuosos, but they and Levine knew how to play for dancers. These aren't symphonic readings of the kind Leonard Bernstein gave when he did Copland or his own music with hte NY Phil. Great as those performances are, Levine is much lighter and more rhythmic, also more casually swaggering and folksy when need be. This deleted CD from EMI may be hard to find outside the used market, but it's a gem. <b>Amazon reviewer</b><br />
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1-10 <b>Aaron Copland: Billy The Kid</b> (Complete Ballet 1938)</div>
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11-15 <b>Leonard Bernstein: Facsimile</b> (A Choreographic Essay 1946)</div>
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16-24 <b>Morton Gould: Fall River Legend</b> (Complete Ballet 1947)<br />
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Ballet Theatre Orchestra conducted by Joseph Levine<br />
Recorded April, 1953 and April, 1955 at the Riverside Plaza Hote, New York City</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-72528486170017031072012-12-12T15:03:00.000-05:002012-12-12T15:03:24.889-05:00JOANN FALLETA & BUFFALO PHILHARMONIC: RODEO/THE RED PONY/PRAIRIE JOURNAL/LETTER FROM HOME<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/THGb37BM-TI/AAAAAAAAEYs/0_sMGv02pnU/s1600/a+cover.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5508355204288674098" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/THGb37BM-TI/AAAAAAAAEYs/0_sMGv02pnU/s400/a+cover.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 400px; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; width: 391px;" /></a><span style="color: red;"><b>new links!</b></span><br />
Although it's played and recorded frequently, there is a genuine difference between a decent performance of Rodeo and a really excellent one such as we have here. This difference can be summed up in two words: rhythm and tempo. When it comes to rhythm, it's not merely a question of hitting the syncopations in the opening movement and concluding Hoedown, but of being both accurate and relaxed enough to let the music swing. This is a quality that Bernstein's performances always had, and JoAnn Falletta understands it too. This gives the music both the necessary verve in the outer sections and real balletic grace in the two inner ones, reminding us that we are, after all, hearing a story told through physical movement.<br />
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When it comes to tempo, the issue is at once simpler and less impressionistic. In Buckaroo Holiday, speeds have to be quick enough to prevent the music from breaking up into discrete, detached bits. Once again, Falletta & Co. come through with flying colors. The music never sounds mechanical, disconnected, or excessively "Stravinskian". Copland disliked excessive sentimentality, but his music is never dry (the rich, warm, but clear sonics also help in this department). And what turns out to be a successful recipe for Rodeo works just as well in all of the other pieces here. Prairie Journal (a.k.a. Music for Radio) is one of the least known of Copland's "Westerns", but it's every bit as enjoyable as the three great ballets, and this is as fine a performance as you will hear anywhere. Letter from Home is an exercise in nostalgia that never turns overly sweet.<br />
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Best of all, perhaps, is The Red Pony, one of the great film scores of all time, and a glorious work that for some reason seldom gets played live. Copland's invention is of exceptionally high quality throughout, and once again you can hear from the unusual freshness of the opening bars how effortlessly Falletta and the Buffalo players get into the spirit of the music. There are so many delightful moments, from the raucous Circus Music to the unforgettable Walk to the Bunkhouse, a piece that has become the very essence of musical Americana. Finally, it's great to see one of the very popular pieces, like Rodeo, coupled with some less ubiquitous examples of Copland's genius. A wonderful disc! <span style="font-weight: bold;">David Hurwitz</span><br />
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1. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Prairie Journal (1937)</span> 10:55<br />
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">Rodeo - Four Dance Episodes (1942)</span><br />
2. Buckeroo Holiday 7:20<br />
3. Corral Nocturne 3:41<br />
4. Saturday Night Waltz 4:26<br />
5. Hoe Down 3:26<br />
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6. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Letter from Home (1944) </span>6:23<br />
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<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Red Pony Suite (orchestral version) 1948</span><br />
7. I. Morning on the Ranch 4:27<br />
8. II. The Gift 4:35<br />
9. IIIa. Dream March 2:29<br />
10. IIIb Circus March 2:29<br />
11. IV. Walk to the Bunkhouse 2:58<br />
12. V. Grandfather's Story 4:15<br />
13. VI. Happy Ending 3:11<br />
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Recorded at Kleinhans Music Hall, Buffalo, NY USA on January 31 and February 1, 2005 </div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-11246472828566860972012-09-24T07:55:00.000-04:002012-09-24T08:11:25.657-04:00FANFARE FOR AMERICA, A FILM BY ANDREAS SKIPIS (DVD5 - ARTHAUS MUSIK 101 573)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This DVD is a very enjoyable way to spend an hour. The first issue I must address, however, may prove a stumbling block for many viewers. The narration of this documentary is in German, with English subtitles. Nowhere is this mentioned on the package, which to me seems deceptive. The explanation is that the film was made by Frankfurt Radio in 2001. If you can get around the incongruity of a film about an American composer in German, I think you’ll find much to enjoy. The interviews in the film, thankfully, are conducted in English. Musically, the film offers fine performances of highlights from Copland’s works, with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony conducted by its then music director, the American Hugh Wolff. I heard Wolff lead a lovely performance of the Clarinet Concerto with Karl Herman and the New Jersey Symphony, so his excellence here doesn’t surprise me. Not all the works included are the usual suspects. There’s the 1925 Music for Theater, the 12-tone Connotations, and the original 13-instrument version of Appalachian Spring. Wolff says that this last, as chamber music, possesses the feeling of settlers in an isolated area. Stella Doufexis also gives a lovely rendition of three of the orchestrated Emily Dickinson songs.
One of Wolff’s trenchant observations about Copland is that he did not have a big ego. He did not, as an artist, have to believe that he was right and everyone else was wrong. Copland, claims Wolff, would say that he was doing things one way one day, and maybe another way the next. Excerpts from an interview with Copland put you in the presence of the man, who is absolutely charming. He even discusses his victimization for his leftist views during the McCarthy era without any sign of bitterness. The film does not mention Copland’s homosexuality, although biographer Howard Pollack does say that he lived a temperate life and with restraint. One of my favorite stories about Copland involves his friend Leonard Bernstein urging him to come out of the closet. Copland replied, “I’ll leave that to you, my boy.” On a personal note, Copland studied piano with Clarence Adler, who was my mother’s teacher.
Other highlights of the film include an excerpt from Martha Graham and her company dancing Appalachian Spring, and an all too short portion of the Clarinet Concerto with Benny Goodman and the composer conducting. Leonard Bernstein is shown directing A Lincoln Portrait, but no other information is given about this concert. I recall it as a telecast with William Warfield narrating and the New York Philharmonic, from the Royal Albert Hall in London. Director Andreas Skipis has devised some trick camerawork for the performances of Fanfare for the Common Man and Music for Theater that I find very engaging. In sum, this is a good biography with a healthy dollop of beautiful music. It adds to my appreciation of Copland. Perhaps we should ask why there is a film from Germany like this and not one from America.
I can’t resist adding one more story about Copland that’s not in the film. Early in his conducting career, Copland was leading a rehearsal, with Serge Koussevitzky in the hall. Afterwards, Copland asked Koussevitzky what he thought of his conducting. Koussevitzky replied, “What do you think of my Double Bass Concerto?” <b>FANFARE: Dave Saeman </b></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span class="bbc_center"><span style="font-family: Book Antiqua;"><span class="bbc">Picture format: NTSC 4:3<br />
Sound format: PCM Stereo<br />
Region code: 0 (worldwide)<br />
Subtitles: English, German, French, Spanish<br />
Running time: 60 mins<br />
No. of DVDs: 1 (DVD 5)<br />
1:1 using DVD Dycrypter</span></span></span></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-18845269237050506452012-09-04T07:51:00.007-04:002012-09-04T12:01:43.940-04:00BOHUSLAV MARTINU PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA, ANDREW MOGRELIA: OF MICE AND MEN & OUR TOWN - COMPLETE FILM SCORES <a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4o6ntuWYdc4/UEYl26inMSI/AAAAAAAAGqI/EN5lxyEyfaQ/s1600/folder.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 400px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4o6ntuWYdc4/UEYl26inMSI/AAAAAAAAGqI/EN5lxyEyfaQ/s400/folder.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5784352396761575714" border="0" /></a><i>“Hollywood is an extraordinary place. You must come here some time. It's like nothing else in the world. Thank heavens!”</i><br />—<b>Aaron Copland to Serge Koussevitzky, 18 October 1939</b><br /><br />Copland’s interest in film music dates back years before his first cinematic score. He had programmed film music as the next to last of the Copland-Sessions Concerts in 1931. Auspiciously, that concert featured two short films by Ralph Steiner, who eventually provided Copland with the opportunity to compose music for his documentary The City in 1939. One of Copland’s finest scores, documentary or otherwise, it became his calling-card to studio work.<br /><br />Copland had visited the west coast in the late 1930s, at the urging of his friend and cousin Harold Clurman, who was advocating for him with studio music executives looking to attract new talent from the concert world. Though early meetings failed to produce any engagements, it does point up a larger campaign by Copland at this time to expand his audience by producing works for theater and radio. Compositionally, Copland’s music shifting more and more into that quintessential “American sound” we associate with him to this very day.<br /><br />Accounts differ on how exactly Lewis Milestone, the director for the film adaptation of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, encountered Copland’s music to The City. Whether it was at the urging of Milestone’s violinist brother Nathan, or Copland’s agent, Abe Meyer, the result was his arrival in Hollywood in October 1939.<br /><br />Copland struck rare artistic gold with his engagement to score Of Mice and Men. Milestone had won a lawsuit against producer Hal Roach that included a cash payment and a contractual agreement to fund the movie—this, and the absence of any studio Musical Director, meant a hands-off approach rarely afforded a new composer on the lot. Copland composed at the piano, screening the movie using a portable editing device called a moviola. This allowed him great precision in placing the beats of each cue to the picture and dialogue. The score was written in about six weeks and recorded with a 45–52 piece studio orchestra under the direction of Irvin Talbot on 11 to 12 December 1939. Copland’s score is a remarkable work, avoiding many of the musical devices already commonplace by 1939. Copland did not write leitmotifs and pin them to all the characters, instead he wrote music to correspond with the broader ideas of the work. The main theme for Of Mice and Men is a folk-like melody, something Copland described as likely to have been whistled by the main characters George and Lennie, and it expresses the idea of the better life they are reaching toward. This theme, by extension, becomes the hopes of all the marginalized characters depicted in the film. Copland was unafraid to experiment in modernistic expression in the score. Most notably, the 26 second clashing chord that climaxes The Fight cue offered unheard of modernism for the time, and is likely some of the most dissonant music Copland ever created. The critical scene of Lennie accidentally killing Mae (Curly’s wife) in the film allowed Copland to create new themes late in the score which he interwove masterfully with the dream theme in the final dramatic cues. The scene where George shoots Lennie certainly was one of the most heartrending scenes filmed in the 1930s (much less today) and demonstrates a high point in the marriage of music and picture. The poignancy of loneliness, the tragedy of the outcast, and the ultimately ennobling spirit of the common, struggling American, are themes Copland connected to over and over again in his career. In this score he charts them out with incredible sensitivity to the film’s narrative.<br /><br />After the West Coast première for Of Mice and Men, Copland headed back to New York. He had been offered an immediate follow-up film, but declined because, as he wrote to Virgil Thompson, “the picture stank.” His agent may have been scandalized, but it was a relief to his friends who feared he might be consumed entirely into the motion picture business. The desire for greater exposure may have led Copland to Hollywood, but it was really the War which kept him there. The violence in Europe was unsettling the nation, and Copland was no exception. He found it difficult to write as if nothing was going on. Part of his decision to score the film version of Thornton Wilder’s play Our Town only three months after finishing Of Mice and Men was, in a measure, the desire to do something which could lend comfort to the country in a time of increasing anxiety. He also saw it as a personal challenge: to demonstrate that a composer could create two wholly different musical scores within a brief window of time.<br /><br />Director Sam Wood, afforded Copland nearly as much freedom as Milestone did in creating the score. Copland eschewed using any popular tunes, deciding instead to create an original score that once again had folk-like qualities while adding cues of an almost quasi-religious feel which served to emphasize the universal themes of the work, detailing the life of a town against the life of the universe. Irvin Talbot (Copland would not conduct his own film scores until The Red Pony in 1948) once again conducted a studio orchestra of about fifty players. The well-known Grover’s Corner theme gets the most play, but the love theme, which does double duty as a motif for Emily and George, the young couple in the drama, is featured nearly as much. The more expansive “music of the stars” is quoted prominently in the main titles, the beginning of the third act on the hilltop cemetary overlooking the town, and in the epilogue. Smaller thematic material includes the narrator’s theme, which often bookmarks cues, and the children’s theme. Perhaps some of the most striking, unheard music from the score is the cemetery music, which is quietly celestial, functioning almost like a kind of American Fantasia. The climactic cue Emily’s Dream where Emily re-visits her sixteenth birthday is at turns reflective, dissonant and plaintive. It features the use of musical saw, which Copland used as a way to tamp down on the sentimentality of the moment.<br /><br />Elements of these two film scores were adapted to concert suites by Copland. Much of the music from Of Mice and Men used in his Music for Movies suite was scaled down and re-arranged for a more chamber-sized orchestra, often using friendlier keys. The Our Town Suite has become a mainstay for many orchestras. The published suite dated 1945 and dedicated to Leonard Bernstein originally given its première in June 1940 on the radio to promote the film by Howard Barlow and the Columbia Broadcasting Symphony. It incorporated more music from the original score.<br /><br />Copland garnered a total of four Academy Award Nominations in 1940 and 1941 for these two scores. One for best original scoring, and one for best music score (regardless of author or genre). The only nominee to do so in both categories. Their impact on the ears of audiences and composers, both for film and concert stage, was deeply felt and lasts with us today. The uniquely American institution of Hollywood finally found a uniquely American voice. <span style="font-weight:bold;">Mark Leneker</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#ff0000;"><b>Click <a href="http://filmscoreclicktrack.com/2010/01/interview-mark-leneker/"><span style="font-size:130%;">HERE</span></a> for an interesting interview with the producer of these recordings</b></span><br /><br /><div align="center"><span style="font-weight:bold;">Of Mice and Men (1939) </span><br />1 Prelude and Titles 3:12<br />2 The Wood Scene 2:06<br />3 The Wood at Night 1:13<br />4 On the Ranch 1:53<br />5 Threshing Machine No. 1 0:42<br />6 Threshing Machine No. 2 1:10<br />7 Threshing Machine No. 3 1:11<br />8 Barley Wagons 1:42<br />9 Mae at Home 2:34<br />10 Death of Candy's Dog 3:08<br />11 Mae in the Barn 1:36<br />12 In the Bunkhouse 5:51<br />13 Preliminaries to Fight 1:19<br />14 The Fight 1:18<br />15 Death of Mae 2:54<br />16 George Determined 1:14<br />17 Near the Brush 3:40<br />18 Lennie's Death 2:17<br />19 End Title 0:30<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Our Town (1940)</span><br />20 Main Title 2:12<br />21 Story of Our Town 2:06<br />22 Off to School 1:22<br />23 Introducing the Professor 0:54<br />24 Grover's Corners 0:56<br />25 Emily in Love 1:01<br />26 The Town at Night 5:00<br />27 The Letter 1:16<br />28 Grover's Corners Again 1:00<br />29 George and Emily 3:51<br />30 The Drugstore Scene 0:55<br />31 The Hill Top 5:29<br />32 The Crisis 1:30<br />33 Scene in the Cemetery 7:28<br />34 Emily's Dream 5:06<br />35 The Epilogue 1:53<br />36 Cast of Characters 0:39<br /><br />Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic Orchestra<br />Conducted by Andrew Mogrelia<br /></div> Unknownnoreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-20567366040514674432012-06-28T13:40:00.004-04:002012-06-28T22:02:21.945-04:00RAMON SALVATORE: COPLAND PIANO MUSIC-ROMANTIC & MODERN<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-V9f3xgfh-qo/T-yXL2Je6QI/AAAAAAAAF0U/y9uTbRtGZv8/s1600/folder.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 399px; height: 400px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-V9f3xgfh-qo/T-yXL2Je6QI/AAAAAAAAF0U/y9uTbRtGZv8/s400/folder.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5759144253269666050" border="0" /></a>Salvatore presents an unusually complete stylistic survey: the high Romanticism of the Sonata in G Major, Copland's early flirtations with French impressionism and jazz, the classic Americana for which he's best known, and his bold modernism. Cedille's includes only original piano works (no transcriptions), performed with clarity and imagination by a leading exponent of American piano music. Composed at the behest of his traditionalist teacher Rubin Goldmark, Copland's Sonata in G Major is his most ambitious early work. "It demonstrates a familiarity with and mastery of traditional form and harmony that is impressive," writes composer Philip Ramey in his notes for the CD booklet. Ramey was a close friend and associate of Copland.<br /><br />Sonnet II (1919), a 27-bar miniature, is a sonorous, post-Impressionistic piece performed for the first time in 1985. The Cat and the Mouse (1920) caused a falling out between Copland and Goldmark over the "modernism" of its erratic rhythms and French impressionist veneer. The witty little piece became Copland's first published work. Three Moods (1921) marks the first appearance of jazz in Copland's work. Serious, abstract, carefully articulated -- yet emotionally stirring -- Copland's Passacaglia (1922) shows the influence of composition teacher Nada Boulanger, who stressed control and clarity. Copland insisted that the sweetly pastoral miniature Down a Country Lane (1962), commissioned by Life magazine, had nothing to do with a country lane. "I didn't think up the title until the piece was written," he said. Ramey discovered Copland's exquisite bagatelle Midsummer Nocturne (1947) while foraging through his friend's files in 1977. It premiered in Cleveland in 1978. The sternly challenging Proclamation (1973/82) and soothing Midday Thoughts (1944/82) are Copland's last works in any genre. Both are based on sketches for never-completed works. Proclamation was originally intended as a large-scale piano piece. Midday Thoughts dates back to Copland's Appalachian Spring period and shares the ballet's sweet temperament.<br /><br />The generous survey concludes with the fascinating Piano Fantasy (1957), Copland's most complex and virtuosic work for solo piano. He wanted it to suggest "a spontaneous and unpremeditated sequence of 'events' that would carry the listener irresistibly (if possible) from first note to last."<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">Ramon Salvatore (piano)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sonata in G Major (1921)</span><br />1. I. Allegro Maestoso<br />2. II. Andante Cantabile<br />3. III. Allegro Vivace<br /><br />4. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Sonnet II (1919)</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Three Moods (1921)</span><br />5. I. Embittered<br />6. II. Wistful<br />7. III. Jazzy<br /><br />8. <span style="font-weight: bold;">The Cat And The Mouse (1920)</span><br />9. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Passacaglia (1922)</span><br />10. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Down A Country Lane (1962)</span><br />11. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Midsummer Nocturne (1947)</span><br />12. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Proclamation (1973/82)</span><br />13. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Midday Thoughts (1944/82)</span><br style="font-weight: bold;"><br style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Piano Fantasy (1957)</span><br />14. I. Slow<br />15. II. Rubato<br />16. III. Beginning A Little Slowly<br />17. IV. Quite Fast And Rhythmic<br />18. V. Suddenly Fast<br />19. VI. As At First<br /><br />Recorded at WFMT Chicago, IL from December 1994 thru February 1995</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-63131543098137380522012-05-17T07:31:00.006-04:002012-05-17T07:39:28.750-04:00UNITED STATES ARMY FIELD BAND SOLDIERS' CHORUS: THE LEGACY OF AARON COPLAND<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CnCvs3b0QUE/T7ThyL9G4BI/AAAAAAAAFtc/nwZzIBSBEsA/s1600/folder.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 396px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CnCvs3b0QUE/T7ThyL9G4BI/AAAAAAAAFtc/nwZzIBSBEsA/s400/folder.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5743463677123026962" border="0" /></a>The Legacy of Aaron Copland is an eclectic collection of works written by the great American composer Aaron Copland. Regarded as the "dean of American music", Copland's works are said to evoke the limitless American landscape as they achieve a difficult balance between modern music and American Folk styles.<br /><br />Copland's goal was to fill "musical needs created by historical events". The United States Army Field Band Soldiers' Chorus, led on this album by Col. Finley R. Hamilton, has made it a point to present musical excellence and inspire patriotism. The versatility of the members helps make the Chorus one of the most prestigious music organizations in the world.<br /><br />The Legacy of Aaron Copland features some of Copland's greatest works including "Stomp Your Foot" and "Simple Gifts". This recording is a beautifully educational and entertaining compilation of some of Aaron Copland's work performed by the United States Army Field Band Soldiers' Chorus.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br style="font-weight: bold;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Selections from The Tender Land </span>(trans. Thomas Duffy)<br />1 Stomp Your Foot 3:06<br />2 The Promise of Living 5:09<br />3 Lark 4:07<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Old American Songs: Set One </span>(trans. William Silvester)<br />4 The Boatmen's Dance 2:43<br />5 The Dodger 2:06<br />6 Long Time Ago 2:46<br />7 Simple Gifts 1:17<br />8 I Bought Me a Cat 2:22<br /><br style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Four Motets</span><br />9 Help Us, O Lord 3:05<br />10 Thou, O Jehovah, Abideth Forever 2:04<br />11 Have Mercy on Us, O My Lord 4:14<br />12 Sing Ye Praises to Our King 1:33<br /><br />13 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Las Agachadas</span> 3:26<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Old American Songs: Set Two</span> (trans. William Silvester)<br />14 The Little Horses 2:44<br />15 Zion's Walls 1:49<br />16 The Golden Willow Tree 3:37<br />17 At the River 2:42<br />18 Ching-a-Ring Chaw 1:37<br /><br />19 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Canticle of Freedom</span> (trans. Thomas Duffy) 13:32<br /><br />United States Army Field Band Soldiers’ Chorus<br />Finley R. Hamilton, conductor; Robert A. McCormick, director<br />Recorded August, 1999 at Devers Hall. Fort George G. Meade, Maryland</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-40174427210863798462012-05-03T08:17:00.011-04:002012-05-03T12:56:28.825-04:00UNITED STATES ARMY FIELD BAND: EMBLEMS, THE LEGACY OF AARON COPLAND<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-M3OjpZwwTzw/T6J5VPw89-I/AAAAAAAAFqo/P1YBwfCQ_Rg/s1600/folder.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 393px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-M3OjpZwwTzw/T6J5VPw89-I/AAAAAAAAFqo/P1YBwfCQ_Rg/s400/folder.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5738282281139501026" border="0" /></a><em>I couldn't locate any review of this CD so the annotation is a bit skimpy. However, the booklet that accompanies the disc is quite extensive and is included as part of this post in PDF format. Hearing these familiar pieces played by wind band is an interesting experience. I hope you will enjoy this disc, the second of two done by the U.S. Army Field Band. I have the first one coming up next. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Scoredaddy</span><br /><br />The Legacy of Aaron Copland: Emblems</em> is the second album featured in the series of concert band recordings honoring the lives and music of individuals who have made significant contributions to the band repertoire and to music education. <em><br /><br />The Legacy of Aaron Copland: Emblems</em> features some of his greatest compositions. Special guest, Charles Osgood, anchor and writer of <em>CBS Sunday Mornings</em>, appears as a narrator on "Preamble for a Solemn Occasion" and "Lincoln Portrait." This album also features Copland's famous "Variations on a Shaker Hymn," and "An Outdoor Adventure," among many other Copland classics.<br /><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">1 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Variations on a Shaker Melody</span> 3:29<br />2 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Down a Country Lane</span> (arr. M. Patterson) 3:03<br />3 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Ceremonial Fanfare</span> 3:59<br />4 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Preamble for a Solemn Occasion (version for wind ensemble)</span> 3:15<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Billy the Kid: Waltz and Celebration</span> (arr. P. Lang)<br />5 Waltz 4:02<br />6 Celebration 2:32<br />7 An Outdoor Overture (version for band) 9:10<br /><br />8 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Emblems </span>10:52<br /><br />9 <span style="font-weight: bold;">Lincoln Portrait </span>(arr. W. Beeler), narrated by Charles Osgood 15:54<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Red Pony Suite (version for wind ensemble) </span><br />10 IIIa. Dream March 2:47<br />11 IIIb. Circus Music 1:52<br />12 IV. Walk to the Bunkhouse 2:40<br />13 V. Grandfather's Story 4:33<br />14 VI. Happy Ending 3:13<br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><br />Recorded August, 1999 at Devers Hall. Fort George G. Meade, Maryland<br />United States Army Field Band<br />Finley R. Hamilton Conductor</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-77785917098006936572012-04-25T16:19:00.004-04:002012-04-25T16:23:24.101-04:00MUSIC FROM COPLAND HOUSE: CHAMBER MUSIC<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-b2hyui8W8l8/T5hceS8OvrI/AAAAAAAAFnE/Ipjl6uNGRSM/s1600/cover.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 386px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-b2hyui8W8l8/T5hceS8OvrI/AAAAAAAAFnE/Ipjl6uNGRSM/s400/cover.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5735435801006620338" border="0" /></a>Among Aaron Copland's least-known compositions are his chamber pieces, seldom performed and recorded in spite of the composer's long tenure as the "Dean of American Music." This neglect has been attributed to the supposed difficulty of Copland's modernist style -- often featured in his chamber music -- which some have found less appealing than the robust Americana mode Copland cultivated from the late '30s onward. Yet even the works that anticipate his populist interests -- such as Ukulele Serenade (1926) and the Sextet for string quartet, clarinet, and piano (1928), and a masterpiece that is fully part of Copland's "homespun musical idiom," the Violin Sonata (1943) -- have languished in relative obscurity.<br /><br />Thankfully, the musicians at Copland House and the Borromeo String Quartet have devoted themselves to the promotion of Copland's chamber works, and have assembled a comprehensive and enjoyable program, which Arabesque has recorded with clarity and resonance. Arranged chronologically, from the Movement for string quartet (1923) to the Threnodies (2) for flute and string trio (1971), the selections reveal both Copland's willingness to experiment and his undogmatic approach to styles, methods, and material. After hearing this double-disc, listeners will find much to like in this overlooked oeuvre -- even among the haunting serial works -- and gain a greater appreciation of Copland's versatility and depth. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Blair Sanderson</span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">DISC ONE</span><br />1. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Movement for String Quartet </span>(1923)<br />2. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Prelude for Piano Trio </span>(1924)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Two Pieces for Violin and Piano </span>(1926)<br />3. Nocturne<br />4. Ukulele Serenade<br /><br />5. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Vocalise for Flute and Piano </span>(1928)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Two Pieces for String Quartet</span><br />6. Lento molto (1923)<br />7. Rondino (1928)<br /><br />8. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Vitebsk for Piano Trio (1928): Sextet for String Quartet, Clarinet and Piano </span>(1933, rev. 1937)<br />9. Allegro vivace<br />10. Lento<br />11. Finale: precise and rhythmic<br /><br style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">DISC TWO</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sonata for Violin and Piano </span>(1943)<br />1. Andante semplice<br />2. Lento<br />3. Allegretto giusto<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Quartet for Piano and Strings </span>(1950)<br />4. Adagio serio<br />5. Allegro giusto<br />6. Non troppo lento<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Duo for Flute and Piano </span>(1967-71)<br />7. Flowing<br />8. Poetic, somewhat mournful<br />9. Lively, with bounce<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Two Threnodies for Flute and String Trio </span>(1971)<br />10. In Memoriam: Igor Stravinsky<br />11. In Memoriam: Beatrice Cunningham<br /><br />Derek Bermel: clarinet<br />Michael Boriskin: piano<br />Paul Lustig Dunkel: flute<br />Nicholas Kitchen: violin<br />Wilhelmina Smith: cello</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-68834179925714313062012-01-27T10:52:00.001-05:002012-01-27T17:17:51.455-05:00ROSS POPLE & LONDON FESTIVAL ORCHESTRA: APPALACHIAN SPRING & OTHER WORKS<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SeSvGrCkwiI/AAAAAAAADIs/0s_PbUwZzRQ/s1600-h/Copy+of+IMG_0001.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; width: 400px; float: right; height: 400px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324573188626367010" alt="" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/SeSvGrCkwiI/AAAAAAAADIs/0s_PbUwZzRQ/s400/Copy+of+IMG_0001.jpg" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">re-up by request, new link in comments</span><br />This is another "donation" by the very generous Miguel. My sincere thanks... <strong>Scoredaddy</strong><br /><br />Though Aaron Copland is probably best known for his more accessible music (like his ballet scores Rodeo and Appalachian Spring), this CD presents, alongside selections from these pieces, some earlier and more intricate works of this great American composer. Of course, Appalachian Spring is very well known to many, though here it is performed in the original setting for thirteen instruments. For those who only know the full-orchestra version, this may present some surprising new sounds and it's certainly a nice diversion. Since Appalachian Spring is one of my favorite pieces, I enjoyed this greatly.<br /><br />The second work on this CD is the Sextet for clarinet, piano and string quartet. In fact this piece is a transcription of Copland's second symphony (the "short symphony"). Due to the difficulties that this symphony presented to many professional orchestras (mainly the intricate rhythmical structure of the work), it was rarely played. Copland, to make this work accessible to the public, made this arrangement for a smaller ensemble. Characteristic for Copland's work in this period (the nineteenthirties), its idiom is much more difficult than works like Appalachian Spring. So, it may take some getting used to, although it's already extremely Copland-like (you can already hear traces of what later will become for example rodeo or Appalachian Spring). The first movement is a jumpy, dance-like Allegro vivace, much like the Hoe-down also on this CD. The second movement, Lento, is intense and quiet, much like the quieter moments in Appalachian Spring. Without pause, the Lento passes into the Finale, introduced by some sudden piano chords. This finale is a very rhythmic, fast, bur humorous piece. At the end, thematic material from the first movement is recapitulated. Though it is, as I said, no Appalachian Springs, I find this a great piece. It's very interesting to hear that a lot of elements of Copland's later works are already present here, albeit in a different form and stage of development.<br /><br />Quiet City, for English Horn, Trumpet and Strings was written in 1941 (two years before Appalachian Spring). It's a dialogue between the two solo instruments with string accompaniment. Though it is a intimate work, focussing more on harmony than on rhythm, I find myself getting bored towards the end, it's quite a lot of the same really.<br /><br />The two pieces for string orchestra are arrangements of the two pieces for string quartet that Copland wrote between 1923 and 1928. The Lento molto is a melodramatic piece with dense harmonical writing. It's a silently flowing piece with now and then some dramatic crescendo's. The second piece, a rondino, opens similar to the first movement of the sextet. Although it is not as complicated as the sextet, it's has the same character, albeit more lyrical (as can be expected with a string orchestra). But, even when there is more lyrical writing there is always the driving force of the opening rhythm, even pizzicato in the violins under a beautiful cello-melody.<br />The last work on this CD is the exuberant Hoe Down from Rodeo. This is Copland on his most humorous and most enthusiastic. The violins even produce some dubious tones in this semblance of a drunken feast.<br /><br />I find this CD a very nice compilation of some of Copland's well-known and less well-known works, with very nice ensemble playing. It's definitely a CD that will never lose its charm. <strong>JJM Peters </strong><br /><br /><div align="center">1. <strong>Appalachian Spring</strong>, concert suite for full orchestra 26:30 (1945)<br /><br /><strong>Sextet, for clarinet, piano & string quartet</strong> (arr. of Symphony No. 2) 15:38 (1937)<br />2. Allegro Vivace 4:40<br />3. Lento 4:54<br />4. Finale 6:00<br />Violins: Robert Gibbs, Amanda Smith<br />Ian Rathbone (viola), Ferenc Szucs (cello), Michael Freyhan (piano), Anthony Pike (clarinet)<br /><br />5. <strong>Quiet City, for English horn, trumpet & strings</strong> (from the incidental music) 10:07 (1940)<br />John Wilbraham (trumpet), Alison Alty (English Horn)<br /><br /><strong>Two Pieces for string orchestra</strong> (arr. from 2 Pieces for string quartet) 9:19 (1923, 1928)<br />6. Lento Molto 5:20<br />7. Rondino 3:58<br /><br />8. <strong>“Hoe down” from Rodeo</strong>, ballet 3:01 (1942)<br /><br />Performed by: London Festival Orchestra conducted by Ross Pople<br />Recorded January 24&25, 1996 at The Warehouse, London UK</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-19191927155090794142012-01-24T14:02:00.001-05:002012-01-24T14:07:05.549-05:00PAUL POSNAK & PETER ZAZOFSKY: COMPLETE WORKS FOR VIOLIN AND PIANO<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DnhofXw8HQA/Tx8AclH6-xI/AAAAAAAAFXk/XigQW3SYORg/s1600/folder.jpg"><img style="float: left; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 399px; height: 400px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DnhofXw8HQA/Tx8AclH6-xI/AAAAAAAAFXk/XigQW3SYORg/s400/folder.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5701276144276011794" border="0" /></a>Simply put, Aaron Copland is one of the most important composers of the twentieth century. He codified a concert music sound that was distinctly "American," and single-handedly created a generous path for composers in his native land, bringing to "the new world" what was mostly, up until that point, an imported and exclusively European art form. He lived a long and productive life, one that spanned almost the entire century, and worked not only as a composer, but as a conductor, pianist, teacher, author, concert promoter and generous friend to music.<br /><br />His parents immigrated from Poland and Lithuania to New York City in their adolescence; Aaron was their fifth child, born in 1900. He was gifted at the piano, studying with Victor Wittgenstein and Clarence Adler. He took lessons in harmony and counterpoint with Goldmark, an old-fashioned teacher who was dedicated to Beethoven and Fux, and against whom Copland rebelled, as children do, becoming enamoured of Scriabin, Debussy and Ives (whom Goldmark called "dangerous"). Eventually, when he was twenty, the young composer-to-be set sail for Paris and the tutelage of Nadia Boulanger.<br /><br />Under Boulanger Copland began to write his first full-fledged pieces, as well as keeping an involved notebook of musical ideas, an example of his legendary parsimonious nature, always thrifty with everything, especially notes. Using the new knowledge his teacher had imparted to him about Stravinsky, he also cultivated an interest in Jazz, mostly as seen through the eyes of the French, though he did have some knowledge of it from his time in New York. When he returned to America, it was with the score to a ballet called Grohg, along with sketches that would become the Symphonic Ode and Music for the Theatre in his satchel. He had begun to find his voice.<br /><br />Copland’s legendary compositional output changed it all; Americans no longer had to seek Teutonic refuge, trying to be Brahms. Works like the Third Symphony, with its Fanfare for the Common Man, Rodeo, Billy the Kid, Appalachian Spring, the Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson and El Salon Mexico showed American composers that it was possible to create a sound that was both nationalistic and musically sophisticated. He taught generations to draw influence from what was around, whether that happened to be Gershwin, Debussy, jazz, folk-tunes or hoedowns.<br /><br />Yet Copland was more than a creator of wistful American nostalgia; he was a deeply sophisticated musician, aware of aesthetic trends of his time. Some of his works, like the early Piano Variations or the later Inscape, are truly modernist creations, not ignoring the influence of the Second Viennese School. His output was diverse, and even eclectic. He also wrote a great deal of chamber music, much of which is included here.<br /><br />Copland seemed to have two separate sides, the populist and the aesthete. The Sonata for Violin and Piano seems to fall in between the two, being jaunty and full of good tunes, but also based on sophisticated harmonies and unorthodox musical schemes. The piece is dedicated to Lieutenant Harry H. Dunham, a close friend of Copland’s who died in battle, and the date of its première (17th January 1944, with violinist Ruth Posselt and the composer at the piano) shows that war was probably very much on the pacifist Copland’s mind. Cast in three movements with traditional titles (Andante, Lento and Allegretto giusto) this is truly a neo-classical work, but it is also pure Copland; as with everything, he took what he needed of the theoretical conceits, but ultimately composed to his instincts.<br /><br />Two Pieces for violin and piano, which Copland wrote in the mid 1920s for himself and violinist Samuel Dushkin to play in a Boulanger-sponsored concert in Paris, is a chance to see Copland playing with new ideas, including a new fascination with jazz (this is also the period he was writing his heavily jazz-influenced Piano Concerto). Much of this music would be mined for later scores, but they do hold interest on their own. This is music that is bitonal (in more than one key at once), undoubtedly influenced by Darius Milhaud, whom Copland esteemed highly. In the Ukelele Serenade Copland is having a good time trying to make the fiddle sound like something it is not.<br /><br />Copland’s piano trio Vitebsk, one of his few "Jewish" works, is here arranged for violin and piano. It is a startling piece, full of wailing dissonances, even using microtones, notes which fall in between the cracks of piano keys, not of the "Western" well-tempered system. It is based on The Dybuk, a Jewish folk-tale, which also fascinated George Gershwin and Leonard Bernstein, about spirits and doomed love in a small Hasidic community, and Copland hoped the music would, in his own words, "...reflect the harshness and drama of Jewish life in White Russia." It is, therefore, a lean, almost angry work, with many moods contained in its taut single movement.<br /><br />Dipping even further into the well of Copland’s juvenilia, Two Preludes for Violin and Piano are attempts to translate poetry into music, as Liszt had done in his tone poems. The poets in whom Copland found inspiration were Witter Bynner and Wallace Stevens, both contemporaneous and American. Here we see the seed of the Copland yet to come, the off-kilter rhythms, the stark harmonies, and the sparseness of texture. The titles offer their own explanations; these are musical moment pieces, composed to a single-focused and specific idea of mood.<br /><br />Originally scored for flute and piano, Copland’s Duo was re-scored by the composer in 1977 at the request of Robert Mann, the violinist for the Juilliard Quartet and Copland enthusiast. The "all-but" sonata was therefore transcribed into this version, which took a good deal less time than the composition - Copland worked for three years on the Duo, commissioned by William Kinkcaid. The famous flautist wanted something that would work "...like a sonata," and Copland certainly delivered the goods, offering a tightly formed work in three movements. The second movement in particular, the composition of which took most of the three years, evokes, in the composer’s own words "a certain mood that I connect with myself - a rather sad and wistful one, I suppose."<br /><br />The ballet Rodeo was a divisive moment in Copland’s career, a complete smash hit, and yet the piece that managed to alienate him from much of his community. Copland, they thought, had sold out. Copland even incorporates some memorable American folk-tunes. It is a cowboy romance, full of wranglers and cowgirls, and culminating in a hoedown. The choreography and scenario were by Agnes de Mille, who, on the strength of her work on Rodeo, was hired to choreograph a new musical by Rodgers and Hammerstein called Oklahoma!, and Copland composed dutifully to her vision, though he preferred his idea for a ballet about Ellis Island. The 1942 première at the Metropolitan Opera was an enormous success, with a standing ovation. The suite from the work is one of Copland’s most recognizable achievements, with hundreds of performances and countless wonderful recordings. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Daniel Felsenfeld</span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">Paul Posnak (piano)<br />Peter Zazofsky (violin<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sonata for Violin and Piano (1943)</span><br />1. I. Andante semplice 7:41<br />2. II. Lento 4:56<br />3. III. Allegretto giusto 6:55<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Two Pieces for Violin and Piano (1926)</span><br />4. Nocturne (Lento moderato) 00:05:40<br />5. Ukelele Serenade (Allegro vivo) 00:04:26<br /><br />6. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Vitebsk (Study on a Jewish Theme for Piano, Violin and Cello) (1929) </span>12:03<br />Harbaugh, Ross, cello<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">7.</span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Prelude No. 1 for Violin and Piano (1917) </span>3:41<br />8. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Prelude No. 2 for Violin and Piano (1917)</span> 4:54<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Duo for Violin and Piano (1978)</span><br />9. I. Flowing 5:44<br />10. II. Poetic, somewhat mournful 4:50<br />11. III. Lively, with bounce 3:22<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Rodeo: Hoe Down 1942 (arr.1945)</span><br />12. Rodeo: Hoe Down 3:14<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Billy the Kid: Waltz and Celebration (1938)</span><br />Arr. For violin and piano<br />13. Waltz (Molto moderato) 3:56<br />14. Celebration (Allegro) 2:24<br /> <br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Total Playing Time: 1:13:46</span><br /><br />Recorded: at Gusman Hall, University of Miami, School of Music, Coral Gables, Florida on May 9 and June 14, 15 and 16, 2000</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-47385369728043652452010-10-21T21:52:00.003-04:002010-10-21T21:54:01.684-04:00SERGE KOUSSEVITZKY & BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: APPALACHIAN SPRING , LINCOLN PORTRAIT + HANSON: THIRD SYMPHONY<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/TMDugtvVTfI/AAAAAAAAEiE/q0-6PAFRA4M/s1600/cover.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 399px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/TMDugtvVTfI/AAAAAAAAEiE/q0-6PAFRA4M/s400/cover.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5530682588212317682" border="0" /></a>These historic recordings works are linked by wartime and the premonition of war. The Copland works belong to the war years - both post-Pearl Harbour. Appalachian Spring was when recorded here still work 'hot off the presses'. It was a ballet with a ballet reputation rather than concert music. It is done with deliciously rushed slides and deep-running bass-heavy figures (13.45). Koussevitsky relishes the Stravinskian influence which is, in his hands, very strong indeed - direct from Le Sacre and Petrushka. In addition Koussevitsky does tender duty to the more plaintive voices (e.g. 16.22). Holstian and Respighi influences can be heard at 18.52. He makes a real Abschied out of the last five minutes. This suddenly becomes the centre of gravity of the whole piece - giving it symphonic weight.<br /><br />The Hanson with its Pohjolan and Brucknerian rumblings is a pioneer recordings as are all of these tracks. The symphony only flags in the finale where the pesante element weighs down the sense of direction. There is Sibelian pert wind writing aplenty. Hanson tries in the andante tranquillo to build the breadth of his great free-ranging theme in his Romantic Symphony. He just misses. He builds some surprisingly sinister visions as well - especially in the finale. His opera Merry Mount (will that work ever be recorded in modern sound?) was the quarry for this Breughel-Dali surrealism. Koussevitsky takes his time - all the time in the world! The largamente does not work as it should ending up far too ponderously rhapsodic.<br /><br />The Lincoln Portrait has all the usual stirring strengths. What impresses though is the sudden poignant tenderness of the music for the words 'He was born in Kentucky'. This has been done well by many others and in better recordings. My recommendations are James Earl Jones on Delos and Charlton Heston on Vanguard. There were some quibbles when this disc first appeared in 1998 but at bargain price there is too much here to savour to let an allegedly synthetic sound quality deny you the pleasure of this deeply felt music making. For my part the sound quality was perfectly satisfactory. It is no barrier to enjoyment. <b>Rob Barnett </b><br /><br /><div align="center">1. <b>Aaron Copland: Appalachian Spring (1945) </b>24:29<br /><br /><b>Howard Hanson: Symphony No. 3 (1936)</b><br />2. Andante lamentando 9:57<br />3. Andante tranquillo 8:09<br />4. Tempo scherzando 5:54<br />5. Largamente e pesante 10:34<br /><br />6. <b>Aaron Copland: Lincoln Portrait (1942) </b>14:06<br /><br />Melvyn Douglas (narrator - Lincoln)<br />Boston SO/Serge Koussevitzky<br />rec Symphony Hall, Boston: 31 Oct 1945 (Appalachian); 20 Mar 1940 (Hanson); 2 Feb 1946 (Lincoln) </div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75184267809768124.post-71932880404024219192010-08-29T20:56:00.004-04:002010-08-30T13:35:44.696-04:00MARCELO BRATKE & MARCELA ROGGERI: MUSIC FOR TWO PIANOS- THE OPEN PRAIRIE<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/THsCLKh682I/AAAAAAAAEak/Jsod19iHxjk/s1600/a+cover.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; WIDTH: 400px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 397px; CURSOR: pointer" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5511000959846380386" border="0" alt="" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nEZYA1gkvQs/THsCLKh682I/AAAAAAAAEak/Jsod19iHxjk/s400/a+cover.jpg" /></a>A lot of the repertoire for two pianos is arranged from orchestral music, but none the worse for that. The sound of two concert grands is uniquely exciting, though it can be cumbersome if the players are not perfectly synchronised, or if they compete rather than cooperate.<br /><br />Marcelo Bratke and Marcela Roggeri sound as if they have been playing together for a long time. On Monday, they only looked at each other when they started each piece, not needing to afterwards because they felt the music together. It was an object lesson in true ensemble. He played nearly everything from memory, and while she had prompt scores, for much of the time she didn't appear to need to consult them.<br /><br />Their programme brought together three American composers united by popular culture [this refers to a concert, reviewed herein]. Copland made his own two-piano arrangement of his cowboy ballet Billy the Kid, preserving its lean and airy textures. Just occasionally, in the second number, for instance, dissonances that are absorbed as instrumental colour in the orchestral original sound intriguingly arbitrary in the piano duo version. The hardest thing to make convincing (and get together) on two pianos is probably the broad opening music, which returns at the end. It was very well played.<br /><br />Danzon Cubano also exists in an orchestral version, though it was originally for two pianos. Bratke and Roggeri got its cheeky rhythmic syncopations perfectly. And they caught the subtle switches of tempo in Copland's El Salon Mexico, arranged by Leonard Bernstein.<br /><br />Gershwin wrote his Three Preludes for piano solo, and we heard an arrangement which Marcelo Bratke made in collaboration with Julian Joseph, attempting to evoke the sound of a big band. At least, that's what Bratke's programme note said, though the point of a big band sound is surely its brashness, and Bratke's own playing with Roggeri was a bit too refined to create that effect [not included on this CD].<br /><br />I wonder what the Labeque sisters would have done with the same music, because they fairly thrash their instruments. But while the French girls are unrivalled in their way, these Latin Americans have their own discreet, considerate style which is charming rather than stunning. I don't usually find the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story [not on this CD] charming, exactly, but I'm grateful that Bratke and Roggeri did their very best to make them so. Their recent CD of this programme is available on the Etcetera label, distributed by Chandos Records. <span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Adrian Jack</span><br /><br />Check out <a href="http://fanfareforcopland.blogspot.com/2009/11/william-chapman-nyaho-susanna-garcia.html">http://fanfareforcopland.blogspot.com/2009/11/william-chapman-nyaho-susanna-garcia.html</a> for a recording of the same repertoire by a different piano duo.<br /><br /><br /><div style="TEXT-ALIGN: center"><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Billy the Kid</span><br />1] The Open Prairie 3:10<br />2] Street in a Frontier Town 4:23<br />3] Billy and his Sweetheart/Mexican Dance 3:24<br />4] Celebration after Billy’s Capture 2:28<br />5] Billy’s Demise 1:18<br />6] The Open Prairie Again 1:35<br /><br />7] <span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Danzón Cubano</span> 6:57<br />8] <span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Variations on a Shaker Melody</span> 5:29<br />9] <span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Danza de Jalisco</span> 3:56<br />10] <span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Dance of the Adolescent</span> 6:05<br /><br /><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Two Movements from Rodeo</span><br />11] Hoe Down 3:10<br />12] Saturday Night Waltz 3:55<br /><br />13] <span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">El Salón Mexico</span> 9:23<br /><br />Marcelo Bratke - piano<br />Marcela Roggeri - piano<br /><br />Recorded at St. Phillip’s Church, Norbury UK in July, 1999</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7