One of our frequent visitors at our Southgate townhouse was Denny, the Vietnam vet from Lewistown that we had gotten to know in Mifflin Hall who was in his late 20s but looked 40. Denny was still rooming with Ken, the fundamentalist Christian, on the fifth floor of Mifflin Hall. I don’t know if he … Continue reading Your Song
Music
Capriccio Italien
When I was growing up, we had a record album from the Reader’s Digest called The Festival of Light Classical Music. It had pretty much what you might expect. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, The 1812 Overture, Bolero, all the famous, easily digestible pieces. And it had Chaikovsky’s Capriccio Italien. Though, like nearly everyone else, it mis-transliterated Chaikovsky’s name. Chaikovsky had … Continue reading Capriccio Italien
The Day the Network Died
Have I ever told the story of what composer Max Reger wrote to a critic who gave him a negative review? He wrote: “Ich sitze in dem kleinsten Zimmer in meinem Hause. Ich habe Ihre Kritik vor mir. Im nächsten Augenblick wird sie hinter mir sein!” (“I am sitting in the smallest room of my … Continue reading The Day the Network Died
Encore At the Proms
Yannick brought the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra to the Proms this year, and they performed an evening of Richard Strauss music, including the final scene from the opera Salome and the tone poem Ein Heldenleben. At the end there was an encore, but things didn’t go quite as expected. By the way, the video that Yannick … Continue reading Encore At the Proms
My Fair Ladies
There are several complete performances of the musical My Fair Lady available on YouTube. I’ve sampled the ones that I could find (YouTube’s search function is awful so I can’t promise that I found them all), and I picked three that I think might be worth your attention, assuming you enjoy the musical art form that … Continue reading My Fair Ladies
Conga!
There are two dynamic conductors who appeared on the musical scene 20 years or so ago. The Philadelphia Orchestra snagged the one from north of the border, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, some time ago, and has signed him to a longterm contract. The Los Angeles Philharmonic snagged the one from south of the border, Gustavo Dudamel, and … Continue reading Conga!
Variations on a Nursery Tune
I heard this music on the radio a few weeks ago and found it delightful. It’s Ernst von Dohnányi’s Variations on a Nursery Tune. The Nursery Tune in question is called “Ah, vous dirai-je, Maman” in France, but it has a different name in English speaking countries. Dohnányi claimed that the piece was written “for the … Continue reading Variations on a Nursery Tune
Them That’s Got Shall Have
I heard this on the jazz station the other day… On an unrelated note, John Oliver has a followup to a story he did a couple weeks ago.
Åse’s Death
Coincidences seem to happen to me all the time. Case in point: A few nights ago I was watching a video of an orchestra playing Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suite, but I got distracted and looked something up on the internet and lost track of time until the final piece, “In the Hall of the Mountain … Continue reading Åse’s Death
November 3, 1956
In November 1956 we were living in the Great Stone House on my grandparents’ farm just outside Womelsdorf, Pennsylvania, but as my mother had been brought up in Richland and my father on a farm just outside Richland, and my mother’s parents still lived in Richland, we visited that borough frequently. On November 3 Richland's … Continue reading November 3, 1956