Music #436 - William Walton

William Walton  - top tracks 

(1902 – 1983)

Sir William Turner Walton OM was an English composer. During a sixty-year career, he wrote music in several genres and styles, from opera to film scores. 

Battle of Britain (1969) movie  - opening scenes         

Henry V (1944) movie  - Agincourt Song

His best-known works include 

* Façade  (a 3-minute sample)

* Belshazzar's Feast  (cantata)

* Viola Concerto

* First Symphony

Legends:
* Battle of Britain
* Henry V: Non Nobis and Te Deum
     - Non nobis, non nobis, Domine   /Not to us, not to us, O Lord/
       Sed nomini tuo da gloriam.   /But to thy name give glory./
* Façade (Front) – An Entertainment   
* In the story of Belshazzar's Feast, the Jews are in exile in Babylon. After a feast at which Belshazzar, the Babylonian king, commits sacrilege by using the Jews' sacred vessels to praise the heathen gods, he is miraculously killed, the kingdom falls, and the Jews regain their freedom.

Source: Wikipedia

Music #434 - Prokofiev

Sergei Prokofiev  - top tracks

/prəˈkɒfiɛv/  (1891 – 1953) 

A Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres, Prokofiev is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century. 

His best-known works are 
* 5 piano concertos
* 9 completed piano sonatas
* 7 symphonies.


Piano Concert No.1

Martha Argerich & Alexandre Rabinovitch
at "Le festival de la Roque-d'Anthéron"
(an international piano festival) in 2005

War & Peace opera   

The Nazi invasion of the USSR spurred him to compose his most ambitious work, an operatic version of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace.

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Besides many other works, Prokofiev also composed family favourites, such as 
* the March from The Love for Three Oranges, 
* the suite Lieutenant Kijé, 
* the ballet Romeo and Juliet,
* Peter and the Wolf.


Love for Three Oranges opera  

March by Itzhak Perlman

Lieutenant Kijé  
This score was composed for the 1934 Soviet film Lieutenant Kijé based on the novel of the same title.

* Mvt 3 of 5 Kijé's Wedding
* a full suite

Cinderella   

Paris Opera Ballet

Gambler opera

Staatskapelle Berlin

Romeo & Juliet

Based on Shakespeare's play, it is one of the most enduringly popular ballets. 
Music from the ballet was extracted by Prokofiev as three suites for orchestra and as a piano work.
Suite No.2 - Mvt 1 of 7 - Montagues and Capulets / Dance of the Knights

* orchestra version

* piano version - with score
* a full version

Peter and the Wolf  

(L) Vancouver Symphony Orchestra

 
(R) Disney Story

Source: Wikipedia

Music #433 - Stravinsky

Igor Stravinsky

(sometimes spelled Strawinsky or Stravinskii)
[ˌiɡərʲ strɐˈvʲinskʲɪj]  (1882 - 1971)

A Russian, and later French and American composer, he is considered one of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century.


He first achieved international fame with three ballets: 
* The Firebird
* Petrushka
* The Rite of Spring

Firebird / L'oiseau de feu

The Firebird ballet is based on Russian folk tales of the firebird that is both a blessing and a curse to its captor. 
* Infernal Dance to start of Finale
* Finale
* Ballet

Petrushka  

The ballet tells the story of a Russian traditional puppet Petrushka, who is made of straw and with a bag of sawdust as his body, but who comes to life and develops emotions. 
* Part 1   * Part 2   * Part 3 

The Rite of Spring (Le sacre du printemps)

After various primitive rituals celebrating the advent of spring, a young girl is chosen as a sacrificial victim and dances herself to death. 
* Mariinsky Ballet

* Jeffrey Ballet 1987

Source: Wikipedia 

Music #432 - Barber

Samuel Barber 

(1910-1981)  

He is one of the most celebrated composers of the 20^th century.

An American, he was twice awarded the Pulitzer Prize for music, for
* opera Vanessa
* Concerto for Piano and Orchestra.

Also widely performed is his Knoxville: Summer of 1915, a work for soprano and orchestra.

His Adagio for Strings has earned a permanent place in the concert repertory of orchestras. 

Source: Wikipedia

Adagio for Strings - String Quartet No.1 Mvt 2

This music piece can be solemn, 

* as sung with mass prayer Agnus Dei (Lamb of God) in Latin

It can be light and heavy: 

* heavy metals added to light it up, and to speed it up!

* digitized

It can be a sad requiem L.  
Besides the funeral of President FD Roosevelt, it was performed in ...

* mourning the deaths in 911

* trailer theme in the Platoon movie 

* end theme in the Elephant Man movie 
   - “I am not an animal! I am a human being! 
        I … am … a man!”  Good grief!

Music #431 - Gershwin

George Gershwin  - a story of Gershwin 

(1898 – 1937)

Gershwin is an American composer and pianist. His compositions spanned both popular and classical genres. 

Among his best known works are the orchestral compositions:
* Rhapsody in Blue
* An American in Paris
* Porgy and Bess.

Rhapsody in Blue 

“... a musical composition for solo piano and jazz band, which combines elements of classical music with jazz-influenced effects.” 
  
* Melodica concerto version from the Nodame Cantabile series

* Piano concerto  - Leonard Bernstein on piano & conducting

An American in Paris   

“... a symphonic composition inspired by time Gershwin had spent in Paris.”

* Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra 

* I got rhythm in the An American in Paris (film) - Gene Kelly.   

Porgy and Bess  
"... tells the story of Porgy, a disabled black beggar living in the slums of Charleston, South Carolina. He attempted to rescue Bess from the clutches of Crown, her violent and possessive lover, and Sportin' Life, the drug dealer."

* Summertime
* AGT
* 15 songs in a movie made 

Source: Wikipedia

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Extra: 
Gene Kelly tap dancing on roller skates in one film.

Music #430 - Copland

Aaron Copland 

[KOPE-land]  (1900-1990)
   
An American, he was instrumental in forging a distinctly American style of composition. In his later years he was often referred to as "the Dean of American Composers"

Works include 
* the ballets Appalachian Spring, Billy the Kid and Rodeo
* Third Symphony
* Fanfare for the Common Man

Source: Wikipedia

Fanfare for the Common Man  

This fanfare has only percussion & brass sections.

* Composed to motivate Americans during WW2. 

* It was played to motivate Americans after 911.

Simple Gifts  
by an elder of the Shakers, a Christian division in USA

Hancock Shaker Village

- This former Shaker commune emerged in the towns of Hancock, Pittsfield, and Richmond in the 1780s, organized in 1790, and was active until 1960.

- An independent non-profit organization now operates the property as an open-air museum.

- Hancock, Massachusetts (USA)

Centre Family Dwelling House

- Micajah Burnett (1791-1879) & Moses Johnson (1752-1842), 1824-34

- Pleasant Hill, Kentucky (USA)

* It was a dancing song/hymn in the Shakers' chapel  (with lyrics) 

Copland made this melody well-known by borrowing it into section 7 (of 8) of his Appalachian Spring ballet suite.  
* Simple Gifts in Appalachian Spring


The Appalachian ["appa-LATSCH-en"] Mountains 
(brown in color on map) run among the 13 Atlantic states and Louisiana. 

Music #429 - Poulenc et "Les Six"

Francis Poulenc   - top tracks
[fʁɑ̃sis pulɛ̃k]
(1899 – 1963)

A French composer, Poulenc composed various genres of music.  
He was a member of the French group Les Six (see below).







* Les biches / Female Deer  - a ballet with chorus and jazz idioms

* Les chemins de l'amour / The Ways of Love - one of his most popular songs

* Les mamelles de Tirésias / The Breasts of Tirésias

* La voix humaine / The Human Voice

* Sinfonietta (pour orchestre) - light and full of dance rhythms

Les Six   - top tracks
Les Six [le sis] is a name given in 1920 to a group of six French composers working in Montparnasse. Their music is often seen as a reaction against the musical style of Richard Wagner and the impressionist music of Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel.

The six members were: 
* Georges Auric,
* Louis Durey,
* Arthur Honegger,
* Darius Milhaud,
* Francis Poulenc,
* Germaine Tailleferre.

Source: Wikipedia