Friday, October 30, 2015

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2015

QUOTE:
"I adore art...when I am alone with my notes, my heart pounds and the tears stream from my eyes, 
  and my emotion and my joys are too much to bare.”
AUTHOR: Giuseppe Verdi
MEANING OF THE QUOTE:
“The emotion and joy felt from the act of creating art is totally 
  fulfilling.”







COMPOSER 
COPLAND
Themes from:
"Our Town" and "The Red Pony"
Grover's Corners (from Our Town)
EMI Studios, London England; Producer: Paul Myers - June 1974
Grandfather's Story (from The Red Pony)
The Phoenix Symphony - conducted by James Sedares - May 1991
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xb4Gk_n4TM&feature=related

-----------------------------------------------

Our Town Suite
Conducted by Aaron Copland
As used in the Spike Lee film "He Got Game" (1998)

Our Town,
Thornton Wilder’s

affecting stage portrayal of life and death in a New England village,

opened on Broadway in February 1938. It scored an immediate success. 


Brooks Atkinson, theater critic of the New York Times, called it

“a beautifully evocative play ... [that] has transmuted the
 simple events of human life into universal reverie.”

Audiences agreed, and Our Town enjoyed an initial Broadway

run of 336 performances. The play’s triumph called Wilder to

Hollywood, where he wrote a screen adaptation of his work
that was filmed in 1939.

In 1940, when the play was about to become a film, the Hollywood
producer Sol Lesser asked Copland (who had recently composed
music for the film version of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men)
to compose the music. Copland admired Wilder, and when he heard
that ''Our Town'' had been written mostly at the MacDowell Colony


and that Grover's Corners was patterned

 after the town of Peterborough, N. H.,

Bird's-eye View of Peterborough, NH 

where Copland had composed several musical works,
the combination was too much for the composer to resist.


Copland had seen Wilder’s play, but he now re-read
it and sketched some musical ideas that occurred to him.

“My job,” he observed, “was to create the atmosphere of a typical

New Hampshire town, and to reflect the [film’s] shifts from the real

to the fantasy world. Because of the nostalgic nature of the story, most
of the music had to be in slow tempo.... I tried for clean and clear
sounds, and in general used straightforward harmonies and rhythms
that would project the serenity and sense of security of the play.”




The score for Our Town was composed in 1940, and the

film, after getting its first showings in May of the same
year, opened to acclaim scarcely less enthusiastic than
that garnered by Wilder’s play. Before the movie appeared
widely in theaters, Copland prepared a short concert excerpt
(and adapted some excerpts for piano), which was first
performed on the following June 9th during a radio broadcast
by the Columbia Broadcasting Symphony under
Howard Barlow and the Columbia Broadcasting Symphony
Afterward, the composer prepared a more carefully crafted version
of the suite. This definitive (revised) version received its first
performance on May 7, 1944, by the Boston Pops, conducted by
Leonard Bernstein, to whom Copland dedicated the score.

Our Town
Suite for Piano
Features Three Selections:
1] The Story of Our Town 
2] Conversation at the Soda Fountain
3] The Resting Place on the Hill
Performed by Eric Parkin

OUR TOWN (1940)
Full Movie
Adaptation of Thornton Wilder's Pulitzer Prize-winning
play set in a small New England town in the early 1900's.
The story tells of the drama and conflict in every family.
Nominated for five Academy Awards in 1940.
With captions.

OUR TOWN (1940)
Full Movie
Without captions.

LINKS

ARTICLE FROM REVIEW SHEETS: 
http://www.reviewsheetscentral.com/?/rs/10/music_jun.htm

Characters
Stage Manager - The Stage Manager has no name other than his title, and he
seems to exist both in the world of the audience and the world of the play,
where he assumes various roles within the daily life of Grover's Corners
(a druggist and a minister, notably). He exercises control over the action
of the play, moving the other characters around, halting their conversations
for his own interjections, and informing the audience of events that we do
not see. With his omniscient point of view and power over the events on
stage, he occupies an almost divine function in the story.
George Gibbs - The son of Dr. Gibbs and Mrs. Gibbs. A decent, upstanding
young man, George is a high school baseball star who plans to become a
farmer after high school. His courtship of and marriage to Emily Webb is
central to the play's limited narrative structure.
Dr. Gibbs - George's father, and the town doctor for Grover's Corners. (The
Gibbs and Webbs are next-door neighbors.)
Mrs. Gibbs - George's mother, and Dr. Gibbs's wife.
Mr. Webb - Emily's father, and the editor of the local newspaper.
Mrs. Webb - Emily's mother, and Mr. Webb's wife.
Mrs. Soames - A gossipy woman who sings in the choir with Mrs. Webb
and Mrs. Gibbs.
Mr. Stimson - The choirmaster. His alcoholism is a subject of gossip in
Grover's Corners.
Rebecca - George Gibbs's younger sister.
Wally Webb - Emily Webb's younger brother.
Howie Newsome - The milkman in Grover's Corners.
Joe Crowell, Jr. - A paperboy.
Si Crowell - Joe Crowell's younger brother, also a paperboy.
Professor Willard - A professor at the state university.
Constable Warren - A local policeman.
Sam Craig - Emily Webb's cousin, who has left town but returns for her
funeral.
Joe Stoddard - The undertaker in Grover's Corners.

Summary
Our Town is introduced by the Stage Manager, who welcomes the audience
to Grover's Corners, New Hampshire, in May of 1901. The stage is largely
empty, save for some tables and chairs that represent the homes of the Gibbs
and Webb families, where most of the action in Act I takes place. After the
Stage Manager's introduction, we watch a typical day unfold in the town. Dr.
Gibbs returns from an early morning delivery of twin babies; Mrs. Gibbs and
Mrs. Webb make breakfast, send their children off to school, and meet to
gossip in their gardens. Then we have an interruption, as Mr. Webb and
Professor Willard tell the audience some basic facts about the town. Afternoon
arrives, and George Gibbs walks home from school with Emily Webb, talking
about homework. That evening, Mrs. Webb and Mrs. Gibbs come home from
choir practice together, while George and Emily talk to one another through
their open windows. As night falls, the first act comes to an end.

Act II takes place three years later, on George and Emily's wedding day. The
morning is rainy, and George goes over to see his fiancée, only to be shooed
away by Mrs. and Mr. Webb, who insist that seeing the bride-to-be is bad luck.
Then the Stage Manager introduces a flashback to the previous year, when
George and Emily went to get an ice cream soda together, and their courtship
began. After the flashback, we return to 1904, and their wedding day. Both
bride and groom are jittery, but their parents calm them, and they go through
with the marriage--with the Stage Manager officiating as minister. They go
out together, and the second act ends.

As Act III begins, nine years have passed, and the scene has shifted to the
cemetery, where Emily is going to be buried (she has just died in childbirth).
As the funeral goes ahead, we hear the voices of the dead, including Mrs
. Gibbs. They are detached witnesses to the goings-on, having reached a point
of understanding where they are no longer concerned with earthly events. The
newly-buried Emily joins them, and quickly decides to go back and relive part
of her life. She chooses her twelfth birthday, and we watch as she steps into
the past and begins to live the day again. However, she quickly becomes
unhappy because she can see and understand so much more than the living,
and demands to be taken back to the cemetery. As she settles in to the peaceful
wisdom of the dead souls, George comes and weeps by her tomb. "They don't
understand, do they?" she says of the living, while the stars come out over
Grover's Corners, and the play ends.


-----------------------------------------------



Probably the best known of his film

scores, Aaron Copland composed this

for the 1948 Republic Pictures film


(on the studio lot in the San Fernando
Valley, California), directed by
based on the novel The Red Pony
(a collection of short stories or vignettes) by

John Steinbeck. An LP, conducted by Copland,

was issued of the original soundtrack recording which

was orchestrated by R. Dale Butts and Nathan Scott.

Copland adapted his score into a concert suite,


and completed it during August of the same year

in response to a commission from Efrem Kurtz,
Efram Kurtz

who included it in his first program as conductor of the
Houston Symphony Orchestra on October 30, 1948.



John Steinbeck’s well-known tale is a series of vignettes concerning a ten-

year-old boy named Jody and his life in a California ranch setting.There is

a minimum of dramatic or startling action in the plot. Rather, the story gets
its warmth and sensitivity from the character studies of Jody, Jody’s
grandfather, the cow-hand Billy Buck, and Jody’s parents, the Tiflins. 

The effectiveness of The Red Pony score stems from Copland's belief that
film music should be subordinate to the film it accompanies. Copland
composed The Red Pony score using his self-described method of "assembly,"
augmenting this process with devices to synchronize the music with the picture.
Examination of archival sources shows how the score reflects the acknowledged
influence of Igor Stravinsky, the needs of the film medium, and the plot of The
Red Pony specifically. Despite Copland's modern style characteristics, the music
functions much like a conventional Hollywood film score.

Six-Part Orchestral Suite

The orchestral suite, originally arranged by Copland for the

Houston Symphony Orchestra, lasts approximately 20–25

minutes and consists of six separate pieces:
Morning on the Ranch (I)
from "The Red Pony" Suite
Conducted by JoAnn Falletta

The Gift (II)
from "The Red Pony" Suite

Dream March and Circus Music (III)
from "The Red Pony" Suite
Performed by the New Philharmonia Orchestra
Conducted by Aaron Copland

Walk to the Bunkhouse (IV)
from "The Red Pony" Suite
Conducted by Leonard Slatkin

Grandfather's Story (V)
from "The Red Pony" Suite

Happy Ending (VI)
from "The Red Pony" Suite
Conducted by Paul Phillips
The Pioneer Valley Symphony

In 1966, Copland transcribed selections (four movements of the six-part
orchestral suite were retained) from the orchestral suite for band (Red Pony
Film Suite for Band). The first performance of this work was scheduled for
the U.S. Navy Band under Anthony Mitchell
Lieutenant Commander Anthony
A. Mitchell Leader, 1962-1968
 at the Midwest Band and
Orchestra Clinic in December 1968.
The Red Pony Suite
Performed by The Gustavus Wind Orchestra


I. a & b. Dream March and Circus Music. 
Jody tends to lapse into day-dreams. Two of them are pictured
here. In the first, Jody imagines himself with the cow-hand,
Billy Buck, at the head of an army of knights in silvery armor;
in the second, he is the whip-cracking ringmaster at the circus.

II. Walk to the Bunkhouse. 
Billy Buck was a “fine hand with the horses,” and Jody’s
admiration knew no bounds. This is a scene of the two pals
on their walk to the bunkhouse.

III. Grandfather’s Story. 
Jody’s grandfather retells the story of how he led a wagon
train “clear across the plains to the coast.” But he can’t hide
his bitterness from the boy. In his opinion, “Westerning has
died out of the people. Westerning isn’t a hunger any more.”

IV. Happy Ending. 
Some of the title music is incorporated into the final
movement. A folk-like melody suggests the open-air
quality of country living.
Performed as a Ballet:
Morning on the Ranch (I)
from "The Red Pony" Suite
Conducted by Leonard Slatkin
Eugene Ballet Company
Choreographed by Toni Pimble 2010-2011 Season
at Hult Center for the Performing Arts - Eugene, Oregon
LINKS

Thursday, October 29, 2015

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2015

QUOTE:
"It's not what you are, but what you don't become that hurts."
AUTHOR: Oscar Levant
MEANING OF THE QUOTE:
"Not working up to and using your abilities to their fullest potential
  will stop you from feeling content with your progress."






COMPOSER 
COPLAND
Quiet City
Quiet City
London Symphony Orchestra
Some pictures of New York

Originally written as incidental music for
an experimental play written by Irwin Shaw
Irwin Shaw
in 1939, Quiet City was re-arranged by
Copland the following year into a one
movement, ten minute piece for solo
trumpet, solo English horn (cor anglais)
English Horn

with a string ensemble backing. This piece,
which premiered in New York City and
performed by conductor David Saidenberg
and his Saidenberg Little Symphony,
David Saidenberg

was about a young trumpet player who imagined
the nocturnal thoughts of various dwellers in a great city
and played the trumpet to express his feelings about them.
Copland's biographer, Vivian Perlis, has said that the music in this piece
"reflects the introspective Copland, who liked to compose during the late night
hours and enjoyed the idea of quiet streets before a city awakens for a new day."

Edward Hopper: Night Hawks


The music is also intended to reflect the sounds and feelings of "a city that never
sleeps." This is effectively achieved through the use of space and silence; the
texture is never particularly dense, but rather sparse and open as if reflecting upon
the vastness of the city landscape. There is also a distinct improvisatory feel to the
melodies in both the horn and trumpet, which adds to the idea of two people
interacting with one another.

Quiet City is decidedly melancholic and contemplative. It opens with broadly
spaced atmospheric chords from strings and English horn, evoking a transparent
-like night stillness. The trumpet soon enters with tentative, haunting notes (which
Copland marked as "nervous, mysterious") and gently emotional phrasings.

Copland viewed Quiet City as
"a rather unusual showpiece for the two soloists; unusual 

because one seldom hears trumpet and English horn in roles
as contrasting instruments in a soloistic yet quiet setting."

"The idea of contrasting trumpet with English horn was a travaille, a 'find,'
giving, I think, a certain freshness and variety of instrumental color,"

Continuing on, Copland said of his instrumentation choice:
"A practical reason for the English horn was to let the trumpeter
have a breathing space, so that he wasn’t made to play continuously…
There are not many quiet trumpet-solo works in the repertory, and I
doubt whether there are many English horn solo-pieces of any sort.
Quiet City is challenging music for the soloists, with a comparatively
straight forward orchestral accompaniment."
Georgia O'Keeffe:
 Radiator Building Night New York, 1927 

Quiet City
Wynton Marsalis, trumpet
Phillip Koch, English horn
Conducted by Donald Hunsberger
Eastman Wind Ensemble



Quiet City, based on material Copland had
previously written for a stage production, was
a play which focused on two main characters,
whose personalities, as well as their emotions
and angst, were portrayed through music.
The Irwin Shaw play, commissioned by
Harold Clurman,
Harold Clurman
founding member of the Group Theatre in
New York City, and directed by Elia Kazan,
Elia Kazan

was, as Copland described it,
"…a realistic fantasy concerning the night thoughts
of many different kinds of people in a great city."

The music aimed at expressing
"the emotions of the characters, the nostalgia and inner
distress of a society profoundly aware of its own insecurity."

The story tells of two Jewish brothers, one of whom abandons his Jewish
ancestry to pursue a life of material success; changes his name, marries a
rich socialite, and rises to become the president of a department store, and
the other a jazz trumpeter who, content with being an artist, embraces a more
unconventional, isolated lifestyle, expressing his loneliness through his music.
Not succeeding in making the break with his past, the materialistic brother is
continually recalled to his conscience by the haunting sound of the trumpet
his brother is playing. Copland said, in reference to the dichotomy of the two
characters, that it
"helped to arouse the conscience of his fellow players and the audience."

Though the play closed after only the two trial Sunday evening performances in
April, 1939, the music was not to blame. The play's producer later even stated that
"all that remained of our hard work was a lovely score by Aaron Copland."

Copland was convinced by friends to rework the score as a small orchestra
piece and in the summer of 1940 he fashioned Quiet City into a concert suite,
changing the original instrumentation from trumpet, clarinet, saxophone and
piano to trumpet, English horn and string orchestra. In this form Quiet City
was played for the first time on January 28, 1941 in New York and has proved
to be one of Copland’s most effective short works.

In reference to how he reworked the original music Copland stated:
"There wasn't much continuous music with the play, just short
sections, so that the orchestral piece bears little resemblance
to the incidental music, which I never published."

Even though the music was written to accompany a play, he was able to
recreate the musical sections into a piece that stands alone nicely:
"Quiet City seems to have become a musical entity,
superseding the original reasons for its composition."

This music has survived as a popular piece
long after the play has been forgotten.
The composer and saxophonist, Christopher Brellochs, recently
unearthed the original manuscript for trumpet, saxophone,
clarinets and piano had never been published and recorded the
world premiere of Quiet City in its original form.


Quiet City
(Original Chamber Version)
Donald Batchelder, trumpet
Mitchell Kriegler, clarinet
Allison Brewster Franzetti, piano


LINKS

Quiet City
for English horn, trumpet & strings
(from the incidental music)
With William Harrod and Philip Collins
Conducted by Erich Kunze
Cincinnati Pops Orchestra
Photos of Los Angeles

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2015

QUOTE: 
"The history of music, supported by the actual hearing of the master compositions of the different 
  epochs, is the shortest way to cure you of self-esteem and vanity.”
AUTHOR: Robert Schumann
MEANING OF THE QUOTE: 
“A person may think their art is great until they compare
 it with the greatest masters such as Beethoven and Mozart.”







COMPOSER
COPLAND
 Long Time Ago
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Long Time Ago
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Sung by Marilyn Horne
Carl Davis, conductor 

English Chamber Orchestra
Long Time Ago
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1

Long Time Ago
 Lyrics
Traditional
On the lake where droop'd the willow
Long time ago,
Where the rock threw back the billow
Brighter than snow. 
~~~~~
Dwelt a maid beloved and cherish'd
By high and low,
But with autumn leaf she perished
Long time ago.
~~~~~
Rock and tree and flowing water
Long time ago,
Bird and bee and blossom taught her 
Love's spell to know.
~~~~~
While to my fond words she listen'd
Murmuring low,
Tenderly her blue eyes glisten'd
Long time ago.

Long Time Ago
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Sung by William Warfield
As stated by the Library of Congress:
"Long Time Ago," also known as "Shinbone Alley," 
is one of the few pieces of published music dating from
before the Civil War that is believed to be a genuine
African American tune. The song, published in 1833,
comes to us filtered through a  performance by a white
Thomas Dartmouth Rice
It was offered for sale not as an example of
African American music but as a part of 
Rice's repertory. It is, in fact, the standard
picture of Rice in his blackface costume that
stands at the head of the music.

"Long Time Ago" was republished with a different,
sentimental text in 1939 as 
Lyrics by George Pope Morris
Composed by Charles E. Horn
1839
George Pope Morris
George Pope Morris                             Charles E. Horn

In this form, in a harmonization
done by Aaron Copland in his Old American Songs
of 1950, it is still widely sung.

LINKS

I Bought Me a Cat
The Cat - Bart Van Der Leck
The Cat - Bart Van Der Leck
I Bought Me a Cat
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Sung by Marilyn Horne
I Bought Me a Cat
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Sung by St. Charles Singers
Robert Hanson, Conductor
Elgin Symphony Orchestra

I Bought Me a Cat
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Sung by William Warfield
Aaron Copland, Conductor
Columbia Symphony Orchestra

Copland first heard "I Bought Me A Cat,"
a child's a "cumulative" nonsense song,
when it was sung to him by playwright
lynnpntg.jpg - 10 K
Lynn Riggs
(who learned it during his
boyhood in Oklahoma), 

http://www.facsimiledustjackets.com/pages/books/34123/lynn-riggs/green-grow-the-lilacs
on which the musical Oklahoma! would be based. Although Copland and Riggs
originally planned to use the tune in Tragic Ground, a large work for musical theater,
the project was abandoned for want of a willing producer; all rejected the story due
to lack of humor. However, I Bought Me a Cat survives as the most memorable and
comedic of the Old American Songs.

The style, like that of “Old MacDonald,” has a verse repeating and adding a new animal
with each iteration (the last “animal” being a wife!). The song affords the soloist the
opportunity of impersonating various animals and the accompaniment simulates
barnyard sounds of the cat, duck, goose, hen, pig, horse and cow.

Text: Traditional
-----------------VERSE 1-----------------

I bought me a CAT
My cat pleased me,
I fed my cat under yonder tree.
My cat says fiddle eye fee.
-----------------VERSE 2-----------------

I bought me a DUCK,
My duck pleased me.
I fed my duck under yonder tree.
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.
-----------------VERSE 3-----------------
I bought me a GOOSE,
My goose pleased me.
I fed my goose under yonder tree.
My goose says, ‘Quaw, quaw,’
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.

-----------------VERSE 4-----------------

I bought me a HEN,
My hen pleased me.
I fed my hen under yonder tree.

My hen says, Shimmy shack, shimmy shack,’
My goose says, ‘Quaw, quaw,’
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.
-----------------VERSE 5-----------------

I bought me a PIG
My pig pleased me.
I fed my pig under yonder tree.
My pig says, ‘Griffey, griffey.’
My hen says, Shimmy shack, shimmy shack,’
My goose says, ‘Quaw, quaw,’
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.
-----------------VERSE 6-----------------
I bought me a HORSE
My horse pleased me.
I fed my horse under yonder tree.
My horse says, ‘Neigh, neigh.’
My pig says, ‘Griffey, griffey.’
My hen says, Shimmy shack, shimmy shack.’
My goose says, ‘Quaw, quaw,’
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.


-----------------VERSE 7-----------------

I bought me a COW
My cow pleased me.
I fed my cow under yonder tree.
My cow says ‘Moo, moo,’
My horse says, ‘Neigh, neigh,’
My pig says, ‘Griffey, griffey.’
My hen says, Shimmy shack, shimmy shack,’
My goose says, ‘Quaw, quaw,’
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.

-----------------VERSE 8-----------------

I bought me a WIFE
My wife pleased me.
I fed my wife under yonder tree.
My wife says, ‘Honey, honey,’
My cow says ‘Moo, moo,’
My horse says, ‘Neigh, neigh,’
My pig says, ‘Griffey, griffey.’
My hen says, Shimmy shack, shimmy shack,’
My goose says, ‘Quaw, quaw.’
My duck says, ‘Quaa, quaa,’
My cat says fiddle eye fee.

----------------------------------

I Bought Me a Cat
from "Old American Songs"
Set 1
Sung by James Taylor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSfX8Pf2da0


I Bought Me a Cat
Traditional Version
Sung by Pete Seeger
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXd2ebvwNss

LINKS
http://novellaqalive2.mhhe.com/sites/dl/free/0072307838/66027/Chap_6_Lesson_Plan_Experiencing_Style.doc