Labor Day weekend. Road trip!
This week on “The Lost Chord,” I hope you’ll join me for summer’s last hurrah, as we burn rubber with an hour of quintessentially American music about travel by car.
Frederick Shepherd Converse’s “Flivver Ten Million” celebrates the Ford Motor Company’s affordable assembly line automobile, from its creation in a Detroit factory to the manifest destiny of America’s roadways.
John Adams’ “Road Movies” has nothing to do with Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, alas; what it is, however, is a violin sonata written firmly within the American tradition, with a special affinity at its core with Copland’s Violin Sonata.
Virgil Thomson’s “Filling Station,” written for Leon Kirstein’s Ballet Caravan, may have the distinction of being the only ballet set at a gas station. The work’s success gave Copland the confidence to follow through on a Caravan commission which resulted in “Billy the Kid.”
Finally, we’ll hear one of Michael Daughtery’s most performed works, the exuberant “Route 66,” inspired by the storied “Main Street of America.”
Put the pedal to the metal. American composers hit the road for Labor Day, on “The Last Roads of Summer,” on “The Lost Chord, now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!
Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:
PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT
SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – ALL NEW! – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT
THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT
Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!
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