Classic Ross Amico

Category: Daily Dispatch

Bette Davis Hollywood Icon on Picture Perfect

Fasten your seat belts – it’s going to be a bumpy night!

This week on “Picture Perfect,” for Academy Awards weekend, the focus is on Bette Davis.

A two-time Academy Award-winner, Davis was the first actor to receive ten nominations, five of them in consecutive years. She remains one of the most recognizable figures from Hollywood’s Golden Age.

Enjoy an assortment of classic scores composed for her indelible films, including “Now, Voyager” (Max Steiner), “Mr. Skeffington” (Franz Waxman), “All About Eve” (Alfred Newman), and “The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex” (Erich Wolfgang Korngold).

Davis’ wins came early – she received statuettes for “Dangerous” (1935) and “Jezebel” (1938) – but she turned in solid performances for pretty much her entire career. There is little about her style which doesn’t scream “ACTING!” So it seems only an appropriate choice for this Academy Awards weekend.

It’s a grand throwback to an era when the big screen was filled by larger-than-life personalities. You can always bet on Bette, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, this Saturday evening at 6:00 EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

March 11, 2023
Outland A Space Western Film Discussion

The badge. The shotguns. The swinging saloon doors. The righteous marshal, bound by duty and honor to stand alone against the anticipated arrival of armed assassins – the tension heightened by countdown clocks everywhere. Why, it’s “High Noon” in space!

Roy and I discuss “Outland” (1981), Peter Hyams’ western transplant to one of Jupiter’s moons, with plenty of characteristic digressions – some of them predictable (as when Roy pauses to give entire synopses of classic-though-tangentially-related television shows) and some not so much so (almost anything out of my mouth). Digressions upon digressions. You know you’re in trouble when the first 20 minutes of the show is taken up by us palavering about westerns, spaghetti westerns, and the unscrupulous Italian film industry.

The countdown clock may sputter to two hours, but don’t forsake us, oh my darlings. You can watch it if you care to, here:

I’ll leave Roy to stand alone on Sunday night against the arrival of three special guests: Warren Friedrich (organizer) Robert Wood (author) and David Hirsch (author/columnist: Starlog Magazine). They’ll be talking “Space: 1999,” so I’ll be on the first coach out of there. More specifically, the topic will be Calgary: 1999, a celebration of the sci-fi cult television series starring Martin Landau, Barbara Bain, and Nick Tate. The convention will be held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, April 28-May 1.

Enjoy the exchange, opposite the Oscars, and share your questions and comments when they livestream on Facebook, YouTube, etc., on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner, at a special time, this Sunday evening at 7:00 EDT!

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

And don’t forget to change your clocks!

More about Calgary: 1999 here:

https://www.facebook.com/Space199950years

March 11, 2023
Gandhi’s Decisions in New Princeton Concerto

I’ve been remiss in not mentioning the fact that this weekend will bring a world premiere to Princeton, courtesy of composer William Harvey and the Princeton Symphony Orchestra. Harvey will be the violin soloist in his new concerto, “Seven Decisions of Gandhi,” to be performed on two concerts at Richardson Auditorium this Saturday and Sunday.

Long an admirer of Gandhi, whose nonviolent resistance movement helped end British rule in India, Harvey was intrigued by the fact that the influential reformer and revolutionary was also once a violinist. He muses, “Had Gandhi decided to stick with the violin, world history might be very different. This gave me the idea that a violin concerto about his life could be based on decisions that made him the international nonviolence icon he is today.”

Dibyarka Chatterjee will accompany on the tabla, traditional Indian hand-drums, and Snehesh Nag will play the sitar. Sameer Patel will conduct.

The work is dedicated Gandhi’s granddaughter, Ela, on the occasion of her 80th birthday.

Also on the program will be Alexander Borodin’s “Polovtsian Dances” and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 “Pathétique.”

The concerts will be held at Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium on Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 4 p.m. A pre-concert talk will take place one hour before the Sunday performance. For tickets and information, visit princetonsymphony.org.

More about William Harvey

William Harvey

Dibyarka Chatterjee

https://dibyarka.com/

Snehesh Nag

https://www.viewcy.com/p/sneheshnag

Sameer Patel

https://sameer-patel.com/

PHOTO: William Harvey and Dibyarka Chatterjee at last night’s PSO Soundtracks talk, “Instruments of the Indian Subcontinent,” at Princeton Public Library

March 10, 2023
John Williams Fiddler on the Roof Film Music

John Williams… with Topol! Definitely follow the “listen” link for some great photos from the recording sessions and a video of Williams’ Academy Award reception speech. And yes, I do own the remastered soundtrack. It’s on sale from @[100063782071128:2048:La-La Land Records] through 3/16.

March 9, 2023
Music Greats Zhou Tian Hailstork Higdon Hayes

The next time I get an attack of the “contemporary music blues,” I need only think of this amazing concert. Left to right: Zhou Tian, Adolphus Hailstork, David Hayes, and Jennifer Higdon. So wonderful to finally meet Adolphus Hailstork, whose music I have admired since the 1980s, to reconnect with Jennifer Higdon, who is one of the nicest people (and who used to live two blocks from me in Philadelphia), and to catch up with Zhou Tian, a former radio guest and now something of a friendly acquaintance. David Hayes I remember from when he was still a student at Curtis, the kid who went on to conduct the Philadelphia Singers. Of course his career has only continued to blossom. A truly memorable evening, and a concert chock-full of good and even great things!

March 9, 2023

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