Steve Reich is 86 today. Celebrate with “Tehillim” (1982), his vibrant setting of four Hebrew psalms.
Not your thing? How about his Pulitzer Prize winning “Double Sextet” (2007-08)?
Post-Minimalism that yields maximum rewards. Happy birthday Steve Reich!
The Jewish High Holy Days are a period of reflection, ten days of awe and repentance. This Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” the mood is largely meditative for Yom Kippur.
In 1950, Jacob Weinberg composed a string quartet, published as his Opus 55. The work falls into three movements, bearing the respective subtitles “Rosh Hashanah” (the Jewish New Year), “Yom Kippur” (the Day of Atonement) and “Sukkot” (the harvest festival).
Weinberg’s “Yom Kippur” is based on the famous sung prayer “Kol Nidre” that opens the Yom Kippur Eve service, best known to gentiles, probably, through a setting for cello by Max Bruch. Bruch, though not Jewish, always had a good ear for characteristic melodies of different cultures (further exemplified by his “Scottish Fantasy,” “Swedish Dances,” “Suite on Russian Themes,” etc.).
Likewise, Emil Nikolaus von Reznicek – he of “Donna Diana Overture” fame – was moved by the Yom Kippur melody, on which he wrote a large-scale set of orchestral variations. In contrast to the reverential setting by Bruch, Reznicek puts the theme through a befuddling array of permutations, pivoting back and forth from light to serious. It’s not synagogue music, but it is fascinating.
The hour will conclude with a reverential setting by Patrick Sinozich of ”Avinu Malkeynu” (“Our Father, Our King”) by Max Janowski, performed by Chicago a cappella.
Make room for rumination. I hope you’ll join me for “Tones of Atonement,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
Classical music lends itself well to fantasy. And fantasy lends itself perfectly to October, the month of Halloween.
Take the case of Paul Dukas, born on this date in 1865. Dukas composed an opera about Bluebeard and his sixth wife, and a so-called dance poem, “La Péri,” about a fatal encounter with a Persian fairy.
But far and away his most famous work is “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” after Goethe, who in turn based it on an ancient tale. It was that old wizard, Walt Disney, who did more for the piece than anyone else.
The music is fantastic in more ways than one. Happy birthday, Paul Dukas!
“La Péri”
His Bluebeard opera, “Ariane et Barbe-Bleue”
The world’s most beloved vermin as “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”
This week on “Picture Perfect,” to coincide with the Jewish High Holy Days, we’ll have music from movies and television series informed by aspects of the Jewish experience.
We’ll begin with “Exodus” (1960), based on the bestselling novel by Leon Uris, about the founding of the State of Israel. The book is said to have been the biggest seller in the United States since “Gone with the Wind.” The film was directed by Otto Preminger. Paul Newman and Eva Marie Saint lead an all-star cast. Ernest Gold’s stirring music was recognized with an Academy Award and is probably his best-known achievement.
Barry Levinson’s semi-autobiographical “Avalon” (1990) explores the immigrant experience and, for better or worse, the assimilation of a Jewish family into American culture. Alongside his work on “The Natural,” Randy Newman’s score is probably one of his best-loved.
The balance of the hour will be devoted to music from two acclaimed television scores: one for the NBC miniseries “Holocaust” (1978), written by the esteemed concert composer Morton Gould, and the other, the PBS series “Heritage: Civilization and the Jews” (1984), by Emmy Award-winning composer John Duffy.
I hope you’ll join me for a “new year” sampler of films about the Jewish experience this week, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, this Saturday evening at 6:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
We got awfully hung up on yams last night in some truly unexpected (some might say disturbing) ways, during our discussion “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark” (1973), one of the most traumatizing television experiences of our childhoods. I’ve yet to tally up the results of our informal poll, but it’s possible the malevolent yam people are second only to Karen Black’s Zuni doll from “Trilogy of Terror,” in terms of prepubescent nightmare fuel.
After a sweaty contemplation of the relative thrill of being bound by yams, things promise to be much less perverse next week, when we turn our attention to Tobe Hooper’s “Lifeforce” (1985) – which, after all, is only about naked French vampires from outer space.
All will be laid bare during our conversation, on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner. Sharpen your vampire pick-up lines in the comments section (en français), when we livestream on Facebook, next Friday evening at 7:30 EDT!
“Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark”
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