Classic Ross Amico

Category: Daily Dispatch

Where Have All the Oratorios Gone?

It’s January 6. Epiphany. The Feast of the Three Kings. The Christian feast day that marks, among other things, the Magi’s visit to the Christ Child.

I know I’ve lamented in the past about how so many of the magnificent classical music Christmas works of the past millennium have disappeared from the airwaves. Of the larger works, it seems only Handel’s “Messiah,” Bach’s “Christmas Oratorio,” and of course Tchaikovsky’s (secular) “The Nutcracker” are guaranteed.

Thankfully, I have an enormous record library with at least three shelves devoted exclusively to Christmas music, so I’m able to work through a lot of the forgotten and/or neglected masterworks at home and in the car. But it’s not the same as somebody else pulling and programming the music and knowing that I am part of a unified listening community.

I feel the same way when watching a movie that is broadcast, or actually in a theater, as opposed to playing it from my own collection or streaming it. It’s wonderful to live in an age when these things are possible, but it is just not the same as knowing that I’m a part of a communal experience. (That said, I’m certainly not going to watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” on network television with a thousand commercial breaks!)

I must give a tip of the Ebenezer Scrooge top hat to Yle Klassinen in Helsinki for airing Franz Liszt’s “Christus” complete. That station really is a marvel. Oh how I love my digital radio! Of course, I don’t speak Finnish, but I can usually make out the performers when they are announced and the playlists are posted online.

Anyway, I had already listened to the Dorati recording on my own time. I’ve done so for many, many years. It’s enriched my Christmases ever since I first encountered it on the air, broadcast on Philadelphia’s late, lamented WFLN, back in the early 1980s. Time was, when serious classical Christmas music commenced with Advent. Yes, it was leavened with gems like Victor Hely-Hutchinson’s “Carol Symphony,” the aforementioned “Nutcracker,” and Leopold Mozart’s “A Musical Sleigh-Ride,” in the hilarious recording by the Eduard Melkus Ensemble that includes the neighing horses and barking dogs. I looked forward to hearing that every year. I snapped it up when it was reissued on compact disc and have included it in my own broadcasts for decades.

Those works have their place, but it seems the serious, large-scale choral works are all going away. Commerce, secularism, short attention spans, ignorance, and grievance all work against the simple enjoyment of a lot of masterful music. It’s much safer to play three-minute arrangements of familiar Christmas carols. Over and over and over again.

I grant you, three hours is a lot of radio real estate to give up to Liszt’s “Christus.” But can’t anyone even carve out an hour for Vaughan Williams’ “Hodie?” I suppose I should just shut up and be thankful that RVW’s “Fantasia on Christmas Carols” is still in rotation.

I count myself very fortunate to have been able to share “Christus” many times over the years. I know I’ve played it complete on WXLV, WPRB, and WWFM – once I even preempted the weekly opera broadcast – and excerpted the purely orchestral movements even more frequently, working them into my morning and afternoon playlists. “The March of the Three Holy Kings” is a high point.

I am sorry I don’t have a stretch of air-time during which to play it for you now, but the entire Dorati recording of the oratorio (one of three recordings I own, and still my preferred) is posted on YouTube.

If you want to cut to the chase, here’s the march of the Kings.

Think it sounds an awful lot like Wagner’s Wotan? There’s likely a reason for that. I’ve posted about it before.

https://rossamico.com/2023/01/06/three-kings-music-mystery-wagner-liszt/

I try to be sensitive to other people’s faiths and belief systems, and frankly I am no zealot, but when it comes to music, I am very much a fundamentalist. This is not about pushing Christianity down anyone’s throat as much as a desire to preserve and disseminate the sublime Christmas works, many of them by top-tier composers, presented, like the classic movies on TCM, complete and uncut.

Of course, most of these recordings I’ve played over the years are from my own collection. I was very fortunate to be able to do my own programming, for hours at a time, for the better part of three decades. In such a situation, when a radio host loses his platform, countless hours of repertoire go with him. You’ll still get “Messiah,” but you probably won’t get Josef Rheinberger’s “The Star of Bethlehem” (here posted as a playlist of nine separate videos).

Rutland Boughton’s “Bethlehem” is another Christmas work I’m crazy about. You won’t find it in many record libraries at radio stations here in the U.S. But I’ve got it, and I’ve aired it. Rather than write about it again, I’ll refer you to one of my teasers from a few years ago.

https://rossamico.com/2017/12/21/merlin-in-bethlehem-a-christmas-music-surprise/

If you’re a Vaughan Williams fan, I think you will find it delightful. For a long time, I was unable to share any of the audio online, due to Hyperion Records’ justifiably Draconian practice of not allowing any its recordings on YouTube. But the company is now in other hands, so here it is, finally, as a playlist – albeit with the tracks posted separately, so prepare to have to skip an occasional ad.

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas, your resident classical music curmudgeon gives to you… three Christmas oratorios. If I splurged for a dozen, this post would be four times the length!

Have yourself a merry “Little Christmas!”

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IMAGE: Detail from Edward Burne-Jones’ “Adoration of the Magi”

January 6, 2026
Handel in the Garden with Opera Essentia

H. Paul Moon wrapped up 2025 by quietly slipping a gift under the tree in the form of a posted film of an Opera Essentia performance of George Frideric Handel’s “Radamisto.” Countertenor Jeffrey Mandelbaum’s distillation of the composer’s 1720 opera seria in three acts manages to get it down to one hour as “The Queen’s Heart.”

I love this sort of quixotic endeavor, presenting tasteful abridgements of rare Handel operas in New York City neighborhoods for free. The productions are no-budget, bare-bones, and beautiful. Watching the wind rustle the leaves during this performance is magical.

Mandelbaum has appeared widely, in both concert hall and opera house, including at the Metropolitan Opera, alongside such singers as Joyce DiDonato and Placido Domingo.

H. Paul Moon’s feature-length documentary “Samuel Barber: Absolute Beauty” aired nationwide on PBS in 2017.

Opera Essentia performs in New York’s gardens, parks, and other neighborhood gathering spaces. “The Queen’s Heart” was filmed at Green Oasis Community Garden on May 24, 2025.

Enjoy it here:

To view other operas in the series, visit:

https://zenviolence.com/handel

For more information about Opera Essentia, visit:

https://operaessentia.org

January 5, 2026
From Out of the Wilderness to the Land of Plenty

Holy smokes! Now that the holiday “routine” is finally winding down (getting ahead on my radio shows, visiting and hosting family, and generally being festive to the point I have no idea what day of the week it is), I glance at the calendar and realize that I’ve totally, inadvertently crammed next weekend with concerts. And somehow two of those concerts feature the Barber Violin Concerto – on the same day!

How did it happen? I impulsively acquired a seat to Friday afternoon’s Philadelphia Orchestra concert as part of a package deal for deeply-discounted tickets. Of course, I leaped at those programs that really appealed to me, the ones I regarded as must-see (or hear), and then to fill the quota, I picked the Friday concert.

And what’s not to like? The program includes, beside the lovely and moving Barber concerto (with the excellent Augustin Hadelich as soloist), Mahler’s winning Symphony No. 4, and John Adams’ “Short Ride in a Fast Machine” (John Adams for people who think they don’t like John Adams). Furthermore, Dalia Stasevska will be conducting, and I confess I am a little bit in love with her. (The fact that she’s married to Sibelius’ great-grandson further endears her to me.)

What I had forgotten was that I was already holding a ticket to the New Jersey Symphony, which had also lured me at some point with a 50-percent off sale. So I’ll be hearing the Barber concerto again on Friday night in Princeton, this time with Randall Goosby as the soloist. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse, especially with a program that opens with Sibelius’ “Finlandia” and concludes with my personal favorite of the Tchaikovsky symphonies, the Symphony No. 2.

This Second Symphony, which assimilates Ukrainian folk themes, has always been subtitled, in English-speaking countries anyway, as the “Little Russian,” but world events have precipitated a shift toward identifying it as the “Ukrainian.” (I didn’t mention that Stasevska, who moved to Finland with her family at the age of 5, was born in Kyiv – yet another detail that binds the Friday concerts.) In this instance, the NJS’s music director, Xian Zhang, will conduct at Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium.

Then on Saturday evening, I’ll be back at Richardson for a concert of the Princeton Symphony Orchestra. Yet another violinist, Bella Hristova, will be the soloist for Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 1. On the second half will be the Symphony No. 1 of Dmitri Shostakovich.

The program will open with a recent work by Portuguese composer Andreia Pinto Carreia. “Ciprés” takes its inspiration from a poem by Federico Garcia Lorca. The structure of the piece is said to be influenced by the poem’s imagery of trees and water. I’ll be interested to see (and hear) what that’s all about. PSO music director Rossen Milanov will conduct.

I’ll give my ears a rest on Sunday. I’m certainly not complaining – it will be great to get back to attending concerts – but you’ll understand, I hope, that it is a bit like emerging from the desert and trying not to drink too fast!

——–

PHOTO: Dalia Stasevska in her Chuck Taylors. She’ll remain in Philadelphia to oversee John Williams’ Tuba Concerto, with the orchestra’s principal tubist Carol Jantsch, January 15-17. You know I’ll be there for that too!

January 4, 2026
Everything Old is New Again on “The Lost Chord”

This week on “The Lost Chord,” what’s old is new again, as we enjoy a program of 20th century music by French composers who look back to their illustrious forebears.

In the 1870s, following France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian war, there was a rise in musical nostalgia, with composers doing their part to mend the wounded national dignity by looking back to the galant style of the Ancien Régime – an idealized Golden Age which stood outside of Gallic history, full of shepherds and shepherdesses, panpipes and periwigs. The movement gave rise to such works as Camille Saint-Saëns’ Septet and the “Suite dans le style ancien” by Vincent d’Indy.

50 years later, a renewed fascination with music of the 18th century took root in the 1920s, in no small part because of Stravinsky’s sudden shift to neo-classicism. This was concurrent with the rise of Les Six, a loose collective of composers who had begun to flourish in Paris. We’ll hear three of their works that sprang from a shared affection for music of the Baroque.

One of the group’s more prominent members, Darius Milhaud, composed his “Suite d’après Corrette,” a piece for winds after 18th century composer Michel Corrette (with tell-tale “cuckoo” finale), in 1937. Eleven years later, he followed it with “L’Apothéose de Molière,” the title evocative of the spirit of Jean-Baptiste Lully. However, in this instance, the source material was culled from works by the lesser-known Baroque violinist and composer Baptiste Anet, a pupil Corelli and an elite musician in the service of Louis XIV. We’ll hear both Milhaud pieces, presented back-to-back.

Then we’ll have a work by one of his colleagues, the only female member of Les Six, Germaine Tailleferre. In 1964, Tailleferre paid tribute to the Baroque keyboard master Jean-Philippe Rameau, on the occasion of the bicentennial of his death. “Hommage à Rameau” falls into three movements and is scored for two pianos and percussion.

Finally, we’ll turn to Jean Françaix, who was NOT a member of Les Six, although his musical aesthetic would have fit right in. Had he been born twenty years earlier, we might be talking about Les Sept! Françaix’s “Duo Baroque,” composed in 1980, is scored for the unusual combination of double bass and harp. It pays tribute to no specific composer – in fact, for the most part, it doesn’t even sound particularly Baroque – though it does share a certain charm, wit, and elegance characteristic of music of the 18th century.

I hope you’ll join me for “Everything Old Is New Again,” on “The Lost Chord,” now in syndication on KWAX Classical Oregon!

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Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EST/5:00 PM PST

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – Saturday at 11:00 AM EST/8:00 AM PST

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EST/4:00 PM PST

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu

January 3, 2026
Welcome 2026 with a Smile on “Sweetness and Light”

For some, it may be difficult to leave the holidays behind and face the prospect of a long, bleak winter. That would not be me.

But if it describes you, this week on “Sweetness and Light,” I’ll have some Victor Borge to brighten your day. “The Unmelancholy Dane” was born on this date in 1909.

Borge always proved to be quick on his feet, comfortable in his own skin, and unusually personable. Born into a family of Jewish musicians in Copenhagen (his birth name was Børge Rosenbaum), he was already before the public, giving recitals at the age of 8. He received a scholarship to the Royal Danish Academy of Music, and later studied with pupils of both Liszt (Frederic Lamond) and Busoni (Egon Petri).

After a few years of presenting straight classical concerts, he began to develop his act. His mix of music and comedy proved to be popular in Scandinavia, but some of his gibes didn’t exactly sit well with Hitler. When German forces occupied Denmark, Borge hopped a U.S. Army transport out of Finland – though he would return, not long after, disguised as a sailor, to visit his dying mother.

He arrived in the United States in 1940, with 20 dollars in his pocket and no understanding of English. But he was a fast learner, and he taught himself the language by going to American movies.

By 1941, he was already appearing with Rudy Valee and Bing Crosby, and adapting his jokes for U.S. audiences. In 1942, he was named “best new radio performer of the year.” By 1946, he had his own radio show and developed many of his signature routines.

He became a naturalized American citizen in 1948. His Broadway show, “Comedy in Music,” entered the Guinness Book for its unprecedented run, from 1953 to 1956. In the 1960s, he was one of the highest-paid entertainers in the world.

Borge continued to expand his popularity through appearances on television programs ranging from “What’s My Line?” to “The Muppet Show.” He continued to entertain to a ripe old age. He died in 2000, a few days shy of his 92nd birthday.

As he was fond of observing, “Laughter is the closest distance between two people.”

Join me for a selection of Borge at his improvisatory best, working the audience, as he grants requests, from a recording of his record-breaking Broadway show. The program will also include classic bits by Anna Russell and Peter Schickele (“discoverer” of P.D.Q. Bach) and a few more selections from the first of the notorious and uproarious Hoffnung Music Festival concerts.

Enter the new year laughing with an hour of musical humorists on “Sweetness and Light,” this Saturday morning at 11:00 EST/8:00 PST, exclusively on KWAX Classical Oregon!

Stream it, wherever you are, at the link:

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

January 3, 2026

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