Classic Ross Amico

Category: Daily Dispatch

Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee A Musical Celebration

The Queen’s gone platinum! Elizabeth was crowned Queen of England on this date in 1953. In 2015, she became England’s longest-reigning monarch. Celebrations of her 70th year on the throne are underway.

Regardless of what one personally thinks of monarchy, the royals have been responsible for commissioning a rich diadem of music, from some of England’s most respected composers.

Here’s an Elizabeth miscellany. In the coronation marches, especially, you will hear a lot of John Williams. Vivat Regina Elizabetha!

Sir Edward Elgar, “Nursery Suite” (1930), dedicated to Princesses Margaret (newly born) and Elizabeth, and also to their mother, the Duchess of York. (Incidentally, today is also Elgar’s birthday!)

Eric Coates, “The Three Elizabeths” (1944): “Halcyon Days” (Elizabeth I), “Springtime in Angus” (The Queen Mother), and “Youth of Britain – The Princess Elizabeth”

Sir Arnold Bax, “Morning Song: Maytime in Sussex” (1946), for Princess Elizabeth’s 21st birthday

Sir Arthur Bliss, “Processional” (1953), performed before the Coronation Service

Sir William Walton, “Orb and Sceptre” (1953), also before the Coronation Service

Ralph Vaughan Williams, “O Taste and See” (1953), for the Coronation Service

Herbert Howells, “Behold O God Our Defender” (composed on Christmas Day, 1952), for the Coronation Service

Sir William Walton, “Coronation Anthem” (1953)

Sir Arnold Bax, “Coronation March” (1953), after the Coronation Service

Cedric Thorpe Davie, “Royal Mile, Coronation March” (1952)

Benjamin Britten, Courtly Dances from “Gloriana” (1953), opera first performed at the Royal Opera House during celebrations of the coronation

Sir Arthur Bliss, “Welcome the Queen” (1953), from a short film about the first year of Elizabeth’s reign

Malcolm Williamson, “Mass of the Feast of Christ the King” (1975-78), notoriously completed late for the 1977 Silver Jubilee

John Rutter, “Psalm 150” (2002), for the Golden Jubilee

Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, “Naxos” Quartet No. 8 (2005), based on John Dowland’s “Queen Elizabeth’s Galliard,” for the Queen’s 80th birthday

Dame Judith Weir, first female Master of the Queen’s music, “I Love All Beauteous Things” (2016), for the Queen’s 90th birthday

Thomas Hewitt Jones, ”In Our Service” (2022), for the Platinum Jubilee

June 2, 2022
Wrath of Khan 40th Anniversary A Sci-Fi Celebration

In the summer of ’82, it seems it was just a matter of course that when you bought a movie ticket, you were in for an enjoyable two hours of escapism. “E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial.” “The Road Warrior.” “Poltergeist.” “Blade Runner.” “The Thing.” “Tron.” “Conan the Barbarian.”

I’m not sure that I had particularly high hopes for “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.” I remember I was concerned that, by making it not only a follow-up to the elephantine “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” but also a sequel to one of the original series’ television episodes, it would be too esoteric for wider acceptance and too “villain-of-the-week” for a suitably resonant theatrical experience, in a franchise that was in danger of tanking when it had scarcely left drydock.

But “Star Trek II” exceeded all expectations, with uncluttered storytelling, good character development, moments of genuine reflection and poignancy between the swashbuckling space battles, state-of-the-art special effects, a nautical tone that was a throwback to the monumental sea pictures of 20 and 30 years earlier, a career-defining score by James Horner, and Ricardo Montalban as (with apologies to Christopher Plummer) the most enjoyable of the “Star Trek” movie antagonists.

Montalban fought Zorro and Gilbert Roland, danced with Esther Williams and Cyd Charisse, and wore white with sophistication on TV’s “Fantasy Island,” but he will always be remembered for his silver mullet, glistening pecs, and theatrical relish with which he delivered his Melvillian soliloquies in “The Wrath of Khan.”

On the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner, we’ll slingshot back in time to the 20th century to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the release of “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.” Join us for a banquet of cold revenge and Ceti eels in the comments section, when we livestream on Facebook, this week at a special time, THURSDAY EVENING AT 7:00 EDT!

https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

June 1, 2022
Still’s “In Memoriam” & Black Soldiers’ Sacrifice

In common with many American composers, William Grant Still turned to patriotic themes during World War II. Only in his case, there is an added poignancy in his choice of subject matter, “In Memoriam, The Colored Soldiers Who Died for Democracy” (1943), since the black soldiers to whom the work is dedicated not only fought in segregated units, but also experienced inequality at home.

By nature, Still was not a political person, but because of the simple fact of his skin color, the association of race – of what it meant to live in and serve a country that wasn’t always fair to its minorities – is inescapable. The piece is about democracy and war, but the subtext, whether or not the composer intended it as such, is one of racial inequality, even for those who served with honor and gave everything for this country.

Still himself served in the U.S. Navy during World War I.

George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra perform “In Memoriam, The Colored Soldiers Who Died for Democracy” in Kyiv in 1965:

Charles Ives was inspired by the Memorial to Colonel Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, one of the earliest African American units in the American Civil War, when he composed “Saint-Gaudens on Boston Common,” the first movement of his “Three Places in New England” (1915). The 54th was also the subject of the film “Glory.”

May 30, 2022
Korngold’s Much Ado Premiere on The Lost Chord

This Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” on Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s birthday, enjoy highlights from the world premiere recording of his complete incidental music for the 1920 Max Reinhardt production of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing.”

Formerly one of Vienna’s most astounding prodigies, Korngold went on to achieve international celebrity as a composer for Warner Bros. in the 1930s and ’40s. His introduction to Hollywood was by way of Reinhardt’s 1935 film of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

For this recording, a 2013 Toccata Classics release, the music for “Much Ado” was performed for the first time in its entirety since 1933. Musicians of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts are conducted John Mauceri.

To quote the Bard, “Is it not strange that sheep’s guts could hail souls out of men’s bodies?” Strike up, pipers! It’s “Much Ado About Korngold,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

May 29, 2022
Iannis Xenakis Revolutionary Music Visionary

He was a literal revolutionary who altered our perception of music.

Iannis Xenakis was a Communist who came from wealth, an intellectual who was half-blinded, disfigured, and broken-jawed by shrapnel from a tank blast while rioting in the streets of Athens. He helped to drive the Axis out of Greece, opposed the restoration of the monarchy by the British, and was sentenced to death in absentia by a conservative regime. He fled the country using forged papers. He settled in Paris, illegally, where was hired by the architect Le Corbusier.

There, he applied himself seriously to composition. He was refused as a student by Nadia Boulanger and Arthur Honegger. His lessons with Darius Milhaud went nowhere. It was Olivier Messiaen who at last recognized and acknowledged his unique genius. But understanding his special gifts, even Messiaen refused to spoil him with the humdrummery of drills in harmony and counterpoint. Instead, he gave him his benediction.

“I understood straight away that he was not someone like the others…. He is of superior intelligence…. [T]his was a man so much out of the ordinary that I said… ‘No, you are almost 30, you have the good fortune of being Greek, of being an architect and having studied special mathematics. Take advantage of these things. Do them in your music.’”

Xenakis took that freedom and ran with it. He explored music from the perspective of architecture, mathematics, and physics, yet his creations could be searingly visceral. He experimented with spatial effects, pushed the boundaries of electroacoustics, and devised computer systems that could translate graphical images into sound.

Xenakis may have been a towering intellectual, but he was also a force of nature. His death sentence, which had been commuted to a ten-year prison term, was finally lifted in 1974. Finally, he was able to return home, where he was received as the avant-garde Odysseus and intellectual Colossus he was.

His music has been described as wild, terrifying, raw, primal, primordial, and elemental. He made the serialists of mid-century seem hidebound, which in a sense they were, and positively tame by comparison.

Is Xenakis a man for all seasons? It depends on how you like your Sunday mornings. Any Xenakis worth playing is worth playing loudly.

Happy birthday, Iannis Xenakis, on what would have been your 100th birthday.

“Pléiades” (1979)

“Metastasis” (1953-54), with graphical score

“Pithoprakta” (1955-56), with graphical score

“Serment-Orkos” (1981)

May 29, 2022

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