Nobody went to his 250th birthday party. But was he bitter?
Naaaaaa…
Happy 251st, Beethoven!
For another festive occasion: musicians of the Southwest German Radio Orchestra surprise Sir Roger Norrington on his 84th birthday with this playful arrangement of Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony.
Norrington, now 87, retired from the podium on November 18.
I’ve run hot and cold on John Adams over the years. I think “Shaker Loops” and “Nixon in China” are brilliant. So many of his other things, not so much. But this Nativity oratorio must be one of his most successful pieces.
“El Niño” was given its world premiere at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris on this date in the year 2000. The American premiere followed, in San Francisco, on January 11, 2001. Kent Nagano conducted on both occasions, and the dream team soloists included Dawn Upshaw, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, and Willard White.
“El Niño” – which has nothing to do with the weather – retells the Christmas story. Part I focuses on Mary’s reflections before giving birth in a stable in Bethlehem. Part II takes place after the birth, and encompasses the Slaughter of the Innocents and other events from the early life of Jesus.
The texts, in English, Spanish, and Latin, are drawn from the King James Bible, the Wakefield Mystery Plays, Martin Luther’s Christmas Sermon, the Gospel of Luke, and gnostic gospels from the Apocrypha, alongside poems by Rosario Castellanos, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Gabriella Mistral, Vicente Huidobro, Rubén Dario, Hildegard von Bingen, director Peter Sellars, and Adams himself.
I can’t speak to Sellars’ direction. I’ve never seen it with the visuals. But musically, I was very pleased with it, when I first purchased the Nonesuch Records album 20 years ago. It’s a great tonic after running through multiple versions of “Messiah.”
Part I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hFSuGwl7jU
Part II
I’m going for my booster shot this afternoon, so in case I’m in the Twilight Zone tomorrow, I’m posting about this now.
This week on “Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner,” we offer, for your consideration, a discussion of Rod Serling’s “Carol for Another Christmas” (1964).
Serling updates Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” to the mid-20th century, with an all-star cast headed by Sterling Hayden (including, among others, Ben Gazzara, Pat Hingle, Steve Lawrence, Eva Marie Saint, Peter Sellers, and Robert Shaw as the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come!). The director is four-time Academy Award winner Joseph L. Mankiewicz.
This is the first of our “viewer’s choice” selections, a “Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Feature” feature we hope to return to regularly in the future. Thanks to Jon Haag for his recommendation.
We had actually wanted to cover this rare TV movie last year, but at the time it wasn’t available for purchase or streaming. Some altruistic soul has since uploaded it to YouTube. The film is also scheduled for broadcast on Turner Classic Movies, on December 23 at 12 noon EST.
As a warm garnish to Serling’s Cold War “Christmas Carol,” we’ll also talk about “The Night of the Meek” (1959) from Season 2 of “The Twilight Zone,” with Art Carney a disillusioned department store Santa who discovers a most unusual bag of tricks.
Submitted for your approval: two middle-aged sci-fi geeks, working hard to spread some twilit holiday cheer, on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner. Fabricate your ironic twists in the comments section. It will be a lesson learned, I’m sure, when next we livestream on Facebook, this FRIDAY EVENING AT A SPECIAL TIME, 7:30 EST.
Think you’re played-out on Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol?” Consider giving this one a shot.
“The Passion of Scrooge” is not just a filmed performance of a work by composer Jon Deak (who, from 1973 to 2009, was also a bassist with the New York Philharmonic); it is a collaborative documentary in which the film direction is every bit as expressive and essential to the overall experience as anything that happens musically or onstage.
The award-winning filmmaker, H. Paul Moon, has received perhaps his widest exposure through the nationwide television broadcast, on PBS, of his documentary “Samuel Barber: Absolute Beauty.” Moon traveled from D.C. to the studios of WWFM – The Classical Network to talk with me about Barber – who was born in West Chester, PA, and attended Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute of Music – in 2017.
We met up again, a couple of years ago, to chat about his work on “Scrooge.” I’m delighted to find that he posted the audio file of our conversation.
Contemporary, challenging, and thought-provoking, “The Passion of Scrooge” strips away the accrued nostalgia for a well-worn holiday tradition to get at the heart of Dickens’ message.
Moon’s film is on BluRay and DVD and is also available for online streaming. To learn more about it, listen to our conversation – with selections from Deak’s opera – or visit scroogeopera.com.
At Paul’s suggestion, the balance of the hour during his visit to WWFM was devoted to a recording of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “On Christmas Night,” a rarely-heard masque also inspired by “A Christmas Carol.” Here’s a link to the music if you’d like to reconstruct the full experience.
Zen Violence Films
Aaron Copland (93) Beethoven (95) Composer (114) Film Music (136) Film Score (143) Film Scores (255) Halloween (94) John Williams (195) KWAX (229) Leonard Bernstein (103) Marlboro Music Festival (125) Movie Music (151) Mozart (88) Opera (207) Philadelphia Orchestra (89) Picture Perfect (174) Princeton Symphony Orchestra (108) Radio (88) Ross Amico (244) Roy's Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner (290) The Classical Network (101) The Lost Chord (268) Vaughan Williams (103) WPRB (396) WWFM (881)
