Classic Ross Amico

Category: Daily Dispatch

  • Indiana Jones’ Princeton University Connection

    Indiana Jones’ Princeton University Connection

    Did you know Indiana Jones was born in Princeton, NJ? Supposedly on July 1, 1899. According to his fictional biography, he lived here until 1908, at which time his father, Henry Jones, Sr. – a professor of medieval studies at Princeton University – embarked on a lecture tour.

    The Joneses returned to Princeton in time for Indy to attend Princeton High School. However, he never did graduate. While on spring break during his senior year, he fell in with Poncho Villa, while visiting the Southwest, then got caught up in World War I.

    Indy himself is supposed to have taught at Princeton University in 1933. However, his longtime employer, and the one we see in the movies, is Marshall College, a fictional institution, in Bedford, Connecticut.

    40 years after the release of “Raiders of the Lost Ark (on June 12, 1981), and all this is news to me. Then, I was never a follower of “The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles” television show or the spin-off novels or video games.

    The period during which the Joneses lived in Utah, in 1912, portrayed in the opening sequence of “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,” coincides with Henry Jones Sr.’s Princeton sabbatical. Henry Jones taught at Princeton from 1899 until at least 1938.

    At some point, Oxford-graduate Marcus Brody, Indy’s boss at Marshall, also took courses at Princeton.

    Needless to say, as a “Raiders” fan and now a Princetonian, I find this newly-acquired Indy lore fascinating.

    https://indianajones.fandom.com/wiki/Princeton

    https://indianajones.fandom.com/wiki/Princeton_University

    In real life, William Hootkins, the actor who played Major Eaton in “Raiders” (and memorably uttered the line “TOP… MEN”) graduated from Princeton in 1970. I wrote a post about it in 2019.

    PHOTO: Indiana Jones and the Princeton Tiger?

  • Bulgarian Music This Sunday on WWFM

    Bulgarian Music This Sunday on WWFM

    This Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” it’s “take 2” for a Bulgarian travelogue, postponed from April because of a technical glitch.

    Despite his Mexican-sounding first name and Swiss birth, Pancho Vladigerov was a seminal figure in Bulgarian music. He was the country’s first major composer to harness Bulgarian folk traditions to classical forms.

    Fairly well known in Central Europe during the 1920s, when he was an associate of the theatrical impresario Max Reinhardt, Vladigerov had many of his works published by Universal Edition and recorded by Deutsche Grammophon. He was a composer of opera, ballet, symphonic music, five piano concertos, two violin concertos, chamber music, songs, choral works, and piano pieces.

    Tonight, we’ll hear a generous selection from Vladigerov’s “Bulgarian Dances” of 1931.

    Also on the program will be American composer Derek Bermel’s affectionate souvenir of his studies in the region, “Thracian Echoes” of 2002. Bermel served as artist-in-residence at Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study from 2009 to 2013. His “Thracian Echoes” was performed locally by the Princeton Symphony Orchestra in 2011.

    There will be no balking in the Balkans. Skim the cream of Bulgarian music, on “Bulgar Wheat,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

  • Indiana Jones 40th Anniversary

    Indiana Jones 40th Anniversary

    Indiana Jones first cracked his whip on the big screen on June 12, 1981. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg’s smart homage to cinematic serials of yore, “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” took off like a shot to become the year’s highest-grossing film and a cultural phenomenon.

    This week on “Picture Perfect,” as we anticipate the release of “Indy 5” in 2022, we’ll celebrate four decades of fedoras and five o’clock shadows. Tune in for selections from John Williams’ classic scores for the series, including “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (1981), “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” (1984), “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade” (1989), and “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” (2008).

    Remember, it’s not the years – it’s the mileage. Join me for a highly subjective hour of music and reflections on the Indiana Jones series, to mark the 40th anniversary of “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, this Saturday evening at 6:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org!

  • Tania León Wins Pulitzer for “Stride”

    Tania León Wins Pulitzer for “Stride”

    Here, with all the hullabaloo, I forgot all about the Pulitzers being announced yesterday. Congratulations to Tania León, the recipient of this year’s prize for music, for her composition “Stride.”

    “Stride” received its world premiere by the New York Philharmonic on February 13, 2020. The music is a response to the orchestra’s “Project 19” commissioning program, for which 19 women wrote works to mark the centennial of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which guaranteed a woman’s right to vote. The inspiration for León’s piece was Susan B. Anthony.

    León discusses “Stride”

    The work in rehearsal:

    You’ll find an interview with the composer, in which she talks about the piece, here:

    https://www.npr.org/sections/deceptivecadence/2021/06/11/1005649919/tania-leon-wins-music-pulitzer-for-stride-a-celebration-of-womens-suffrage

    León, born in Havana, settled in New York in 1967. Among her teachers was Ursula Mamlok.

    This year’s other finalists in the category were Ted Hearne, for “Place,” and Maria Schneider, for “Data Lords.”

    It’s a good thing it’s still breakfast, because I really feel like I’ve got egg on my face for having forgotten, especially after devoting this past Sunday’s “The Lost Chord” to Pulitzer Prize winning music! If you missed it, you can still catch the show as a webcast at the link below. The playlist includes works by William Schuman (the very first recipient of the music prize), William Bolcom, and Caroline Shaw (the category’s youngest honoree).

    https://www.wwfm.org/post/lost-chord-june-6-further-pulitzer-surprises

  • Raiders of the Lost Ark Secret of the Incas & More

    On the 40th anniversary of the release of “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” enjoy last night’s discussion of a movie that heavily influenced it, “Secret of the Incas” (1954).

    We’re taking Friday off next week, but Roy will be back with his son, Ryan, for a special Father’s Day edition of Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner, on Sunday, June 20 – with the topic to be announced.

    Then Roy and I will reunite for yet another riveting conversation, about “Dimension 5” (1966), a time travel-espionage-thriller starring Jeffrey Hunter, France Nuyen, and Harold “Odd Job” Sakata, on Friday, June 25.

    Time travel always increases our chances of punctuality. The Facebook livestreams begin at 7 pm EDT.

    https://www.facebook.com/roystiedyescificorner

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