Not even H.G. Wells, who projected that intellects, vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, dreamed that they would ever come for our Christmas. And like that other Welles, Orson – who started out at the top with “Citizen Kane,” only to wind up doing wine commercials – Zadora never made a better film.
It’s just not Christmas until Santa Claus is on Mars. Join us for our stunned reactions to the cult camp classic “Santa Claus Conquers the Martians” (1964), on the next Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner, live-streamed on Facebook, this Sunday evening at 7:00 EST!
With Christmas only days away, there’s still much to be done. Even so, this Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” we pause to remember the story of the first Christmas, with music by a couple of English composers inspired by the Nativity.
Alongside Sir Charles Villiers Stanford and Sir Edward Elgar, Sir Hubert Parry was one of the key figures of the so-called “English Musical Renaissance.” He influenced a whole generation of much better-known composers, including Ralph Vaughan Williams and Gustav Holst. We’ll hear his “Ode on the Nativity,” given its first performance on the same concert, at the Hereford Three Choirs Festival in 1912, as Vaughan Williams’ “Fantasia on Christmas Carols.”
Vaughan Williams, the great-nephew of Charles Darwin, and an atheist in his youth, later softened into a kind of “cheerful agnosticism.” He dearly loved the King James Bible, and he especially enjoyed Christmas. Of course, he wrote much music on the subject. In fact, his very last composition was “The First Nowell.” He worked diligently at the piece, inspired by medieval pageants, during his final month, but died suddenly before its completion.
However, even at 85 years-old, RVW retained a remarkable concentration. He managed to pound out the whole thing in short score in only a few weeks. Furthermore, he had fully orchestrated the first two-thirds. The finishing touches were applied by his assistant, Roy Douglas – he of “Les Sylphides” fame.
If you like the “Fantasia on Christmas Carols,” I think you’ll really enjoy this. It’s pastoral music for a pastoral scene. Join me for “A Play in a Manger,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
Actually, this was originally planned to be our Black Friday show, but then things went awry with the internet connection. The choice seemed an oddly appropriate one for the “shopping season,” due to the film’s sharp commentaries on greed, gluttony, and consumerism run amok. I remember in the 1970s, in the days before premium cable channels fragmented our society forever, “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” was shown on TV on Thanksgiving night. At any rate, it was good to revisit this Gene Wilder classic, which seems to only get better with the passing of time, because, let’s face it, human nature has not changed, and everyone deserves to be sent to the taffy-pulling machine.
Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner is livestreamed on Facebook most Friday and Sunday evenings at 7:00 EST.
It’s a fantastic toy shop of Christmas film scores! Enjoy selections from “Miracle on 34th Street” (Cyril J. Mockridge), “A Christmas Carol” (Franz Waxman), “Home Alone” (John Williams), “Ben-Hur” (Miklós Rózsa), “The Bishop’s Wife” (Hugo Friedhofer), and “The Holly and the Ivy” (Malcolm Arnold). It’s the last weekend before Christmas, and the elves are in overdrive! There’s no assembly required, on “Picture Perfect” – music for the movies – this Saturday evening at 6:00 EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
At a time when tyrant conductors still very much roamed the earth, Fritz Reiner was one of the most feared. With a glower that would make Bela Lugosi quake – and sporting quite the similar hairline – Reiner was forged in Hungary at the twilight of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Hungary at the time had quite the reputation for churning out great conductors. Among those to achieve considerable international success were George Szell, Eugene Ormandy, Antal Doráti, Ferenc Fricsay, Sir Georg Solti, and István Kertész.
Among Reiner’s own teachers was Béla Bartók, with whom he studied piano. Reiner would later repay the favor with what many consider to be the benchmark recording of Bartók’s “Concerto for Orchestra.” He also worked closely with Richard Strauss in Dresden, and his recordings of Strauss’ works are equally revered. All in all, the Chicago Symphony under Fritz Reiner was a surefire choice to give the ol’ hi-fi a good workout in the early days of stereo.
Reiner became a naturalized American citizen in 1928, and began to teach conducting at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Among his pupils was Leonard Bernstein. His first American post was as principal conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony. He led the Pittsburgh Symphony for ten years, from 1938 to 1948, then spent several years at the Met. But it was as music director of the Chicago Symphony that he attained legendary status.
For a master interpreter of some of the largest and most challenging works in the repertoire, his baton technique was notable for its precision and economy. Much of what he achieved, unfortunately, was through the brutality he exerted in rehearsals. Reiner emerged from an Old World steeped in aristocratic methods. At the top of their profession, conductors then were regarded as gods-on-earth. When drive and ego were bolstered by absolute power, working conditions became downright perilous. Before strong musicians’ unions, conductors exercised the authority to fire anyone on the spot. So when musicians played for Reiner, they played as if there lives depended on it – or at the very least their livelihoods.
Did it make for better musicmaking? You can’t argue with the excellence of Reiner’s Chicago Symphony.
Read this account of the day Reiner finally gave his “perfect concert.”
