Prohibited from doing live air shifts until the college relaxes its restriction on part-time personnel. Freelance writing assignments postponed until events resume, advertisers step up, and people start going out again. Volunteer activities suspended until it’s safe to return.
I think it’s time to start growing my Corona beard.
Spring arrives at 11:50 pm (EDT).
Too soon?
A PLAYLIST FOR EPIDEMIC, PLAGUE AND CONTAGION
(Dedicated to the Prince Prosperos of Fort Lauderdale)
André Caplet, “Conte fantastique,” after E.A. Poe’s “Masque of the Red Death” (the consequences of partying in time of plague)
Constant Lambert, “King Pest” from “Summer’s Last Will and Testament” (listen for grotesque references to “Watkin’s Ale”)
Simon Holt, “St. Vitus in the Kettle” (named for St. Vitus’ Dance, the medieval “dancing plague”)
George Frideric Handel, “Israel in Egypt” (Trinity Wall Street, bringing it Old Testament):
Flies, lice, and locusts
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPuKHelZyL4&t=12m0s
Hail and fire
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPuKHelZyL4&t=14m24s
Darkness
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPuKHelZyL4&t=16m42s
Smiting of the first born
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPuKHelZyL4&t=19m33s
Franz Schmidt, “The Book with Seven Seals” (complete with musical evocation of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse)
César Cui, “A Feast in Time of Plague”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SqlrZ8lLrc
John Corigliano, Symphony No. 1 (to the memory of friends and colleagues lost to AIDS)
Movt I. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrWOvPOSeiQ
Movt II. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjHPxpAaR0c
Movt III. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UTbB49UsmE
Movt IV https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uj1JP3M5z7E
Daniel Catán, “Florencia in the Amazon” (inspired by works of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, including “Love in the Time of Cholera”)
Complete
Guillaume Machaut, Medieval music from the time of plague and courtly love
Dies Irae (‘nuff said)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dlr90NLDp-0
Going through Marlboro withdrawal? “Music from Marlboro” may be on hiatus at WWFM – The Classical Network, but while we wait out the Coronavirus, there’s plenty in the larder to indulge your appetite for great chamber music performances at the website of the Marlboro Music School and Festival.
Happy birthday, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov! I’ve always been a fan.
Recommended Rimsky playlist:
Ormandy and the “Procession of the Nobles” from “Mlada”
Song of the Viking Guest from “Sadko,” with Mark Reizen
Lots of intoxicating music in this staged performance of “Sadko” (complete, Gergiev conducting)
Ernest Ansermet conducts the Symphony No. 2 “Antar,” a haunting work, full of beautiful melodies, that was once much better known
Leopold Stokowski conducts the “Russian Easter Festival Overture,” employing a bass-baritone in place of a trombone solo, for maximum liturgical effect
Evgeny Mravinsky conducts a suite from “The Invisible City of Kitezh”
Mikhail Pletnev in Rimsky’s little-known gem, the Quintet for Piano and Winds
Lily Pons sings the “Hymn to the Sun” from “Le coq d’or”
Leif Segerstam conducts “Scheherazade,” with a highly unconventional, piratical conclusion
“Flight of the Bumblebee” with real bees (!), courtesy of The Lost Fingers
Riccardo Muti has the time of his life rehearsing – and singing! – “Nabucco” at La Scala.
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