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Ashcan Classics Making Music with Found Objects

by

Ross Amico

May 31, 2025

in Daily Dispatch

2 responses

Wait! Hang on to that seashell collection! Don’t get rid of that eraser! Before you take out the recyclables, think twice. Grab a flower pot, a soup can, or a Coke bottle, and pull up a chair. This week on “The Lost Chord,” we’ll be playing a lot of garbage.

So, what else is new?

Well, I’m afraid this week I mean it quite literally. We’ll hear a three-movement “Garbage Concerto” by Canadian composer Jan Järvlepp, selections from “Underground Overlays from the Cistern Chapel” – acoustical experiments employing various permutations of conch, trombone, and didgeridoo, inside a two-million-gallon water tank, no less – rendered by Stuart Dempster and friends, and a short piece for prepared piano (foreign objects inserted between the strings) by John Cage.

That’s “Ashcan Classics,” making music with found objects, on “The Lost Chord,” now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

Wish I could give credit to the artist, but I can find no attribution
Planet of the Apes Prophecy Music Review

by

Ross Amico

May 30, 2025

in Daily Dispatch

6 responses

I don’t know about you, but I found life much less disturbing when all these escapist fantasies I viewed or read as a kid became so embedded in our popular culture that they attained almost “camp” status. I’ve been noticing of late, and I must say, it’s making me rather uneasy, that an awful lot of them are starting to seem downright prophetic.

But really? “Planet of the Apes?”

Of course, the “Apes” movies were always thinly-veiled allegories about all the ways humans are idiots – violent, acquisitive, xenophobic, racist, fundamentalist, and irredeemably destructive. Unquestionably it is so, but even the original “Planet of the Apes” had moments of self-aware levity! Once the lights came up and we got on with our lives, who believed these fairy stories were more than cautionary tales? Who anticipated that the destiny of human civilization would seem to be playing out just as the “Apes” movies forecast?

But that’s what gives them their elemental power. The issues addressed, sadly, will always be the same. Ignorance, fear, and brutality will always rage against enlightenment, equity, and compassion, and the people who can make a difference will never change before it’s too late.

But… it’s Friday, and I know you’re all looking forward to the weekend. Our demise may be inevitable, but for now, kick back and enjoy selections from this lovingly restored, limited edition boxed set of “Apes” music from La-La Land Records.

Today on “Picture Perfect,” in the wake of my spoken intro about Jerry Goldsmith’s seminal score, delivered earlier this week, prior to a screening of the first film at Princeton Garden Theatre, I am primed for primates. I hope you’ll join me as we sample music from “Planet of the Apes” (1968),” “Beneath the Planet of the Apes” (1970), “Escape from the Planet of the Apes” (1971), “Conquest of the Planet of the Apes” (1972), and “Battle for the Planet of the Apes” (1973). Composers will include Goldsmith (who also scored “Escape”), Leonard Rosenman (“Beneath” and “Battle”), and Tom Scott (“Conquest”).

Has there ever been a more nihilistic series pitched to a family audience? From the era of Flower Power, the Vietnam War, and the Nixon administration, “Planet of the Apes” was the ultimate bad trip. As I say, it’s easy to view these films as silly, escapist fare, but more than half a century later, the themes, subtexts and overarching message of “Planet of the Apes” remain disconcertingly relevant.

Keep your filthy paws off me, you damn dirty apes! Yes we have no bananas, on “Picture Perfect,” music for the movies, now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT

SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT

Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/
Planet of the Apes Score Celebrated at Princeton

by

Ross Amico

May 29, 2025

in Daily Dispatch

6 responses

Despite the rain, I’m happy to report there was a very nice turn-out last night for the Princeton Garden Theatre’s screening of “Planet of the Apes.” I spoke beforehand about Jerry Goldsmith’s bold and imaginative music. Also, there was the enticement of trivia and prizes! (The Garden has the most knowledgeable and passionate audiences.)

The film was shown as part of the theatre’s “Keeping the Score” series, lovingly curated to illuminate the powerful contributions of music, in all its varieties, to the collaborative art form that is cinema. Next up: Franz Waxman’s score for Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rebecca” on June 4. The schedule for the next few months is posted on the Garden’s website. Thank you, Princeton Garden Theatre. It was heartening to find that people clearly still love their “Apes!”

https://www.princetongardentheatre.org

Since I am primed for primates, the focus of my movie music show, “Picture Perfect,” this week will be a survey of all five of the “Apes” scores from this era, including music by Goldsmith, Leonard Rosenman, and Tom Scott. The show will air on KWAX, this Friday at 8:00 p.m. EDT/5:00 p.m. PDT. Stream it wherever you are at the link!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/
Korngold Birthday Rediscovering a Master

by

Ross Amico

May 29, 2025

in Daily Dispatch

4 responses

Today is the birthday of one of my favorite composers, Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957), in my heart since childhood, thanks to viewings of “The Adventures of Robin Hood. But guess what? I love his concert music and his operas too! Here’s a joyous discovery for a spring afternoon: Korngold at the piano, playing his own themes from opera and the movies, at the home of Ray Heindorf, who worked very closely with the composer as an orchestrator on a number of his classic film scores. By 1951, Korngold had already left Warner Brothers. He would work on only one more film, the Richard Wagner biopic “Magic Fire,” released by Republic Pictures in 1955. Hear Korngold sing (if you can distinguish him from Heindorf) and actually speak, especially during the final minutes, accompanied by some fascinating home movies.
Per Nørgård, Influential Danish Composer, Dies at 92

by

Ross Amico

May 28, 2025

in Daily Dispatch

2 responses

The prolific Danish composer Per Nørgård has died. In all, the creator of some 400 works, he leaves eight symphonies, six operas, ten concertos, assorted choral works, chamber music (including ten string quartets), and works for solo instrument. Nørgård emerged from the dominant musical influences of the region – Carl Nielsen and Jean Sibelius, mainly, but also that of his teacher, Vagn Holmboe – to immerse himself in central European modernism.

In 1959, he discovered the infinity series, a serial method from which he developed unifying structural elements in much of his subsequent work. His Symphony No. 3 was the first to apply the method for the integration of melody (such that it is), harmony, and rhythm. “Voyage into the Golden Screen” is considered a landmark of spectral composition. Among his music written for film is that for the international success “Babette’s Feast.”

By some, he was regarded as the foremost living Nordic composer. All the same, his is probably not the music you’ll want to take with you for your morning commute. It can be an interesting listen in quieter, more introspective moments. That said, I had an extra CD of his Symphonies Nos. 2 & 4 and, like Robert Louis Stevenson’s bottle imp, I couldn’t give it away. You have to give the guy credit for steadfastly following his own muse.

He is not to be confused with the Finnish composer Pehr Nordgren, who died in 2008. Nørgård was 92 years-old.

R.I.P.

“Gennen Torne” (“Through Thorns”) for harp, flute, clarinet, and string quartet – the same combo used for Ravel’s “Introduction and Allegro” (2003)

Symphony No. 1 – right out of the gate, subtitled “Austera” (“Austere”), undeniably Scandinavian (1953-55)

“Voyage into the Golden Screen” (1968)

Symphony No. 3 (1972-75) with chorus

Symphony No. 8 (2010-11)

Live performance of the work, with Nørgård acknowledging the orchestra and applause at the end

Interview with the composer (in Danish), with charming interludes of him performing his juvenilia at the piano, illustrated by cartoons he drew as a kid

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