Classic Ross Amico

Tag: Father’s Day

Prodigal Son Ballet Father’s Day on KWAX

Nothing is guaranteed to get Dad out on the dance floor faster than ballet music inspired by the Prodigal Son.

As related in the Gospel of Luke, a young wastrel burns through his family fortune, then returns home to the arms of a forgiving father. The son’s elder, more responsible brother is none too pleased, but the father explains that since the younger son has repented and returned, as if from the dead – in essence, was lost, and is now found – it is cause for celebration.

This week on “The Lost Chord,” it’s an off-center Father’s Day tribute, as we listen to ballet music inspired by the Parable of the Prodigal Son.

We’ll hear a late, folk-inspired score by the Swedish composer Hugo Alfvén, staged in honor of his 85th birthday in 1957, and Sergei Prokofiev’s alternately pungent and transcendentally lyrical opus, written for the Ballets Russes in 1928. The latter was developed simultaneously with Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 4 and shares much of the same thematic material.

Father knows best. Celebrate the Day of the Dad with “Son Dance,” ballet music inspired by the Prodigal Son, this week 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/

June 14, 2025
Father’s Day Serenity on Sweetness and Light

This week for “Sweetness and Light,” on the eve of Father’s Day, give Dad what he really wants – some time alone with the radio!

Grant him the peace to enjoy a program of works by composers from classical music dynasties, music performed by composers’ offspring, performer-families making music together, music dedicated by father to son and vice versa, and the odd piece written specifically about fathers and family.

Seriously, how many neckties and cannabis pipes can a guy own? Now make yourself scarce and don’t come back until you’ve got some coffee and pancakes. Dad’s got some listening to do, to “Sweetness and Light,” this Saturday morning at 11:00 EDT/8:00 PDT, exclusively on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Stream it wherever you are at the link:

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

“Shhh… Classic Ross Amico is on.”

June 14, 2025
Spaghetti Western Music for Father’s Day on KWAX

This week on “Picture Perfect,” for Father’s Day, it’s a fistful of spaghetti for Dad.

We’ll be sampling an hour’s worth of distinctive scores from spaghetti westerns – ultra-cool, hyper-stylized entertainments, made by Italians but often shot in Spain, with their multinational casts heavily dubbed in post-production.

Spaghetti westerns frequently turned the conventions of American westerns on their heads. At any rate, the morality of the traditional western was made much murkier, with antiheroes cast as protagonists, usually motivated by greed and revenge. Especially greed.

As with the American film industry, only more so, when the Italians found something that worked, they went into overdrive, churning out literally dozens of knock-offs and imitations a year, until a given genre had run its financially lucrative course.

To this end, over 600 European westerns were produced between 1960 and 1980. The most influential of these were those directed by Sergio Leone, especially those of the so-called “Dollars” Trilogy – “A Fistful of Dollars,” “For a Few Dollars More,” and “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”

These, of course, featured then-rising star Clint Eastwood. His co-star in the second and third films was Lee Van Cleef, who in American westerns such as “High Noon” and “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” had bit parts as one of the villain’s henchmen, but became an international superstar as the spaghetti western’s most reliable – and bankable – heavy.

We’ll sample from music for the “Dollars” Trilogy, composed by Ennio Morricone, and the “Sabata” Trilogy (which also starred Van Cleef), composed by Marcello Giombini.

Tell Dad it’s all-you-can-eat. We’ll be piling the plates high with music from spaghetti westerns, 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/

June 13, 2025
Father’s Day Music Kebab on KWAX

This week on “Sweetness and Light,” on the eve of Father’s Day, grab a cold one and meet me at the grill. I’ll be assembling a classical kebab for Dad.

The adage, “the family that plays together, stays together,” will be borne out through all-in-the-family performances by Los Romeros (the Royal Family of the Spanish Guitar) and the Shostakoviches (composer father, conductor son, and pianist grandson). Cellist Julian Lloyd Webber, brother of Andrew Lloyd Webber, will play music by their father, William. Proud papa Erich Wolfgang Korngold will unveil his “Baby Serenade,” written for the impending arrival of his son, Georg (future record producer George Korngold). We’ll also hear a setting of a Danish folk song, “Father and Daughter,” by Percy Grainger, and a beloved Giacomo Puccini aria sung by a daughter to her father.

All in all, it will be a more creative, and possibly more gratifying, alternative to the gift of yet another necktie. Lots of music on the menu for Dad on a savory “Sweetness and Light,” this Saturday morning at 11:00 EDT/8:00 PDT, exclusively on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Stream it, wherever you are, at the link:

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

June 15, 2024
Father’s Day Movie Music Entitled Birds

Sure, sure, sure. This weekend is Father’s Day. But I did movies about fathers last year.

This year, I’m broadening the focus to “entitled birds.” It allows me to program music from “To Kill a Mockingbird,” with Gregory Peck playing one of the great fathers on film, but also to diversify.

The hour will open with a suite from “The Maltese Falcon” (1941). Humphrey Bogart plays private dick Sam Spade, in John Huston’s adaptation of the Dashiell Hammett novel (not incidentally, full of avian symbols and similes). Mary Astor is the dangerous dame, and the first-rate cast supporting includes Peter Lorre, Sidney Greenstreet, and Elisha Cook, Jr.

The music is by Adolph Deutsch, who in the 1950s became associated with musicals (he won Oscars for his work on “Oklahoma,” “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers,” and “Annie Get Your Gun,” and was nominated for “The Band Wagon” and “Showboat”), but in the 1940s, he was as noir as that closet song-and-dance man, George Raft, some of whose crime films he scored.
.
Then it’s on to the most overt Father’s Day association of the hour and the aforementioned “To Kill a Mockingbird” (1962), based on Harper Lee’s beautiful coming-of-age novel. Gregory Peck plays one of his most memorable roles – defense attorney and model father Atticus Finch (his surname yet another bird). The book was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1961. Peck won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1962. Elmer Bernstein received his only Oscar for his work on “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” of all things. “Mockingbird” remains one of his most memorable and moving scores.

“Jonathan Livingston Seagull” (1973) flies alone on the program as the only film in which the title refers to an actual bird, though the context is a fabulous one, based on Richard Bach’s bestselling parable. James Franciscus supplies a superimposed human voice. The score is by songwriter Neil Diamond, ably assisted by composer Lee Holdridge (who turned 80 on March 3). We’ll hear Holdridge’s music from the film’s “The Other World” sequence.

Finally, Errol Flynn plays Geoffrey Thorpe, captain of the “Albatross” (yet another bird), who defends England on the eve of the Spanish Armada in “The Sea Hawk” (1940). The music, perhaps the greatest pirate score ever written, is by Erich Wolfgang Korngold. If I had kids, I would be perfectly content on Father’s Day if they left me alone to watch “The Sea Hawk.” As my grandfather used to say, “You can help me by standing over there.”

I hope you’ll join me for “Entitled Birds,” 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 – ALL NEW! – 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/

June 14, 2024

Tag Cloud

RECENT POSTS