To get you in the mood for Trick-or-Treat, here’s Frederic Curzon’s “Dance of an Ostracised Imp.”
Tag: Halloween
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Support Classical Music Radio Donate Now
You can’t take it with you, you know. It’s October, and every non-profit in creation is seeking your support. Amidst all the hurly-burly, I hope you will consider the importance of classical music in your life. If you listen to the radio, and you enjoy the variety of the music and the creativity behind its presentation, just remember, it’s all publicly funded. People in the community, people just like you – perhaps you yourself (and I hope it is so) – have seen to it that the music you love continues to enrich the airwaves. You are the life-blood of public radio. With Halloween right around the corner, you might want to do something about it, if you haven’t already, before it is too late. Thank you in advance for supporting classical music on your favorite radio station.
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Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder Halloween Terrors on WPRB
At its climaxes, Arnold Schoenberg’s “Gurrelieder” makes Mahler’s “Symphony of a Thousand” sound like chamber music.
This Thursday morning on WPRB, we’ll sample from Schoenberg’s early exercise in Romantic excess, as we attempt to dodge the undead hordes on their wild hunt. It will be one of many wild rides we’ll endure, in our desperation to cling to life and soul, as we are assailed by wave after wave of Halloween terrors.
We’ll be set upon by Victor Hugo’s djinns (twice). We’ll be tempted and tormented by Goethe’s Erlkönig (three times). We’ll bolt for our lives with Robert Burns’ Tam O’Shanter (again, thrice). We’ll encounter a literal night mare in a Norwegian wood (once is enough). We’ll take a couple of short rides in fast machines. And we’ll ride with the Devil, over and over again.
You can flee the Abyss, but you can’t hide, this Thursday morning from 6 to 11 EDT, on WPRB 103.3 FM and wprb.com. We’re going to get you every witch way, on Classic Ross Amico.
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Diabolical Halloween Music on WPRB
The music is so compelling, it’s diabolical!
This Thursday morning on WPRB, with the approach of Halloween, prepare yourself for some wild rides. There will be heart-pounding sprints through nocturnal forests; breathless pursuits by witches, demons, and djinns; and white-knuckle plunges into the abyss.
We’ll hurtle out of control, as modes of transportation go awry, cower under the blankets at the call of ghostly huntsmen, and even experience a literal “night mare.”
We’ll be pursued, kidnapped, and narrowly avert damnation, this Thursday morning, from 6 to 11 EDT, on WPRB 103.3 FM and wprb.com. If we’re not exactly pure, at least we’re chased, on Classic Ross Amico.
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Halloween Hauntings from Marlboro Music
The end of October is marked by deepening shadows, withered cornstalks, and the leer of carved pumpkins. On this week’s “Music from Marlboro,” with Halloween right around the corner, we’ll get into the spirit of things with chamber music of a supernatural bent.
French composer André Caplet was winner of the esteemed Prix de Rome in 1901, placing ahead of Maurice Ravel. He played percussion with the Colonne Orchestra and trained as a conductor under Arthur Nikisch. From 1910 to 1914, he served as director of the Boston Opera. While serving in the First World War, he was engulfed in poisonous gas, which resulted in the pleurisy that plagued him for the remainder of his short life. Caplet died in 1925, at the age of 44.
As the Prix de Rome would suggest, Caplet composed music of considerable merit. Nonetheless, he was fated to be remembered for his work as an orchestrator for Claude Debussy. Debussy’s “Children’s Corner,” “The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian,” “La Boiîte à joujoux,” and “Clair de lune” would all be draped in Caplet’s finery.
Of Caplet’s original music, only his “Conte fantastique” (Fantastic Tale), after Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death,” retains a foothold on the repertoire. Composed in 1908 for harp and string orchestra, it was arranged for harp and string quartet in 1922. The work crackles with atmosphere, invention and suspense. In fact, the program is brought so vividly to life that one can’t help but think that Caplet would have made an excellent film composer. Savor the chill as Prince Prospero’s decadent revels are curtailed by the implacable chimes of midnight!
The Marlboro performance, which dates from 2009, features Sivan Magen, harp; Liana Gourdjia and Bella Hristova, violins; Sally Chisolm, viola; and Paul Wiancko, cello. As an added bonus, the music will be prefaced by a reading from Poe’s creepy classic.
Fifteen years after death of Beethoven, the composer’s star pupil, Carl Czerny, noted that the slow movement of his Piano Trio in D, Op. 70, No.1, reminded him of the ghost of Hamlet’s father. Czerny may not have been all that far off the mark.
Actually, at the time of the work’s composition, in 1808, Beethoven had been kicking around the idea for opera on the subject of Macbeth. The words “Macbett” and “Ende” appear near sketches for the Largo. It’s been speculated that the music may have been a working out of ideas for a proposed scene featuring the three witches. The ominous mood is heightened by eerie and mournful touches, sudden pauses and outbursts, and the use of a ghostly tremolo. The operatic project collapsed when Beethoven’s librettist, Heinrich Joseph von Collin (to whom Beethoven had dedicated the “Coriolan Overture”), begged off of the project, thinking it was too dark.
We’ll hear Marlboro musicians Dénes Várjon, piano; Michelle Ross, violin; and Brook Speltz, cello. The performance was captured on tour in Washington, D.C., in 2015. The first of this season’s Marlboro tours will take place November 11-19, with concerts scheduled for D.C., Boston, Brattleboro, Greenwich, New York City, and Philadelphia. You can learn more at marlboromusic.org.
Join me, if you dare, for “haunting” performances from the legendary Marlboro Music Festival, this Wednesday evening at 6 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
Marlboro School of Music and Festival: Official Page
Daniel Gardner, “The Three Witches from Macbeth” (1775)
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