Classic Ross Amico

Tag: KWAX

Midsummer Night Fairy Music on KWAX

How now, spirit! Whither wander you?

June 23rd is St. John’s Eve, otherwise known as Midsummer Night. In anticipation of the occasion, I invite you to begin your Saturday on “Sweetness and Light” with an hour of fairy music, all of it tying in, in one way or another, with Oberon, king of the fairies, Titania, his queen, and his feeewheeling servant, Puck. Oh yes, and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

We’ll enjoy selections by Carl Maria von Weber, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Walter Leigh, Henry Purcell, Montague Phillips, Erik Satie, and Ambroise Thomas.

Rather audacious of me, I know, but one thing we will NOT hear is the famous incidental music by Felix Mendelssohn! But we hear that all the time, anyway.

It will be as if Puck administered love-in-idleness nectar to your ears, when we’re lost in the musical enchantment of Midsummer Night, on “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 22, 2024
Villa-Lobos’s Hollywood Rainforest

When Heitor Villa-Lobos was contracted by M-G-M to write music for a big screen adaptation of W.H. Hudson’s novel “Green Mansions” (1959), expectations ran high on both sides. The Brazilian master began immediately, diving into the project with characteristic gusto. After all, he had been writing music inspired by the rainforest for his entire career.

Unfortunately, he had very little affinity for the practicality of the filmmaking process, turning in musical impressions of scenes from the book. The studio was befuddled. Since Villa-Lobos was unable to adapt to the customary way of doing things, he was replaced by M-G-M house composer Branislau Kaper, who used the Villa-Lobos material as a springboard for his own dramatic conception. The result is part Villa-Lobos, part Kaper, and all M-G-M gloss.

Villa-Lobos was a little embittered by his Hollywood experience. He promptly assembled a multi-movement symphonic poem, “Forest of the Amazon” (1958), some 75 minutes in length, which employed his rejected sketches. He made a recording of 45 minutes of the music in 1959, for which the soprano Bidu Sayão came out of retirement.

This week on “Picture Perfect,” we’ll hear selections from both versions of “Green Mansions,” as well as from the Mayan adventure “Kings of the Sun” (1963), by Elmer Bernstein, and “La noche de los Mayas” (“The Night of the Mayas,” 1939), by Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas.

If you can’t beat the heat, join it! It’s an hour of tropical inspirations from films centered on the indigenous peoples of Latin America, 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/

PHOTO: The project that left Villa-Lobos feeling green around the gills

June 21, 2024
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.
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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
Goldmark’s Rustic Wedding Symphony on KWAX

I’ve always been a fan of Karl Goldmark’s “Rustic Wedding Symphony.” It’s always made me happy. Back when I had a live radio air shift, I used to program it every spring. Apparently, I’m in good company. It also received the imprimatur of Johannes Brahms, Goldmark’s walking companion, who thought it the best thing the composer ever wrote.

This week on “Sweetness and Light,” the work will form the centerpiece at a June wedding.

The “Rustic Wedding Symphony” has been recorded a number of times, but you don’t really seem to hear it much anymore. We’ll enjoy a performance by the Utah Symphony conducted by Maurice Abravanel.

The work falls into five movements: “Wedding March,” “Bridal Song,” “Serenade,” “In the Garden,” and “Dance.” It’s unusual for me to devote so much of a “light music” program to a symphony, but really, it’s like serving up 40-minutes of smiles.

We’ll also have a party favor in the form of Edvard Grieg’s “Wedding Day at Troldhaugen,” from his delectable “Lyric Pieces” – Troldhaugen being the composer’s home outside Bergen, Norway. Peter Katin, who released all of Grieg’s “Lyric Pieces” over three discs, will be the pianist.

Nothing rustic about Charles-Marie Widor: for 63 years, Widor was organist at the Church of Saint-Sulpice in Paris. We’ll conclude with the Toccata from his Symphony No. 5, a work frequently performed at ceremonial functions, whether they be related to Christmas, graduations, or – for our purpose – weddings. It’s been especially popular at royal weddings, so it’s apt that we hear it performed by Simon Preston on the organ of Westminster Abbey.

Say “I do” to “Sweetness and Light,” a program of music calculated to charm and to cheer, 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/

Pieter Brueghel the Younger, “Wedding Dance in a Barn” (c. 1616)

June 8, 2024

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