Classic Ross Amico

Tag: Richard Strauss

Bavarian Alps with Strauss on WPRB

We leave behind the commotion of the Munich beer halls for an excursion in the Bavarian Alps, courtesy of Richard Strauss. It’s Strauss’ “An Alpine Symphony,” basically for the next hour, as we celebrate Oktoberfest until 11:00 EDT on WPRB 103.3 FM and at wprb.com.

September 29, 2016
Strauss Disses Schoenberg Winter of Discontent

Richard Strauss being catty about Schoenberg (snow-related).

January 25, 2016
Strauss in Snow A Winter Composer

Richard Strauss sitting in the snow.

January 25, 2016
Poetry & Music on WPRB

“Is it the words that move my heart or the music that speaks more strongly? It’s fruitless to try to separate them. Words and music are fused into one… One art redeemed by the other!”

– The Countess, Richard Strauss’ “Capriccio”

I hope you’ll join me this morning on WPRB, when and where there will be plenty of words and music to ponder, as we listen to as much music inspired by poetry and poets as we possibly can in five hours.

It will be a veritable Norton Anthology of works influenced by Matthew Arnold, William Blake, Robert Burns, Lord Byron, Lewis Carroll, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, E.E. Cummings, A.E. Houseman, Victor Hugo, Ben Johnson, Edward Lear, Federico Garcia Lorca, Edgar Allan Poe, Alexander Pushkin, Friedrich Schiller, William Shakespeare, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Wallace Stevens and William Butler Yeats.

You’ll hear choral music, song, overtures and symphonic poems, with Sir John Gielgud reading the texts by Aloysius Bertrand that inspired Ravel’s “Gaspard de la Nuit.”

J.D. Burnett, founder and artistic director of the Kinnara Ensemble, will drop by at around 10:00. He’ll tell us a little bit about the choir’s concert at The Hun School of Princeton this Saturday at 8 p.m., when the group will present Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “Serenade to Music,” along with works by Johannes Brahms and others.

Sharpen your quills – it’s all about poetry and music this morning, from 6 to 11 ET, at WPRB 103.3 FM or online at wprb.com. We’re starving for our art on Classic Ross Amico.

October 1, 2015
Strauss’s 10 Conducting Commandments
Since I mentioned these on the air, I figured I’d copy them here for your edification: Richard Strauss’ “Ten Golden Rules for the Album of a Young Conductor” (1927):
1. Remember that you are making music not to amuse yourself, but to delight your audience.
2. You should not perspire when conducting. Only the audience should get warm.
3. Conduct “Salome” and “Elektra” as if they were by Mendelssohn: Fairy music.
4. Never look encouragingly at the brass, except with a brief glance to give an important cue.
5. But never let the horns and woodwinds out of your sight. If you can hear them at all, they are still too strong.
6. If you think that the brass is now blowing hard enough, tone it down another shade or two.
7. It is not enough that you yourself should hear every word the soloist sings. You should know it by heart anyway. The audience must be able to follow without effort. If they do not understand the words, they will go to sleep.
8. Always accompany the singer in such a way that he can sing without effort.
9. When you think you have reached the limits of prestissimo, double the pace. (Amended in 1948: “Today I should like to amend this: take the tempo half as fast.”)
10. If you follow these rules carefully, you will, with your fine gifts and your great accomplishments, always be the darling of your listeners.
PHOTO: Strauss, there is method in his madness
June 11, 2015

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