Classic Ross Amico

Tag: WPRB

Groundhog Day Music Fest on WPRB

All hail the wise and venerable Groundhog!

This morning on WPRB, we’ll salute the Grand Prognosticator, on his special day, with a musical menagerie of extraordinary abilities. We’ll have music about amazing animals, ranging from insects to eagles to great whales, including Francis Poulenc’s “The Model Animals,” Leoš Janáček’s “The Cunning Little Vixen Suite,” Miklós Rózsa’s “The Jungle Book,” Peter Schickele’s “Bestiary,” and more. The procession begins at 6:00 EST.

Then at 10:00, we’ll have a visit from Saad Haddad, Composer, who will share some of his music and talk a bit about his use of electronic processing to suggest the sounds of his Middle Eastern heritage. Haddad’s fascinating “Manarah” was heard on a concert of the Princeton Symphony Orchestra this past Sunday.

This weekend, the PSO will present its Saturday Evening POPS! Concert. Broadway singer Sierra Boggess will join the orchestra for a program that will illustrate the transition of the musical from stage to screen and back again. The conductor for the concert will be Lucas Richman. Richman has had ample experience working in film, and his concert piece “Behold the Bold Umbrellaphant” certainly reflects a cinematic sensiblity. We’ll hear it this morning, in the 9:00 hour, supporting the clever and entertaining poems of Jack Prelutsky. Get ready to hear all about the Ballpoint Penguins, the Shoehornets, the Zipperpotamuses, and the Clocktopus.

It will be a morning of zoological and cryptozoological wonders for Groundhog Day, from 6 to 10:00 EST (Saad Haddad will join me from 10 to 11), on WPRB 103.3 FM and at wprb.com. I’ll be doling out the feed and shoveling up after everyone, on Classic Ross Amico.

Punxsutawney Phil is expected to make his forecast around 7:20 EST

February 2, 2017
WPRB Celebrates Groundhog Day & Local Music

If you haven’t tuned in to WPRB yet this morning (and you really should), we are saluting the Groundhog this morning with music evocative of the animal kingdom. Sure, Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow, predicting six more weeks of winter, but he’s only right 39 percent of the time. Even so, he deserves our love, because he’s a groundhog.

Yet to come: Lucas Richman: Conductor/Composer’s “Behold the Bold Umbrellaphant,” after witty animal poems by Jack Prelutsky, which will introduce us to Ballpoint Penguins, Shoehornets, Zipperpotamuses, and the Clocktopus, among others. Richman will conduct the Princeton Symphony Orchestra Saturday Evening POPS! concert at Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium this weekend. Broadway phenom Sierra Boggess will celebrate the musical, in a program that will trace its transition from stage to screen and back again.

At 10:00 this morning, we’ll shift gears, as I will be joined by Saad Haddad, Composer. Haddad’s fascinating “Manarah” was heard on a PSO concert this past weekend. He’ll be dropping by to share more of his music and to talk about his use of electronic processing to suggest the sounds of his Middle Eastern heritage.

There’s plenty yet to come today. Join me in hibernation, between now and 11:00 EST, on WPRB 103.3 FM and at wprb.com.

PHOTO: Saad Haddad (left) with PSO Music Director Rossen Milanov

February 2, 2017
Groundhog Day Music Special

Tomorrow, the Groundhog will demonstrate the full scope of his prognosticatory powers, as he emerges from his den, briefly, to call the expiration date on winter.

But the Groundhog is not the only creature of the natural world possessed of extraordinary talents. Tomorrow morning on WPRB, we’ll salute this wise and gifted rodent through music inspired by zoological and cryptozoological wonders – creatures such as the Hedgehog, the Bee, the Unicorn, the Whale, and the Bold Umbrellaphant.

At 10:00, I will be joined by a very special guest, composer Saad Haddad, Composer, whose fascinating work, “Manarah,” was heard on a concert of the Princeton Symphony Orchestra this past weekend. Haddad will share more of his music, which similarly employs electronics to expand the palette of Western acoustic instruments, such as the trumpet, the piano, the violin, the viola, and the cello, to evoke the microtones and glissandi characteristic of the Middle East.

Join me, as I brag as lustily as Thoreau’s Chanticleer, standing on his roost, this Thursday morning, from 6 to 11 EST, on WPRB 103.3 FM and at wprb.com. We shadow the Groundhog, on Classic Ross Amico.

February 1, 2017
Saad Haddad Composer on WPRB

Capping this Thursday morning’s broadcast on WPRB will be a special visit from Saad Haddad, Composer, whose fascinating work, “Manarah,” was heard on a concert of the Princeton Symphony Orchestra this past weekend. Haddad will share more of his music, which similarly employs electronics to expand the palette of Western acoustic instruments, to evoke the microtones and glissandi characteristic of the Middle East.

Haddad found his distinctive voice while transferring video tapes for his mother. “My mom had all these VHS tapes that she wanted me to convert to a digital format so that we could save them on a hard drive,” he says. “When you’re watching these tapes, it’s not like burning a CD, where it’s very quick. You have to watch the whole video for it to convert. So I started noticing my uncles, my aunts. They were my age about 20 years ago. I’m watching them, and I hear some music, the way that they speak, the rhythm of their voices.”

He also noted the singing of a congregation at the Melkite Catholic church where he and his brothers were baptized. The prolonged exposure to these images and sounds of his past inspired him to turn to Arabic inflections as the basis of his original compositions.

Tune in to sample for yourself. Saad Haddad joins me tomorrow morning at 10:00 EST, on WPRB 103.3 FM and at wprb.com. I’ll be there at 6, on Classic Ross Amico.

February 1, 2017
Mozart’s Birthday A Salieri Celebration

Mediocrities everywhere, I absolve you!

Join me tomorrow morning (Thursday) on WPRB, as we steel ourselves for Mozart’s birthday. Mozart was born on January 27, 1756. How will we mark the occasion? Why, by listening to music written by other composers in tribute to him, of course. Not a note of actual Mozart will be heard! Mwah-ha-ha-hahaha!! That makes me so happy.

Composers from the 18th century to the present pay homage to “the creature” tomorrow, from 6 to 11 a.m. EST, on WPRB 103.3 FM and at wprb.com. We’ll be channeling Antonio Salieri, on Classic Ross Amico.

January 26, 2017

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