Classic Ross Amico

Tag: WWFM

Concertanti & Women Composers on WWFM

This afternoon on The Classical Network, I’ll make a concerted effort to hold your concentration with an afternoon of compelling concertanti.

We’ll hear works featuring one or more solo parts, reminiscent of practices of the 17th and 18th centuries. These could take the form of sinfonie concertanti – typically two or more soloists with orchestra – or the Baroque concerto grosso, with musical material passed back and forth between a smaller group of instruments and larger ensemble.

Along the way, I’ll continue to highlight the contributions of women composers during this month in which we celebrate the Clara Schumann bicentennial, with Ellen Taaffe Zwilich’s “Concerto Grosso 1985” and Dame Ethel Smyth’s quixotic Concerto for Violin, Horn and Orchestra.

First – and perhaps of related interest – on today’s Noontime Concert we’ll hear a recital of works by Baroque anomaly Barbara Strozzi.

Strozzi proved to be a phenomenon in an art form that, until the 20th century, wasn’t exactly the most nurturing to women. She was not only a singer, but also a composer. More astonishingly, she appears to have been recognized for it.

DuoSeraphim – soprano Sarah Hawkey and gambist Niccolo Seligmann – will celebrate Strozzi with “In Defiance of Time and Fate.” The program was recorded on December 20th at St. Bartholomew’s Church, 325 Park Avenue, in New York City. Free Midtown Concerts are held at St. Bart’s every Thursday at 1:15 p.m.

Today’s broadcast is another made possible in part by Gotham Early Music Scene, or GEMS. GEMS is a non-profit corporation that supports and promotes artists and organizations in New York City devoted to Early Music. For more information and the complete events calendar, visit gemsny.org.

I think you’ll find there’s always plenty to think about. Your concentration will be amply rewarded, from 12 to 4 p.m. EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

September 24, 2019
Autumn Classical Music Women Composers

La-dee-dah, dee-dah-dee-dum, ‘tis Autumn. Now somebody please tell the weather!

Unfortunately, we all know the drill by now. 90 degrees at the equinox, things cool down somewhat, we put on a sweater, and then it’s back to 110 for Hallowe’en. It makes me long for the days when I would defy my mother so as not to have to wear a coat over my costume.

I hope you’ll join me today on The Classical Network, as I continue to highlight music by women composers – in this month of the Clara Schumann bicentennial – even as I rail against nature with selections to mark the change of season by Cécile Chaminade, Fanny Mendelssohn, Imogen Holst, and Peggy Stuart Coolidge.

I’ll also celebrate the birthday anniversaries of William Levi Dawson, Alexander Arutiunian, and Robert Helps, and offer a musical remembrance of Christopher Rouse, who died on Friday at the age of 70.

The playlist will be as variegated as an enticing pile of leaves. I’ll be munching on Spiced Wafers and making like Nat King Cole, from 4 to 7 p.m. EDT, on WWFM 89.1 FM the Classical Network and wwfm.org.

September 23, 2019
Late Summer Sounds: Women Composers & More

As we continue to savor this precious late-summer’s day, here’s what I’ve got planned musically – as if, in my hubris, there is anything I can do to enhance an already-perfect afternoon.

I’ll continue to highlight the contributions of women composers, during this month in which we celebrate the bicentennial of Clara Schumann. To this end, we’ll hear a suite from “La liberazione di Ruggiero” by Francesca Caccini, on her birthday. This was the first opera composed by a woman and probably the first by an Italian to be performed abroad.

It’s also the anniversary of the births of the great English eccentric and polymath Lord Berners and the Australian composer Arthur Benjamin. Benjamin wrote his most popular piece, “Jamaican Rumba,” for the duo-piano team of Joan and Valerie Trimble. It makes sense, then, to also program Joan’s irresistible “Suite for Strings.”

As if all that weren’t enough, I’ll risk gilding the lily with the inclusion of a charming faux-Baroque dance suite, the conveniently titled “The Nobility of Women,” by Philadelphia composer Kile Smith.

At 6:00, it’s another “Music from Marlboro.” This week, we’ll enjoy three quirky quartets by Mozart, Weber, and Bernard Garfield, as always in performances from the archive of the legendary Marlboro Music Festival.

Tap your toes and take your quartets in the threes. There’s nothing unusual in that, is there? Help yourself to some more tea, from 4 to 7 p.m. EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

PHOTO: A classic Berners tea party (note the horse)

September 18, 2019
Hildegard von Bingen Renaissance Woman

She was a true renaissance woman – before there was even a Renaissance!

Hildegard von Bingen, the 12th century abbess, mystic, visionary, philosopher, scientist, medical theorist, artist, writer, poet, composer, and saint, was a pioneer who excelled in so many fields, it’s a wonder she wasn’t burned at the stake. Where ever did she come from, and why did she have no successors?*

We’ll celebrate this extraordinary figure this afternoon on The Classical Network, as I continue to highlight the work of female composers, a month-long exploration precipitated by the Clara Schumann bicentennial. Tune in to experience music by Hildegard, interleaved with tributes by contemporary composers Aaron Jay Kernis and Christopher Theofanidis. The rest of the afternoon’s playlist will consist entirely of works by women.

First, I hope you’ll join me for today’s Noontime Concert. Mezzo-soprano Chrystal E. Williams and pianist Laurent Philippe will perform songs by Robert Schumann, Federico Garcia Lorca, Benjamin Britten, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Harry T. Burleigh, and Hall Johnson.

The concert was recorded this past May in Merkin Hall at Kaufman Music Center, 129 West 67th Street, in New York City. Merkin’s Tuesday Matinees series presents a new generation of critically acclaimed performers in a concert hall admired for its near-perfect acoustics. To learn more about this season’s offerings, visit kaufmanmusiccenter.org.

Then belly up to the bar for Hildegard’s Feast Day. The table is set for great music, from 12 to 4 p.m. EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

*Interestingly, in reading up on Hildegard, I happened to come across a history of Kassia, a Byzantine abbess and composer who flourished three centuries earlier!

https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2016/03/kassia.html

September 17, 2019
Celebrating Clara Schumann’s Bicentennial

I invite you to join me today in celebrating the bicentennial of the birth of Clara Schumann. Clara Schumann was born Clara Wieck on this date in 1819; she died in 1896.

While she composed comparatively little herself, if we were to stack her manuscripts alongside those of her associates, Robert Schumann and Johannes Brahms, based on what survives, she really sold herself short.

Still, there’s no underestimating her influence as a pianist. Not only was she praised for her imaginative and sensitive interpretations at the keyboard, as a successful performer, she was also able to keep enough food on the table to sustain her large family and to hold it all together when her mercurial husband slipped off the rails.

For the last two decades of her life, she taught at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt. This shot out tendrils in all directions, including to the Juilliard School, where one of her pupils taught Malcolm Frager and Bruce Hungerford.

Fortunately, enough of her music survives to put together a decent salute. We just heard her Piano Trio in G minor on “Music from Marlboro” on Wednesday. Today, we’ll enjoy her “Three Romances” for violin and piano, as well as her Konzertsatz in F minor, the first movement of an intended second piano concerto. We’ll also hear Robert Schumann’s “Variations on a Theme by Clara Wieck” (her maiden name) and “Widmung,” or “Dedication,” a song Robert composed for his new bride.

I am celebrating women all month long. To this end, we’ll also hear Elisabetta Brusa’s opulent Schumann tribute, “Florestan.” Then at 6:00, we’ll hear film scores of Doreen Carwithen, alongside those of her decades-long partner and future husband, William Alwyn.

I hope you’ll join me for Clara Schumann and more, from 3 to 6:00 EDT – with “Picture Perfect” following at 6 – on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

September 13, 2019

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