Rolling in the Deep: the video

The new hit single by Adele somehow escaped my notice until a few weeks ago. When I did finally hear it, I also checked out the video on Youtube, and was quite taken by it. I love the rooms filled with glass and ceramics (though they seem like a terrible waste!), but most of all the dancer in the room filled with sand caught my eye. Something about that room - the low ceiling, the harsh lighting, the sand - evokes a subterranean chamber. I was reminded of the mine shaft I visited last summer in Lansford, PA. The dancer herself, though, brings out a more savage and distant aspect of the scene. She is graceful and full of an inscrutable purpose, seemingly ready to bring down the walls and ceiling with her dance. I see Gagool, the "witch" in King Solomon's Mines, in her. She is something so earthy and distant from Adele's lament of love ill-spent that the video itself becomes more interesting than the shabbily "veiled" lyrics. The dancer joins with the beat of the drums to surpass the singer's polished wail.

Musical Theater = that which causes post-play depression

My last gen ed class of college is on a very familiar and special subject for me: Musical Theater. Having grown up on Broadway music and occasionally indulged in the theater bug at the local Village Players Theater, this is a class I love despite the distant aspect of it (like my statistics class, THDA 440 is online this summer). For the first assignment, I had to describe what "musical theater means to me:" which is to say, the dual association of the classic Broadway shows and Andrew Lloyd Webber 1980s hits which my parents enjoyed, and the offshoot of the tradition of opera, my favorite discipline in the arts. My dad was an avid amateur musical actor and some of my earliest memories are of him learning lines, going to rehearsals, and watching “old” musicals on VHS. My start on the stage was with him (Mr. Bumble, in an impressive costume he handmade) in "Oliver!" - my brother and I were 2 of the 3 smallest orphans in the cast, and I learned just how bad I am at choreography and how depressed I get when a show ends! There is something so engaging about working on music, dance, and words collaboratively. The interaction with the material and your fellow actors, not to mention the audience, is compelling and consuming enough to leave a vacant space in your life when it is completed. I probably won't do much musical theater in the future, but the teamwork and the music/words interface are two of "my favorite things."

Prescott Park performance: The Wizard of Oz

This Sunday night I finally saw a Prescott Park Arts Festival musical performance, and the show couldn't be more appropriate. I have always loved every aspect of the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz - the colors, the characters, the music, and how many tiny details became apparent to me with every viewing. Seeing this film recreated as a musical play is a risky business in part because of the numerous details we all love about Oz. Some details like the puff of steam out of the Tin Man's hat (the scariest part of the film for 4-year-old me!) can't easily be recreated in a live performance, and the beloved actors themselves will not be present. Expectations for the live actors, then, are high: they must look and sound enough like the originals not to jar our eyes and ears, but seem authentic on their own merits. Sunday's performance struck a good balance between re-creating the original and reviving the show in an original manner.
Christine Dulong had the "look" of Dorothy, especially at the distance of my table, and her voice was fresh and clean - not at all an affected reproduction of Garland's manner. She is a UNH theater grad and I am very proud! Knate Higgins and Chris Bradley are a bit young for the Scarecrow and Tin Man respectively, if you are comparing them to Ray Bolger and Jack Haley, but in their own right they are good actors and fine dancers, too. Scottie McLaughlin really stood out as the Lion: "tall dark and handsome" with a grand baritone voice and good comedic skills, I hope to see him in many more roles! The older members of the cast were also excellent: Cathy McKay, John Flynn, and Claudia Faulkner as Auntie Em/Glinda, Uncle Henry/Oz/Marvel/etc, and Miss Gulch/The Wicked Witch of the West anchored the show in its many doublings, with plenty of character. Flynn called the winning ticket at the intermission raffle as well - he is an all around showman.
One exciting surprise for me was the sound and orchestral effects. I expected live players in the pit, but because of the excellent sound tech and the versatile keyboards, the pit was represented by a few horns and a keyboard. Many little details of the film were faithfully brought to life through this team's efforts.
Finally, perhaps my favorite aspect of Wizard of Oz: Dorothy's costume (and really, all the principals'). Ms. Dulong had beautiful ruby slippers, and the Scarecrow, Lion, and especially Tin Man sported fantastic costumes and makeup. And Dorothy's dress, black and white gingham in the Kansas scene, became the classic blue when transported to Munchkinland - staying that color for the final scene back in Kansas. I wonder if this was on purpose, to show how Dorothy brought Oz with her?

Opera on the air: Star Edition

This week's opera broadcast include some of my favorite living voices! First up, WFMT is broadcasting Il Postino, from the LA Opera with Placido Domingo as the poet Neruda. This should be on air Saturday July 16 at 1pm ET ("PREFEED: Friday, July 15, 2011 - 1500 ET | LIVE FEED: Saturday, July 16, 2011 - 1300 ET").

WETA is playing Handel's Alcina with a cast headlined by two excellent singers: Anja Harteros (Alcina), and Vesselina Kasarova (Ruggiero). Broadcast at 1pm ET July 16.

Finally, NPR's World of Opera is featuring Ernani, with one of my favorite living basses, Ferruccio Furlanetto, as Silva. (He was an adorable Leporello to Sam Ramey's Giovanni in a memorable 1987 Salzburg Festival performance with Karajan.) The rest of the cast is none too shabby either: Rudy Park (Ernani); Dimitra Theodossiou (Elvira); and Marco De Felice (Don Carlo). WDAV is livestreaming this.

SciAm on vacuums and subways, and a novel I love

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cocktail-party-physics/2011/07/11/a-series-of-tubes/ The physics in this post are a bit beyond my level of understanding+ability, but it's well written and exciting to read nonetheless. Thanks Jennifer Ouelette for reminding me of Downsiders - a YA novel (which I loved!) about underground dwellings in NYC.

Star Wars: an opera in 5 acts

Who hasn't thought of Star Wars as a Meyerbeer-style rescue opera?
Ok, maybe that is just the opera geek in me. But the cast and plot have much in common with the grand opera of the 19th century. Hero rescues princess and wins a battle in the struggle against an oppressive empire, amid local color, grand spectacle, and grand music.
Ironically, the music would be one major obstacle in the translation of Star Wars from film epic to grand opera: John Williams doesn't seem likely to write an opera himself or allow his music to be incorporated into one. So a composer taking the story (with rights to use it) would need to create a new musical vocabulary for this piece: something iconic and unique enough to distinguish itself from the film's music, while balancing between operatic and vernacular to reach an audience appropriate to such a fusion of grand art and modern fairy tale. I don't think I could dream in my lifetime of doing Star Wars justice. But maybe someone else out there could.

"Lover's Concerto:" elements of the classical

In the recent book, Beautiful Monsters, Michael Long takes a look at my personal favorite subject area: the relationship between classical and popular elements in music. Long is talking about the classical in pop today, as opposed to pop in classical music or classical "popular" elements such as opera themes. Beautiful Monsters features an encyclopedic dash through modern popular music, with hundreds of pieces referenced in passing. You would do well to read this book next to YouTube, because each reference is complemented by the actual sound material (not all of us have this music at instant mental recall) and the references are frequently cross-referenced.
One piece which I gradually recognized as familiar was "Lover's Concerto" by the Toys. I had first heard this piece as a small child, but not matched the piece to any title (though I still recall most of the lyrics and timbres perfectly) or group name. More recently, I had been stunned to find out that this piece is based on another famous miniature, of a very different era and aesthetic: a minuet by Bach. Duh. The meter is now 4/4, instead of the standard 3/4 of minuets, and in addition to having lyrics unrelated to Bach, the song is complemented by saxophone solos and a girl-group sound typical of the early 1960s.
Long's concern is with the use of the term "concerto," seemingly a misnomer here, to "place" the song in a classical register. At the very beginning of the song, before the band starts, several "concerto" chords on a piano are heard. The song's writers, Linzer and Randel, may indeed have felt "concerto" was foreign enough, and classical enough, to label the song with some exotic flavor, as well as to nod towards the classical origins of the melody. (I am unaware of the story of the artistic choice to use Bach material here in the first place; Wikipedia and allmusic cite the 'Bach' melody as well as the attribution of this piece to Bach, but do not hint at any motivation for the "classical" feel evoked here.)
The structure of the song is very tightly woven together, with the solo-group interplay intersecting with the instruments of the band. While the lyrics seem irrelevant to the title, they are well fit to the notes sung, with few awkward moments. When the saxophone solo takes up the melody during the break, the articulations are preserved from the vocal statement, slurring together the notes to which multi-syllable words are set. Tone painting is mostly avoided, even when dealing with lyrics which address "the rain / which falls," and this seems to avoid the full potential for cliche in a song which can only be heard through cliches.

As the song begins in this live video from the show "Hullabaloo," a bust of (presumably) J.S. Bach is seen in the foreground. The intro to the song features saxophones and a "hook" reminiscent of the Four Seasons, another group produced by the same label and often the same songwriters. This hook does not recur, but the sax scoring continues as a theme throughout. The classical bust as scene-setting reinforces the "novelty song" character of this piece; perhaps audiences were aware of the Bach association, making this scenery the only reference to the actual Bach material. In the personal consumption of the song, the only equivalent was this "Concerto" in the title and the piano chords of the first few bars, after which the "concerto" elements fade away.
"Lover's Concerto" continues to resonate throughout the book, as his many encyclopedic references bounce around and reappear.  Long takes into account many different threads relating to this song: pastoralism, antique elements of the text, and the classical ethos evoked by the title. The great thing for me about classical music and popular music as two complementary bodies of work is the way we can enjoy a good pop song or a fun classical piece at different levels - the structure, the bones are there if you look, regardless of the (often enjoyable) surface material.

7/8 of a college degree: looking back on the major(s)

College has been somewhat of a playground for me, though without the typical drinking and party scene. Academically, I have felt encouraged and ambitious enough to attempt a double major, and complete 2 minors.
My major in music had been a sure thing since no earlier than January of 2008, a month or so before auditioning, and before that, I had expected to major in something basic like Spanish. The music major I chose was a broad specialization – Liberal Studies, the former Undifferentiated option, and designed to revitalize interest at UNH in music history and create opportunities for more custom focuses, like ethnomusicology. The curriculum appealed to me, and the focus of the major seemed less performance-oriented – a plus for a self-taught amateur enthusiast. Once at UNH, I participated in both a lesson studio, and the Liberal Studies symposium group. Both were experiences of great value, and seeing the work of my peers in the history field is always sweetly humbling for me. I may know them from classes and UNH life, but I am always amazed to see the breadth of knowledge, different experience, and devotion they bring to their studies! The Liberal Studies experience– classes, professors, and peers – has seen me through 3 years now of UNH music, and in the last year, has inspired me to look towards graduate study in musicology as the next step in my academic career.
The very first class I attended at UNH (and, unless drivers’ ed counts, my very first classroom experience ever after 12 years of homeschool education) was elementary Italian, with Amy Boylan. My operatic vocabulary, functional but creaky, served me well as I found that already I understood Italian at a high level for this intro class. Professor Boylan suggested I enter Mayder Dravasa’s class the following semester and essentially skip a year’s classes – taking the beginning of 1st year and the end of 2nd year back to back. After this much Italian, I was ready for the UNH in Italy at Ascoli Piceno semester abroad, along with 17 other UNH students and piano professors Chris and Arlene Kies. Combining the classes at UNH with an independent study and my Ascoli classes, I had completed a minor with hardly any effort. My only regret was not paying more attention in Amy’s class when we learned about Italian menus and restaurants. I figured this would never come in handy, not expecting to be in Italy a year later..it would have been very useful!
Spring of 2010 brought me very close to declaring a second major in Linguistics. The subject matter fascinates me and the detailed work of surveys, syntax, and morphology scratched some serious academic itches. To understand accents, dialects, and why words look and sound like they do – the ultimate geek experience! I ultimately decided against the major due to the tiny size of the linguistics department – the music community, though small, is about 10 times the size of linguistics and allows for a little bit more cross-fertilization of ideas. I occasionally fantasize about a graduate degree or second B.A. in linguistics, and applying myself to the study of Italian dialects.
My farthest digression from music started around the same time as my classes in Historical and Comparative Linguistics. I took a class on Earth History with the chair of the Geology department, and again, scratched academic itch. Here was the grand panorama of evolution, plate tectonics, and the solar system. I was hooked. Over summer 2010, I made countless spreadsheets of major requirements, trying to configure a plan which allowed me to graduate on time and still hit the high points of two extremely divergent  disciplines. In the end, class options limited the viability of said plan (and I do feel more competent in the humanities/arts than in sciences – if only I had had this discussion in high school!) and I will graduate with geology as my second minor. Geology, Italian, and linguistics are three fields dear to my heart which I still enjoy keeping up with – and hope to revisit over the years if I succeed in creating an academic career. UNH served me well in offering all these options. I would indeed “major in UNH studies” if there were such an option!

Opera Spotlight: L'Italiana in Algeri, La Boheme, and Handel's Hercules

NPR World of Opera features Rossini's L'Italiana in Algeri, with Lawrence Brownlee.

WETA is playing the Castleton Festival's La Bohème

July 9, 2011, 1:00 pm conducted by Lorin Maazel

And Chicago Lyric's broadcast of Hercules (Handel) is on WFMT at 12pm CT (1pm ET).

Mozart's influence: statistical procrastination

I recently completed an online course in Statistics (through UNH's Sociology department). It was, in many ways, the "easiest" class I have ever had, because there was no attendance and I took no notes. There were readings, homework assignments, and quizzes, which did keep me sporadically on my toes, but overall the concept of the class stayed rather remote from my mind. Or so I thought.
Here I am a week later, contemplating the use of statistical methods (some of which, such as regression, I am aware that I never even read about for this class, but may be useful) to assess the influence of Haydn and Mozart on later composers (Beethoven, Schubert perhaps). My plan involves collecting data from piano sonata slow movements (excluding theme-and-variations) such as relative key, melodic contour of the opening phrase,  length, and tempo marking to compare "apples to apples" from Mozart's work to Beethoven's.
Perhaps this is the kind of academic minutia which real scholars dismiss as bean-counting, and I might be better off writing a paper or a piece of my own. I certainly do not know enough about statistics yet to use multi-variate analysis or any of the techniques I have read about recently in books on politics (Why Iowa?: How Caucuses and Sequential Elections Improve the Presidential Nominating Process) or broad social science (Natural Experiments of History - excellent book!). But down the road, my little database might provide me with an interesting sandbox for experiments!

Opera Spotlight: Il Trittico, Lohengrin, and Semele

WETA is featuring Puccini's Triptych this Saturday at 1pm. Listen on the livestream to this performance from last July, conducted by Lorin Maazel. IMSLP has the scores:
http://imslp.org/wiki/Suor_Angelica_(Puccini,_Giacomo)
http://imslp.org/wiki/Il_tabarro_(Puccini,_Giacomo)
http://imslp.org/wiki/Gianni_Schicchi_(Puccini,_Giacomo)
and the libretti are at Operaglass:
http://opera.stanford.edu/Puccini/IlTabarro/libretto.html
http://opera.stanford.edu/Puccini/SuorAngelica/libretto.html
http://opera.stanford.edu/Puccini/GianniSchicchi/libretto.html

Lohengrin is this week's Chicago Lyric broadcast, with Sir Andrew Davis conducting a great cast headed up by Johan Botha and Emily Magee. WFMT also runs a live stream - Lohengrin plays at 12:00pm Central Time (1pm Eastern). Here's the score, from IMSLP, and the libretto.

NPR World of Opera will be featuring Handel's Semele from the Champs-Elysees Theatre. Here's the libretto and the score at IMSLP.

7/8 finished with my college degree: looking back on the gen ed experience

I will miss college classes.  UNH's 40 credit general education curriculum does only require 1 class of all students (English 401), as pointed out to me by the friend who gave me the unofficial campus tour, and the other 36 credits are yours to explore new areas. The ability to dive headfirst into a new discipline (albeit occasionally taking that dive into the shallow end with unexpected results) has been a mainstay of my education thus far. If I could, I would have taken more of these forays into the rest of campus life, and reforms to broaden gen ed lists have crossed my mind several times.
People of my mother's generation, and farther back, Teddy Roosevelt's, have seen gen eds as an arbitrary component of a college education, and a forced sidetrack from the majors in which they are concentrating. I wish future generations could experience a more unified curriculum, where classes drawn from different areas of study demonstrate just how many different ways science and art are "done" at a university. Gen eds should produce wonder, and perhaps some ambition for further pursuit of these disciplines - not a rote presentation for the sake of both instructor and student's "required" participation.
Wouldn't it be great if during a semester, every student became acquainted with several branches of science which are as interdependent as they are independent, such as biology, chemistry, and physics! The 40 credits of gen eds could be re-distributed into several semester-length in depth looks at various areas of study at UNH, divided by broad themes. Already these required classes are distributed by category, and draw from different colleges within the university; interdisciplinary classes are a natural extension of these and the Inquiry courses. Students could spend their classroom time with professors who love their work. Instead of  cramming for midterms, students could learn about the methods, achievements, and principles which unite disciplines - and even learn about the contributions of science to art and vice versa.
There is so much information to encounter in the disciplines at UNH which make up the gen ed pool, and I do not believe that real proficiency is expected as the goal of the general education requirement. Instead of a goal of "mastery" of basic chemistry, or linguistics, or American history, why not allow students to encounter these concepts in a presentation by enthusiastic professors, emphasizing the vast range of work and beauty their subjects embrace?

Countertenor Nicholas Spanos

In search of countertenor versions of the late 19th century French chanson repertoire, I encountered the gorgeous voice of Nicholas Spanos. His repertoire embraces all the usual standbys of modern countertenors - Baroque and older opera, with a good showing of French chanson, some Handel oratorio in English, Spanish folk songs, and Schubert lied. As well as possessing a beautiful timbre and well-chosen vibrato, Spanos is also a very handsome fellow (a necessary trait for fame in this media age, I am sorry to say), with the properly "exotic" tall-dark-handsome look of a leading tenor heartthrob. In short, I hope to see much more of this young singer in the future!  Check out plavos's channel on Youtube for the extensive collection of his repertoire.
Now if only I could hear him sing "Lascia ch'io pianga"......

"Nixon in China" and video game practice

In John Adams' description of the creation process for Nixon in China (recently reposted here), one description which stuck out to me addressed the technical demands of Adams' music. 

At the end of an act the expressions on some players’ faces resemble someone who’s just survived an A-level Japanese video game.

The relationship between video game proficiency and musical proficiency is a striking simile, and one that (at a very low level of interaction) I enjoy. Sometimes I enjoy practicing piano with the same low-level ambition with which I enjoy a good game of Frogger 3D: similar pitfalls, new places, new sounds, eye-hand coordination. Perhaps if I was more ambitious at video games, I'd practice the piano more!
Funny.

A Good Opera read, from Holdekunst Blog

http://holdekunst.com/blog/classical-beach-reading-robert-levines-weep-shudder-die.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+HoldeKunstClassicalMusicBlog+%28Holde+Kunst+Classical+Music+Blog%29 Thanks for posting!

Diva Disappointment: "Firework" and "Edge of Glory"

Katy Perry's recent single "Firework" left me wishing the song had been written for a different diva. The message was in line with other recent work by artists like Lady Gaga and Pink, dealing with low self-esteem and encouragement (at various levels of empowering, like "Born this way" - more about that in a minute - or sappy, like "F***ing Perfect"). But the voice itself was lacking. With a wide range of an octave and a half, "Firework" requires strength, clarity, and a range of expression across the registers. (In my opinion, pop vocals usually play up the differences and uneven qualities of a wide range for expressive purposes, unlike classical vocals where we expect the voice to remain consistent in size and quality in all registers.) Perry's voice has plenty of bite and clarity in the low register, making the verse consistent overall with much of her trademark work (perky pop songs with an edge, like California Gurls). But where the verse begins to transition to the chorus, around "just own the night" her technique lets her down and the voice becomes spread and increasingly strained. The chorus itself is in the highest register Perry reaches and it is a painful reminder that, as tart and clever as Perry's persona is, she can never become the next Mariah Carey, Beyonce, or even...
(I hate to say it)
Lea Michelle.
Yes, the cover which redeems "Firework" for me comes from an all too likely source: Glee. As much as I can't watch Glee without deconstructing fervently the show's small-minded premise and biased plotlines, I have to admit that the show's star Lea Michelle has the voice that Perry lacks. (Artificial amplification and editing techniques aside, because of course both "Glee" episodes and Katy Perry performances and recordings are aided by technology.) Her rendition of "Firework" brought out the athletic nature of the rising line during the transition from verse to chorus with sophomoric perfection - this is, after all, a song to make the losers in you and me feel good about being ourselves - and gave the music all the timbral color and personality that Perry could throw at it. If she can get past having reached stardom for a teenage sitcom and get to Broadway, Lea Michelle seems to have the voice that it takes.

The title track from Lady Gaga's new album "Born this way" hit all the right notes for me. She mentions "transgender" and a whole host of other non-radio-friendly terms which need to be said (though admittedly, "transgender" would be hard to fit into any lyrical scheme - and Gaga places it where it has the most bite and sounds the most idiomatic, in a spoken break). And her main theme is one I support: you are who you are;  and because of her explicit reference to gender identity, among other things, this is not just a drinking song a la Ke$ha, but one that gets to the root of discrimination. Celebrating unique identity is different when you are channeling the average, typical, and broad-based appealing, versus that which doesn't usually qualify for airplay.
That said, the second single leaves the one element I am so attracted to of Gaga's music. Her electro-pop sound and distant allure keep her listeners questioning (even the ridiculous questions perpetuated this mystique, like "is she a man") and capitalized on the artificial nature of most modern pop. Rebecca Black used AutoTune and was rightfully laughed at, because the timbre created by her natural endowment and that of the engineers was laughable and strange in a bad way. Gaga's artificial sound remains attractive, even if also somewhat off-putting. "The Edge of Glory" closes the gap between artist, object (as in "Alejandro" or "LoveGame" - a person of sometimes unspecified gender who is being drawn towards Gaga's persona while we watch the seduction), and listener, and instead reaches for the tired cliche of love songs. The lyrics are easily paraphrased, but let me allow Enrique Iglesias to do it for me. "Tonight I'm loving you" - a sexy song despite its lyrics - exotic appeal is played up by Iglesias here, but not by Gaga in "Edge of Glory." Exotic appeal is the artistic element eschewed here, for basically the first time in the oeuvre of Gaga. We do not look to her for "Silly Love Songs" and I don't believe even Clarence Clemons' sax will boost "Edge of Glory" to the level Gaga usually reaches.

"Opera's Shakespeare:" why Verdi made one NYT critic's Top Ten

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/17/top-10-composers-hailing-operas-shakespeare-and-its-proust/ And I couldn't agree more!

John Adams on "Nixon in China"

http://www.earbox.com/posts/103
Read Adams' recollection of creating the roles and matching the singers to the music. He is self-effacing about his vocal writing and assesses his own music with a clear eye and a very approachable manner.

Listening to 20th century music: spotlight on a favorite blog

 I studied the Quartet for the End of Time in Professor Lori Dobbins' class last year at UNH and loved Messiaen's language. Here is an excellent guide to the work from Michael Barry's blog. Thanks for posting!

Retiring David Tyree on why gay marriage equals anarchy

http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2011/06/retired_football_player_says_s.php
Sometimes the things people say are just too ridiculous to make up.

Skepticblog » “A Boy Named Sue” Revisited

Skepticblog » “A Boy Named Sue” Revisited
A list of top names by profession is statistically scrutinized by the Skepticblog.

Songs to Keep Cool

"Moondance," which I reviewed recently, is a very "chill" song. Here are a few more favorites for cool summer nights.

• Gnarls Barkley: Crazy  Cee Lo Green evokes craziness in such a smooth, seductive way that you almost feel like being crazy with him. Maybe I'm crazy...
• The Doors: Riders on the Storm This song evokes open space, with the long instrumental breaks, even drum beat and ambient "rain" sounds. The lyrics have an alienated quality which functions surprisingly well with Morrison's non-chalant delivery. If he's been left out in the rain, he doesn't seem to be in any hurry to get inside.
• Peter Frampton: Do you feel like we do The alien quality of the talkbox on Frampton's guitar is very modernistic - taking what is familiar (human voice, guitar), and making it unfamiliar by mixing these two elements together.  "Do you feel like we do" begins with an upbeat section which seems only vaguely related to the "chill" part of the song (starting around the 4 minute mark). The talkbox appears at 7:23 and thrills the crowd.
• Phil Collins: In the Air Tonight I'm not sure what Collins sees coming, but the atmosphere is expectant, dark, and as spacious as that of "Riders on the Storm."
• CCR: I Heard It Through the Grapevine Quite different from the music of the California Raisins commercial (Marvin Gaye, Claymation-style), CCR's remix of this song has a cold, cool take on jealousy. In common with the other songs in this list, the mode is vaguely minor (the original leans more towards major mode Motown with blue notes) with steady drums and dark, bass-heavy atmosphere. This track is amazingly long for radio airplay at just over 11 minutes, with the band mulling over the melody and bass riff between vocal episodes.

Father's Day in American music

http://new.headlinecountry.net/?p=186
An excellent Father's Day spotlight on country music tributes to our fathers, always with us. Thanks Tom Roland for the list!

This post dedicated to the memories of my dad, a Father's Day baby who would be 72 today, and another dad I remember fondly, the dad of 4 of my oldest friends. Here are two songs that remind me of them.

Oh What a Beautiful Morning, from the film featuring Gordon MacRae. Years ago, my dad sang Curley in a local production of Oklahoma!. This was for years afterward his signature song, and his voice was still beautiful into his 60s.
I Believe, by Diamond Rio. This song appeared on the radio shortly after my friends' dad Keith was diagnosed with cancer. I may not "believe in ghosts" like the lyrics, but the song still makes me cry.

Songs for the Road

The one accessory any car of mine must have is a radio. The car is my favorite (and usually, only) place to hear current popular music beyond YouTube, and therefore my only automatically produced playlist (I've never liked Pandora's interface - too much of my own choices imposed on what I hear).
"Driving" or "train" songs especially appeal to me. I'm not sure if this is due to my actual music preferences, or my love for automobile travel (and pseudo-nostalgia for/idolization of train travel). Here are some great driving songs - the ones that sound like you're on the road, not just songs about being on the road.

God is great, Beer is good - Billy Currington

Ok, it's not about driving or travel at all, but the rhythm's steady "chugga chugga" beat and leisurely pace (cut time; according to my metronome, about 72bpm) has that perfect "road" sound. The song itself is simplistic  'easy listening country', with a I V vi IV progression for the verse and an interesting if sentimental twist at the end.

Me and Bobby McGee- the Kris Kristofferson version
This time, a song about travel, with a similar beat. Kristofferson's recording isn't a bit rushed, very laid back. Janis Joplin's version is iconic but more high-energy - contrasting qualities which extend beyond the metronome mark and the rhythm section to the voices themselves.







Hey, Good Lookin'

the 2000s cover by Jimmy Buffett and friends from 2004 is an entirely different animal compared to the Hank Williams original. The "good times" community feel of a group of star soloists sharing a good-natured pick-up line is perfect for summer and road trips - though once again, the beat of this song places it in this category, not so much the content. The quality of the voice is once again key - like Joplin and Kristofferson, it's not so much the authenticity of the original singer but the atmosphere the cover creates.





End of the Line - Traveling Wilburys 
The music video for this quintessentially "travel" song takes place on a train. The Traveling Wilburys were an all-star group that included Eric Clapton,George Harrison, and Bob Dylan.


Two of Us - Beatles
A little more upbeat than the other songs here, this piece is actually much more nostalgic and almost bittersweet than the "in the moment" mood evoked by most of this list.
I could probably make a playlist of just Beatles road songs. Here's another:

Any Road
Off of George Harrison's last album, Brainwashed, this song features his son Dhani on guitar and a world-wise lyric from Harrison. Definitely a must for any Beatles road trip.



Mockingbird - James Taylor + Carly Simon
I heard this on a drive through upstate NY, and it makes excellent driving music. The singers' voices mix in an inventive quasi-polyphony; the original version of the song was written and sung by siblings Inez and Charlie Foxx.

 City of New Orleans: Willie Nelson
Suggested to me for this list - this is an all-time favorite of mine and mentioned on my post Songs from my mother, but it is also equally appropriate here for its "train" theme and rhythm. Actually, this song is always appropriate!
(As a side note, Willie Nelson sings great music for any road trip playlist. "On the Road Again" has a much more upbeat feel though, not the "train" beat this post highlights.)

Superconductor: From Mahler to Meat Loaf

Superconductor: From Mahler to Meat Loaf: "Rock's Roots in the 19th Century Art Song" Thanks Superconductor for this great spotlight! The interactions of popular music with classical material are worth a lifetime of study.

Opera Spotlight: The Mikado

Hear this week's opera at http://www.wfmt.com/streaming. Times:

PREFEED:  Friday, June 17, 2011 - 1500 ET

LIVE FEED: Saturday, June 18, 2011 - 1300 ET

Also, check out: Washington WETA (thanks Michelle!) 
http://www.weta.org/fm/listenlive

Bastille Opera's performance of Francesca da Rimini (by Zandonai)
June 18, 2011, 1:00 pm


Chicago Lyric's broadcast this week features the beloved Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, The Mikado. With a native English-speaking cast (more about that in a minute) featuring James Morris and Stephanie Blythe, I anticipate a great performance experience. I've seen Morris live (as Filippo II at Tanglewood, my first live opera) and he is a very handsome, charismatic performer whose voice has a real growl to it.

G & S operettas were part of my introduction to opera (chorus roles in Pirates of Penzance and Patience) and I saw Mikado performed live at the Portsmouth Music Hall in 2003. The satire of these works is wrapped in marzipan music and is still valid today, as the bureaucrats and "nobility" Gilbert lampooned in the Victorian era still walk among us. Mikado features one of my favorite tenor pieces, "A Wand'ring Minstrel I" and many other favorite excerpts. Here's a decent (though more Broadway than G & S)  recording of Simon Gallaher from YouTube.

Finally, a word about native speakers. I  have nothing against artists performing roles in a foreign language, and some of my favorite artists would never have become world-famous if they had been restricted to operas by composers of their nationality. (Sad but true: there are many excellent composers from Bulgaria, for instance, and Bulgaria gives the world many truly excellent singers like Vesselina Kasarova, Nicola Ghiuselev, and Nicolai Ghiaurov, but the big opera houses such as Covent Garden or the Met are not very likely to feature a Bulgarian opera when pieces like Tosca pay the bills.) BUT my caveat: I recently listened to a recording in mono from the 50s of Poulenc's opera Dialogues des Carmelites sung by a French cast - and it was a mind-blowing experience. French is a beautiful language and when sung by a native-speaker cast, the attention to detail and deep understanding of the sounds and associations of the vocabulary is amazing. Here's hoping this week's Mikado is at least half as idiomatic and fluent as that recording!

History through the Operaglass

When I found this book, about 4 years ago, I was thrilled that one of my favorite subjects had been addressed and compiled at such length. Opera tends to tap the most dramatic of stories, so there are plenty of fictional or mythological plots, but many librettists have seen dramatic potential in real stories. That is not to say that "historically based" operas are always accurate: sometimes they can have more legend in them than those based in myth.George Jellinek guides the reader through approximately 1800 years of opera plots, from Giulio Cesare to Tosca and many others in between. Google Books also has a preview and e-book available.

Perhaps someday this book will be updated to the modern era.

And so this is Christmas

almost. But the song I want to explore today is never out of season: John Lennon and Yoko Ono's "Happy Christmas (War is Over)." Like most Christmas songs worth a second hearing, this one has been covered by various artists, and their new takes can add to the overall beauty and community of the song. The harmonic progression of “Happy Christmas" is fairly simple but effective. Dissonances in the accompaniment and melody highlight the song’s attitude of hope in the face of the world’s concerns.

sung by John Lennon and Yoko Ono

One of the most touching moments of the song, whether rehearsed or candid, is Lennon and Ono’s whisper of Christmas wishes to their children before the music starts.  “War is Over", the song’s subtitle, is sung to the countermelody during the chorus. The theme of peace and hopes for a better world echo “Imagine,” released 2 months earlier in 1971. Lennon never stopped hoping for peace and this song, though beloved as a Christmas standard, is an eloquent protest of the war in Vietnam and war anywhere.

sung by Maroon 5

Of all the covers I have heard for this song, Maroon 5 makes the most interesting counterpart to Lennon's version. In contrast to most of the others I looked at (Celine Dion, U2, Sarah Maclachlan), their version begins plainly with the lead singer solo and a piano playing a single line, and does not get much more decorated with that. All the rest choose to begin with guitars strumming and perhaps add tambourines for rhythm, a stylistic choice which echoes Lennon's original recording.  The significance of the instrumentation here reflects the different emotional content in each version. Lennon and Ono are joined by a children's choir, and take the song up and up the scale through modulations, perhaps in a gesture of joy. Maroon 5 skips the upward modulation and chooses to keep the song in a medium-low vocal register for the majority of the song, which keeps the atmosphere intimate and hushed, nothing like the exuberant but deep emotion of Ono singing "war is over/if you want it."

The single line played against the soloist is the countermelody, later used in the chorus with the words “War is over/if you want it/now” with “nota cambiata” non-harmonic tones. The starkness of the piano line makes every dissonant interval in the countermelody stand out, and the vocal line is changed minutely to add emphasis to these dissonant notes. Instead of the tender and hopeful atmosphere of Lennon's version, Maroon 5 seems bittersweetly nostalgic and perhaps more world-weary than optimistic. At 2:55, the lyrics "let's hope it's a good one" are given a bitter cast by the dissonance in the melody over a minor chord (ii), which resolves to a major chord through passing notes in the bass. These notes are harmonized and brought out by strings, which have been added as the song gains momentum. In each repetition of the chorus the chords resolve in the same pattern, but the addition of the strings and the emphasis on the IV chord, bright and sunny, twists this chorus unexpectedly into optimism. Perhaps the singer does not really believe war is over, but by the end of the song we feel it may be possible.

Opera on the Air: free broadcasts

In 2006 when I first got "the opera bug," I made extensive use of online and radio broadcasts to record (to cassette) and hear new operas. Between the Met and WFMT, there is a broadcast nearly every Saturday of the year.

http://www.operainfo.org/ The Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts, carried by many public radio stations. This site also contains background info on the operas of the current and previous seasons, with score examples, photos, and recording clips.

http://www.metoperafamily.org/stream.aspx 
Every week during the Met season (approximately August to May) one performance is streamed live online, through RealPlayer.

http://www.wfmt.com/main.taf?p=12,10 WFMT fills out the year in between Met seasons (May-August), with broadcasts from Chicago and San Francisco's opera houses. Radio coverage can be supplemented by online streams from stations in the WFMT network.

http://www.npr.org/programs/world-of-opera/
Depending on your location, you may hear World of Opera, NPR's opera highlights program. If like me, this is not available to you on air, the website archives "hit singles" and sometimes whole operas.


I will be working on a recurring spotlight on available broadcasts with background on the operas featured.

Moondance

We've all heard Van Morrison's jazz tune "Moondance." How do the covers measure up?

Original version by Van Morrison, with lyrics

The verse is mostly made up of the same A A’ phrase, but Morrison’s feel for the music makes these repeats anything but repetitious. He allows the words to shape the lines in terms of intensity and momentum. Morrison’s voice in this song (both as an instrument and as “author”) is confident and casual, and retains its “rock” timbre while singing convincingly in a jazz style. He sounds like he has the whole night to spend on song and romance, and conveys a laidback yet eager attitude.
Covers for this song are not hard to find, and I heard many of them in between listening to the singers I already knew (Buble, McFerrin, Morrison).

sung by Catherine Reed

Reed does a decent job of varying the phrases, but as noted in comments, her decision to drop her voice at the end of each phrase makes the words less than audible. In a song like “Moondance,” attention to little details make the whole piece more passionate – you can’t rush over any words (even repeated sections) and come across convincingly. Also, her choice of timbres for contrast occasionally strike my ear as odd. Reed’s voice becomes big where the song could be interpreted as soft, etc.

sung by Grady Tate

According to Wikipedia (unsourced, unfortunately), Morrison was pleased by Tate’s cover. Tate changes the melody in little ways, making it his own and increasing the intensity, and in general sings a higher-energy “Moondance” than Morrison. In the first verse, the brushes on the drum sound like the leaves Tate, an excellent drummer, mentions in the lyrics.

sung by Kai McKenzie

McKenzie is called in the caption for this video “the top UK Michael Buble tribute act.” He has a very clean voice; in my opinion his version is way too clean. Every word, even when the song really gets going before the break (2:00), is chopped neatly into place (though the attacks themselves are scooped in a very pop-music style) and the timbre barely varies from the first verse to the end.

sung by Michael Buble

Here’s Buble himself, at the Verizon Wireless Arena of my home state. Singing this live, he brings as polished an approach to the overall song as if he were in the studio. As with Reed, some of his phrases seem “hard” where they could be softer and more tender (such as 3:17 “make some more romance”); this seems to be his way of sounding forcefully romantic or dramatic, not something Buble is known for. Like Tate’s version, he raises the intensity of the song overall from Morrison’s original and it works, especially live.

sung by Charlese

This version strikes me as more idiomatic than the Catherine Reed version, though uneven overall. Charlese uses a great variety of vocal color, and patterns the intensity of her phrases on the text like Morrison. Her voice gets breathy at times in an awkward way, but overall she has plenty of feeling and a free but intense approach to the song.

sung by Bobby McFerrin

Saving arguably the best artist for last, here is Bobby McFerrin. Son of an opera singer, he is a consummate musician and sings the “instrumental” solo at the beginning of this track. McFerrin changes the melody right from the beginning and interpolates new wordless solos, while sticking to the low, calm atmosphere of Morrison’s Moondance. Because the repetitive elements (vocal melody, guitar accompaniment, rhythms) in the song are carefully rearranged and varied, McFerrin manages to make his version even more laidback and precisely romantic than Morrison’s. A similar, live version is linked below.

sung by Bobby McFerrin (recorded live)

in response to "A Gay Girl in Damascus" blog/hoax

When I read the post reporting Amina's disappearance at http://damascusgaygirl.blogspot.com/, I was deeply saddened that the "bad guys" might have won and that her voice might be silenced. But when I heard that Amina was rumored to be a hoax, my feelings of support and solidarity did not change. Whether fictional or not, the voice was authentic and even more importantly, a minority all too often silenced.
I support Tom MacMaster and I hope he finds time one day to write Amina a book. Her story is worth reading and I would gladly buy any such book. Most of all, I support all dissidents who dare to defy parental expectations, state society, and tradition in defense of their own moral compass.

Als die Mutter: Songs from my mother

In my life thus far, there has been no greater musical influence than my mother. Her tastes influenced mine, and my strongest interests in music have developed from the starting point of her printed and recorded collections. My interest in opera would not exist were it not for the musicals of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Rodgers and Hammerstein, which I learned to appreciate because of my parents.
Here are 10 tracks from my mother's record collection or songbooks.

1. Buffy St. Marie “Universal Soldier.”
2. Rodgers and Hammerstein: Waltz from “Carousel”
3. The Beatles: “Taxman”
4. Patti Lupone: “Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina”
5. Willie Nelson: “City of New Orleans”
6. Kenny Rogers: “Lucille”
7. The Shirelles: “Soldier Boy”
8. “Malagueña”
9. Palestrina: Jesu Rex Admirabilis
10. How Great Thou Art

Off beat fugues

I love the intersection of classical forms and popular material, whether it’s the use of ABA form in a rock song or Beethoven’s use of opera hits for themes to vary. Here are some fugues composed on modern pop material which I especially enjoy.

Fugue for the Tinhorns

Frank Loesser’s opening number for “Guys and Dolls” starts the show in a quirky and energetic way, giving the same music to three different gamblers praising the virtues of (and betting on) three different horses. The use of fugue here works well and keeps up the momentum of “Runyonland” (the prelude).

fugue on “Bad Romance”

Giovanni Dettori’s fugue has a good YouTube presence, with covers on organ and piano. Here’s the sheet music: http://www.giovannidettori.com/LadyGagaFugue.pdf Dettori states that this is “not strict counterpoint;” I find it interesting that the answer doesn’t start until the countersubject has begun. He uses the fugal form fairly fluently, making a good argument for the validity of pop material in classical garb.

Fugue on that ubiquitous Nokia ringtone

Nokia phones are everywhere, and everywhere they go the subject of this fugue goes with them. http://www.audiomuse.ca/doc/pdf/lo_nokia_fugue_v2a.pdf Vincent Lo, the composer, writes perky counterpoint around this tune (and presents a very clean typeset score, too).

Fugato Humoresque on the theme of “Dixie”

Now for some professional music. Mana Zucca was a famous soloist and composer around the turn of the century. Look her up online! Shura Cherkassky is another great pianist from later this century and does a fantastic job with this quintessentially American piece. A free recording can be downloaded here: http://www.lykhin.com/eng/classicdb/composers/mana-zucca/1398

.............................................................................................................................................................
Finally, an encore. Though not a fugue, the “Dance of the Hours” from Amilcare Ponchielli’s opera La Gioconda became a popular hit in its day. You may recognize it as another famous pop song: listen to the original (the melody starts at 2:00) and then scroll down for the reveal.

“Dance of the Hours” from La Gioconda

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one of my childhood favorite songs!

Books for summer and beyond

It's summer, and I have more time to read. Here are 27 of the books which I return to over and again, in no particular order, with some quick keywords and Google or Amazon previews when possible. I could write blurbs about all of them, but in most cases the previews explain better than I could. Suffice it to say that what I love most about a book is an author you can connect with, and handsome writing.

Davies, Norman: Europe: a History not so conservative European history
Mumford, Lewis: The City in History
Johnson, Paul: Modern Times conservative American history
Gould, Steven Jay: Wonderful Life on the Burgess Shale fossil deposit
Tolstoy, Leo: Anna Karenina
Hawthorne, Nathaniel: Short Stories try “The Great Stone Face” and “The Wives of the Dead”
Morrison, Samuel Eliot: Old Bruin - life of Matthew C. Perry
Gombrich, E. M.: Little History of the World
Sandburg, Carl: Remembrance Rock nostalgic American epic
Van Loon, Conrad: Van Loon's Lives quirky biography
Dickens, Charles: Dombey and Son
Dawkins, Richard: The Ancestor's Tale evolution in fast rewind
Cozzens, James Gould: By Love Possessed
Russo, Richard: Straight Man college professor humor
Barbery, Muriel: The Elegance of the Hedgehog
Schmitt, Eric Emmanuel: Il Lottatore di Sumo che non diventava grosso *not yet in English that I can find, but well worth the read if you speak Italian.
Atkins, Peter: The Periodic Kingdom chemical geography
McPhee, John: Annals of the Former World *a collection of 5 books* geology and America
Robertson, Don: Praise the Human Season a shared life
Melville, Herman: Moby Dick beautiful words
Conroy, Frank: Body and Soul a musical life
Helprin, Mark: Freddy and Fredericka Charles and Diana
Sobel, Dava: Longitude John Harrison’s chronometer
Livy: Ab Urbe Condita *links to books 1-8, 9-38 also available* nostalgic Roman history
Solzhenitsyn, Alexander: The Cancer Ward humanity 
Connolly, John: The Book of Lost Things modern fable
Steve Hely: How I became a famous novelist book humor

Concert: Allentown PA

This week I traveled to Allentown, PA to visit family and friends. We went to a recital at St. John's Evangelical Lutheran Church, featuring local organist Stephen Williams and the Monocacy chamber orchestra. This is the program, recreated from YouTube links (not with this ensemble).

Toccata Festiva - Samuel Barber
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jC4zz5tP22M&feature=related

Concerto in F - Josef Rheinberger
The Trinity Cathedral is similar to St. John's, though the organ set-up seems larger and more prominent in these videos.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xfe_Y-1IJo Movement I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhrYOZVyQ-Y Movement II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExT8N4JhmO0 Movement III

Divertimento in D, K.136 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Tough choice of recordings - the  Youth Orchestra of the Americas is represented on YouTube, but the recording is a bit fast for my taste. That recording is here if you want to take a look http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXzWjaTCO38 Here is a different recording at a more laid-back pace. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb5d5qQpCdA and the IIIrd movement http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y447ddkRNM4

Concerto in G minor - Francois Poulenc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yiq-QcBHXM

Best Links

Over the past 6 years, I have collected an extensive list of useful sites related to music and academia. Here are some of my favorites, by category.

Free Sheet Music

Imslp.org The sine qua non of all free classical music, IMSLP now has a “search by melody” linked section and categories by genre, era, and instrumentation. Various legal challenges have been brought in the past against IMSLP’s public-domain collection, but the site is still going, and stronger and more useful than ever.

http://www.music-scores.com/useful collection featuring Sibelius Scorch playback and score previews, with music for all skill levels drawing on the classical canon, unusual pieces, and new compositions. Some scores require a subscription to print, but the playback section is always free.

https://urresearch.rochester.edu/viewInstitutionalCollection.action;jsessionid=BC940326E443F1ABB943E6C46A04863B?collectionId=25 The Sibley library at U Rochester has a great database of scanned music (i.e. no Creative Commons work) and is especially useful for piano repertoire and turn-of-the-century works. Much of their collection is now duplicated to IMSLP, but the number of unique holdings at Rochester are still worth searching if IMSLP doesn’t turn up enough for you.

http://www.mutopiaproject.org/browse.html#byComposer All typeset using Lilypad, Mutopia’s various works are fewer and more mainstream than the others mentioned here, but the editions are cleaner and nice to play from. Sometimes an odd gem will appear, so I check the new listings every so often.

CPDL.org Good choral music site, wiki-based for ease of use. Most of the collection is cross referenced along with IMSLP at Wikipedia, so if you look at a composer bio linked from IMSLP, you might find a different set of results at CPDL.

http://icking-music-archive.org/index.php The Werner Icking music collection is also linked frequently at Wiki, and generally is good for Baroque or organ repertoire.

Honorable mentions: 

The Smithsonian collection and the National Library of Australia both feature limited full-color scans of 20th century editions, generally popular prints but also some lesser known music. These sites are good as reference, but not for printing or downloading.

Recordings

Classiccat.net is great for downloading free classical music recordings. This site does not host any recordings, but archives them from around the web categorized by composer. The quality can be hit and miss, and the same for the coverage overall for each composer, but I've found some gems here as the sites referenced often contain large, quality collections and other links.

Naxos Music Library has an extensive listing of labels and records both famous and truly obscure, all worth sifting through and updated frequently.

Classical Music Library and Classical Scores Library are two halves of an excellent archive which fills in important gaps in Naxos and IMSLP's collections. The recordings at CML are not as many as Naxos but I have often found recordings there of artists not listed with Naxos, or historical records from an era not yet available to stream at NML. The scores database in some cases extends past 1923, so the scores are not always public domain; the downside is that you cannot download them (though printing is allowed and if you have a "print to" option such as PrimoPDF you may be able to download a copy in that manner).

Academic Research

These are the databases which my school subscribes to, but some of their functionalities are available for general use.

EBSCO I generally use this database to collect the first few articles on my topic, because EBSCO covers a wide range of topics and levels of focus (i.e. scholarly articles, opera reviews, newspaper editorials).

JSTOR‘s collection overlaps with EBSCO but contains many unique periodicals and subject coverage. Large full-text collection available.

Project MUSE Another full-text database, MUSE is for the arts and offers citations and downloads for their collection.

Grove Music This database covers the serious, in-depth articles of Grove and the quick-reference entries of the Harvard and Oxford Dictionaries and the Oxford Companion to Music. Also available at this site is Richard Taruskin’s Oxford History of Western Music, which is good for a long read or a reference for what you know and should know on the subject.

Opera blog : Likely Impossibilities

http://likelyimpossibilities.blogspot.com/ A great read about all things opera- thanks for posting!

Paganini's Ubiquitous Theme

An inspiration for works by Liszt, Brahms, Schumann, and most famously Rachmaninov, the last caprice of Paganini’s 24 (opus 1) has had a well-cited life over the last century and a half. Other composers, less famous today but celebrated in their time such as Mark Hambourg and Ignaz Friedman also wrote paraphrases on the theme. This theme continues to be “varied” today, with the “Song and Dance” of Andrew Lloyd Webber being a famous example, and influence is seen in numerous other rock/pop writers. The 24^th caprice itself is in theme and variations form, lending itself to new interpretations and homage. Theme and variations is perhaps my favorite form because of the different twists and colors each new composer adds to the original, while still remaining recognizable. Here are some of my favorite takes on the 24^th caprice, both famous and less well-known.

To start off, here is Itzhak Perlman with the original. Perlman is possibly my favorite violinist ever (not a group I’m terribly familiar with, but regardless), with impeccable technique and considerable, friendly charm. Paganini’s 24^th caprice is in A minor, fast and agile, and presents numerous technical demands on the violinist. When transplanted to a different instrument or orchestrated, the caprice’s theme loses some of its diabolical technique but none of its explosive energy and hair’s edge precision. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RM3Qfhd7dAw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9zYrBW9jVQ + http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZJtwdFOoi8&feature=related Ignaz Friedman opens our set of Paganini variations, quoting the theme and varying it in 17 concert studies in A minor. Friedman was a fantastic Polish virtuoso pianist who often wrote concert transcriptions of opera arias or canonical repertoire. He lived from 1882 to 1948, making him a contemporary of the next composer on the list: Sergei Rachmaninoff, who wrote perhaps the most famous piece based on the Paganini caprice.

Rachmaninoff’s “Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini” gets a lot of airplay on today’s “easy listening” classical radio stations, and still gets featured in film soundtracks. The most memorable use in film (for me) was in the 1980 film “Somewhere in Time” with Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve, set in a grand turn-of-the-century hotel. Here’s a clip of the music itself as it appeared in the movie, as Reeve is musing on the lovely actress Seymour. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4N1mxN5JbU He happens to have fallen in love with her across time, but time travel is no match for their love (though doomed). The film is based on a Richard Matheson novel Bid Time Return and uses the 18^th variation, a theme with long lines and sentimental grandeur made for Hollywood (which Rachmaninoff knew, calling this variation “a theme for my producer”) though the equivalent in Matheson’s novel is a Mahler symphony. Interestingly, Matheson is better known for having written I am Legend. The 18^th variation is the most famous of Rachmaninoff’s set, which follows a loose concerto form (fast-slow-fast, with the introduction and 1^st variation placed before the theme appears) and features a piano soloist. Rachmaninoff, like Friedman, brings a virtuosic element to the piano, and casts the homage to Paganini in gigantic Rachmaninoff concrete-and-steel style. When the 18^th variation arrives, the piece has moved in the slow section to Db major and the theme is inverted; it is still a massive, crashing section in terms of what the piano is actually doing, but the orchestra softens the edges and creates the lush romantic atmosphere for which we love this piece. 

Finally, no less a composer than Johannes Brahms (unlike others mentioned here including Paganini himself, a composer of “serious,” German non-”brillant” music) wrote a set of variations on this theme. http://www.kellydeanhansen.com/opus35.html Here is a link with extensive detail regarding each variation, and links for Evgeny Kissin’s rendition on YouTube. Brahms’ variations are of the same cloth as Rachmaninoff’s – the piano here has a big and dense sound, with many shadings of color and sound. These variations are also entitled “Studies,” a title that draws attention to the various pianistic challenges in this work.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fihjGJ0Brw0

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcOeXpV5uzU&feature=related

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uw3VjY4rda8