Ice and snow: that’s what most of us are experiencing lately. Certainly Bowie, Texas is iced in. Everything is closed down that can be, and only a few brave (or foolhardy) souls are sliding down the roads. Yet, as mean as this weather is, I … Read more
Wagner: Siegfried’s Horn Call As a former horn player, I can vouch for the fact that what’s on the video below doesn’t come naturally or easily. French Horn is a treacherous instrument in part because it is pitched high in the overtone series. If that … Read more
Palestrina: Super flumina Babylonis Since I’m doing some editing of our unit on Jerusalem in the Early Sacred Music course, it seems natural to turn to Psalm 137 for this week’s performance pick. Many composers have set this text to music. Psalm 137 describes the … Read more
We all love the famous Abbott and Costello routine. The ambiguity created by giving baseball players interrogatives as names (“Who’s on first? What’s on second?”) sets up and sustains a classic of American comedy. But the joke works only because it is built on a … Read more
J.S. Bach: “Die Katze lässt das Mausen nicht” from “Coffee Cantata,” BWV 211 Bach spent his last 27 years (1723-1750) in Leipzig writing mostly sacred music. As Kapellmeister of the Thomaskirche (St. Thomas Church), he was expected to compose new works for the church. In contrast, … Read more
You open a program and see this title: Sonata No. 29 in B-Flat major, “Hammerklavier,” Opus 106 What does it all mean? Titles of music compositions can be puzzling, but they follow a predictable format that tells us a certain amount about the piece. So … Read more
Debussy: Girl With the Flaxen Hair How do you go about choosing what to listen to? The question makes an assumption that you are the one who gets to choose. That happens less and less often, it seems. If you listen to the radio, or … Read more
There are compelling reasons to learn about the arts, and we discuss a lot of them at the Circle of Scholars. I was listening to Andrew Pudewa, as I often do, and latched onto something he said: You can’t get something out of a brain … Read more
Liszt: La Campanella The name of Liszt resounded across Europe in the 19th century. A celebrity on the level of a Frank Sinatra or Elvis, his piano playing stunned everyone who heard it. Women really did throw diamond necklaces at him and faint in the … Read more
I’ll never forget this moment. It was about two weeks into my 20th-century music history class—a key course then in Southern Methodist University’s music-history curriculum. I was on a professorial “roll,” forecasting for my sophomores a few of the drastic changes that would occur in … Read more