Movie music

Vincent D'Indy's ''Souvenirs" was broadcast last night on KVOD in Denver. The announcer, Charles Andrews, commented that D'Indy would have been a wonderful movie composer. While I am familiar with D'Indy's "Symphony on a French Mountain Air", "Souvenirs" was new to me. As I listened I agreed with Andrews' comment and then began the mental game of imagining what movie I would be watching: a western; a forlorn big city romance; maybe a mystery; a documentary; certainly not science fiction or horror. I don't know exactly what it would be. That is music's limit. Instrumental music can't tell a tale or specify reality. Set the idea first, then music can help define it.

John Ireland

Last night I turned on KVOD and heard the end of a nice piece: John Irelands's "Orchestral Poem", a 15 minute work. The announcer commented at the end that it's too bad that we don't get to hear it more often. I've never heard it performed, but it certainly sounds like it would please an audience.

The announcer proceeded to play Brahm's "Tragic Overture". Okay, KVOD, do what you suggest. The "Tragic Overture" has been broadcast 129 times in the last 1996 days (since 2003). If Ireland's "Orchestral Poem" is that nice, how come KVOD has only broadcast it 21 times over the same 5 and a half years? For every time Ireland's work is played, you play the "Tragic Overture" over 6 times.

I suspect orchestras don't play music by John Ireland much because audiences aren't familiar with him. An English composer, Ireland (1879-1962) has a late-romantic, impressionist sound. I've just downloaded some mp3's from Amazon of his piano concerto and two symphonic studies. Amazon doesn't seem to have the "Orchestral Poem" in its catalog -- too bad. We'll see how much I like the others.

Apollo and Dionysus

Listening to KVOD last night, the announcer Charles Andrews introduced Bruno Walter conducting Beethoven's Symphony #8. KVOD has broadcast this symphony 14 times thus far in 2008, compared to only one time for Symphony #9, by the way. Andrews normally has interesting comments and insight. He said something about the Apollonian versus Dionysian characteristic of Bruno's Beethoven. Apollo represents harmony, order, and reason while Dionysus represents ecstasy and disorder. Was Andrews saying Beethoven's symphony was an example of reason conducted in a disorderly fashion by Bruno Walter? I was confused by the comment but I wondered since the performance was very good.

Later, in the middle of Bach's Violin Concerto, I noticed something that we don't often hear in Boulder -- the sound of rain. I turned off the radio and listened to its quiet trickle on the roof. Apollo and Dionysus were still wandering in my head when it dawned on me that I was right in the middle of both. The sound from the skylight was Dionysus: quiet, pleasant random rain. On my right, with the window slightly open, I could hear the steady uniform plunk of water dripping into the gutter. Dionysus in the skylight, Apollo sliding down the roof. Thank you Charles Andrews!

More on the Alaskan John Adams

In an earlier posting, I mentioned John Luther Adams, the "Alaskan" Adams, to differentiate him from John Coolidge Adams, the "California" Adams, and the more well known John Adams. John Luther Adams had been written up in an article by Alex Ross in The New Yorker. Impatiently I had downloaded some of his music from Amazon, all done by the Cincinnati Percussion Ensemble. I wasn't overly impressed by it, but I decided to wait it out and see what the mail might bring. I had also ordered Earth and Great Weather, a piece commented on by Alex Ross in his New Yorker article. Today it arrived and I'm listening to it as I write this. "Earth and Great Weather" or, as the composer calls it "Nunavlusilaqpauvlu Nan Kak Nats'aa Gweedhaa", is more of the same and, unfortunately, I'm not much impressed. In both Ross's article and in the liner notes there are references to Morton Feldman. I have but one piece by Feldman, his Piano and String Quartet with Aki Takahashi and the Kronos Quartet. Apparently like a lot of Feldman's works, it goes on and on and on -- for an hour and 20 minutes. I like it. While I wouldn't quite rate up in my top 10, I do enjoy listening to Feldman. Unfortunately, I was somewhat disappointed with the "Alaskan" John Adams.

I don't expect to hear any performances of either Feldman or Luther Adams locally, even in a town like Boulder where somewhat adventuresome music is often performed. Percussionists may know Russell Peck's "The Glory and the Grandeur" a concerto for 3 percussionists. I heard it for the first time about 10 years ago at the Colorado Music Festival, under Giora Bernstein. It was fun to listen to, and, equally important, fun to watch. Now, the Boulder Philharmonic is planning on performing it this fall. Unlike the Luther Adam's pieces I've heard, it's percussion AND orchestra, not just percussion. Perhaps that's why I like it more.

Is it performed on the radio? Not on the stations I monitor. It is available on CD since I have a copy, but do they play it. No, but perhaps that's best since you only really appreciate it in a live performance.

John Luther Adams, at first blush

Today, I got my weekly New Yorker and found an article by Alex Ross. Entitled Letter From Alaska, it is about John Luther Adams. This Adams is not to be mistaken from John Coolidge Adams, the "California" Adams of "Nixon in China", "Dr Atomic", "Death of Klinghoffer", and so forth -- the one we really listen to and appreciate. I'm a fan of contemporary music and actually saw a reference to this article earlier this week on Alex Ross's blog "The Rest if Noise". I've read Ross's book of the same name and enjoy reading his writing. I though, good, another new composer! What is he all about? Is this going to be another winner?

After finishing the article I went to Amazon and looked for "John Luther Adams" and found several hits. I looked for titles that Ross referenced and found that some that were available. A few were only available as CD's, so I ordered one "Earth and the Great Weather". I could immediately download some mp3's for only 99 cents, so I did. I patched them into my home-grown mp3 database and listened. Perhaps my choices weren't any good, but I was disappointed. There were 5 pieces, performed by the Cincinnati Percussion Ensemble. They were uninspiring and frankly boring. Dare I say it? Like tedious Edgar Varese.

Ross wrote about 20Th century composers in his book "The Rest is Noise". Prokofiev, Messiaen, Stravinsky, Sibelius, Strauss, -- all the major 20Th Century composers. He also mentioned many many composers like Varese and Feldman, two he referenced in the New Yorker article. Are they Important? I don't know. Listenable? Again, I don't know. I remember getting a record of Varese's music: Ionisation, Density 21.5, Integrales, Octandre, Hyperprism and Poeme Electronique. I still have the record, though I haven't converted it over into mp3's yet. I'm not sure it's worth the effort. Luther Adams from my first brush with him appeals much like Varese.

Morton Feldman does have his appeal. Perhaps the CD of Luther Adam's work Earth and the Great Weather will be more like Feldman than Varese. I'll have to wait for delivery to find out.

Does the radio audience get to hear John Luther Adams? Not for the FM classical stations I monitor. Looking for "Luther Adams" I found nothing with both names together. There were 1170 broadcasts of "Adams" and all appear to be the California one, not the Alaskan one. Luther was found 40 times, but were either by Martin Luther or involving Lutheran.

When to play what and reality.

I tend to listen to my local FM classical music station at night, either preparing for bed, or, as is often the case, while snuggling in bed prior to sleep. The ear-plugs are in so not to bother my wife, a classical music lover but a sleeper first. Many nights I've listened to KVOD out of Denver for hours after the lights have gone out. Sometimes hours and hours.

The reason for setting the scene is that I've come to wonder why this station, and probably others, chooses to broadcast pieces when they do. Last night at around 10:30 they broadcast Bach's Brandenburg Concerto #1. I wasn't exactly snoozing, but it jolted me more awake. The brass seemed too loud and too throbbing for this time of night. Later they played Mozart's "Coronation" piano concerto, which, too, seemed out of place for the late hour. Maybe it's me, but at that time of night I expect long, soothing romantic symphonies ala Mahler, Bruckner, etc. Of course these composers are too long for the radio these days, but why not hope? Anyway, I got to thinking what is an appropriate time for different types of classical music? Baroque all the time? Contemporary only late on Saturday nights the way KVOD does it? Renaissance early in the morning? Classical only at supper time? Should it correspond to the orchestration? The average volume? It's length? Composer? Period? I don't have an answer, but for some reason I want to hear intellectual depth and challenge late at night. On KVOD I don't seem to get it. When I lived in Connecticut, I faithfully listened to WQXR. The late evening was for the late romantics -- not always, but most frequently. Denver was and is a cow town. We get whatever the programming director wants to foist on us, unfortunately. Artistic consistency and planning aren't important.

One other point of interest. I went to a chamber concert performed by musicians from the Colorado Music Festival on the afternoon of April 20th, 2008. My wife and I hosted 2 of the performers, both friends who had visited with us over the past 5 or 6 summers. After the concert, while driving home, I had the car radio tuned to KVOD and lo and behold, the rarest of pieces! They were broadcasting a performance of Beethoven's 9th symphony. While listening I could tell it was a live recording. It had somewhat of a hollow sound, with an occasional audience cough, etc. The Colorado Music Festival had ended its season a few years ago with it, so I suspected it was the CMF orchestra under Michael Christie. It went on, so when I got home I immediately put it on my home radio and continued listening. I was surprised to find out it was not CMF but the Boulder Philharmonic, performed the same year, under the baton of Michael Butterman. Okay, so far, so good. What surprised me next was a week later when I checked my web site (http://classicalfmradio.org) and looked for the frequency count of symphonies I discovered that it had not been counted. Was my programming that bad? How could I have missed it? I investigated and discovered that the KVOD listing for Sunday, April 20th, did not include anything by Beethoven during that time slot. Mozart, Resphigi, Vivaldi, Schubert, Hayden, etc, but not Beethoven. I hadn't tuned to another station; I hadn't mistaken the piece since both my wife and our Japanese guest were with me and agreed. So I can only conclude that the daily listings from the KVOD only partially reflect reality. Should I be surprised? I guess not.

Janacek's Intimate Vixen

Last evening I saw a performance of Leos Janacek's "The Cunning Little Vixen" at the University of Colorado. It was surprisingly good with a large cast and an interesting staging. In preparation for the performance, I'd been listening to it in it's original Czech -- but I didn't understand a word sung. The CU Music school used super-titles and had it sung in English. That was good choice. Clearly it's best to understand what an opera is all about.

This is the second performance of a Janacek piece in a week for me. Last Friday night I heard the Tasman Quartet play his "Intimate Letters", the second string quartet. The Tasman Quartet from New Zealand are the ensemble-in-residence at the University of Colorado School of Music. They will be studying for 2 years with the famous Takacs Quartet. The Takacs did "Intimate Letters" in the fall of 2007, so I wasn't surprised that the Tasman tackled this difficult piece, too. They played it very, very well.

Do we hear Janacek on the radio? Some. It appears that the "Lachian Dances" and "Sinfonietta" are actually played with some frequency on most of the stations I monitor. A suite from "The Cunning Little Vixen" is also performed occasionally, though looking it looks like the full hour and a half opera was only broadcast once in 5 years, over KUSC in Los Angeles. "Intimate Letters" has been broadcast, but it must be too long and too complicated for the KVOD team, who have chosen not to broadcast at all in the last 5 years. What a pity!

One final note about the CU opera performance. First, clearly the students at CU must have smallish bladders. OVer the last 10 or 15 minutes of the performance, small groups of them had to get up and disturb the audience and run off to piddle (or whatever). We read in the paper about the CU students drinking a lot, but come on, guys! If we older audience members can hold it, why can't you?

Lastly there is William Gustafson, the stage director. He always sits in the back and laughs too loudly or breaks out clapping as loud as he can. I feel he is trying to indicate to us, the audience, that now is the time to show our appreciation. Please, the show deserves applause, but let us choose when and how much.

Performers or the performed?

Last night, KVOD broadcast Haydn's Cello Concerto #1. The announcer, Stephanie Wendt, praised the cellist, Matt Haimovitz, raising expectations about the performance. As I listened I wondered about his performance. What could I really sense about his playing? How did it rate compared with others? Could I tell? More importantly, could I tell over the radio?

I go to many live concerts. Live artists are always at risk during the playing. What if they flub a note, miss some, go out of tune, etc? You can watch and feel the intensity of playing and appreciate the artists' skill. But can you judge that over the radio? For me, no -- it's an imperfect medium for judging talent. Radio just can't compete against a live performance.

It turns out that the Haydn Cello Concert #1 has been performed 5 times thus far this year on KVOD. Twice by Truls Mork, twice by last night's Haimovitz and once by Jacqueline du Pre. So is it the intention of the radio station to show us different artists or to play music? I don't know. Personally, I'd rather hear different music rather than different artists playing the same piece.

How to judge a masterpiece.

I earlier commented that I had read Alex Ross's "And the Rest is Noise", an intriguing book. It's a bit of a tome, but well worth the effort. When writing about Olivier Messiaen, Ross gives somewhat short-shrift to his Turangalila Symphony and doesn't have a lot to say about Vingt Regards su L'Enfant Jesus, but at one point he refers to Des Canyons aux Étoiles (The Canyons and the Stars) as Messiaen's masterpiece. Well, after getting a copy, I have to say it really does sound like Messiaen with his distinctive percussiveness and stange chords and plent of bird-like sounds. But his masterpiece? Both Turangalila and Vingt Regards are much more impressive to me, but Ross must have some reason for favoring Des Canyons. Beats me why, though.

Given that December 10th, 2008 is the 100th anniversary of Messiaen's birth, here in Boulder we have been luck to hear quite a bit of his music. I've tracked down and listened to a lot of Messiaen lately. He's been featured by Hsing-ay Hsu several times at the University of Colorado. Wouldn't you expect some of the FM radio stations to play some of his music? Well, not yet this year. KVOD, in Denver hasn't played anything yet, nor have many of the other stations I monitor. When they do play something by him, it's typically his Quartet for the End of Time, historically significant and penetrating, but not on my all-time favorite Messiaen list.

Boulder has many music lovers, a strong music faculty at the university, several critics and a bunch of musical organizations. Surprisingly, I haven't found anyone yet that has also read Ross's book. I've lent my copy to a friend who promises to read it and give me feedback, but he hasn't yet. That's surprising for an often written-about book that made the Pulitzer finals this year.

What did they hear that I didn't?

I went to a Takacs String Quartet concert last night and was treated to the string quartet number 59, known as "The Rider" or the "The Horseman". A well-played, typically Haydn-esque quartet, As usual, the Takacs was flawless. What I got thinking about as they played was how did this get nicknamed "The Rider"? The program notes (by Andreas Anderswo) said ".. is immediately apparent after that pause that follows the unison introduction to the opening Allegro: the instruments enter one by one imitating each other with the first subject upon which a lilting subject follows". Now I ask, what does this have to do with riding horses or being a horseman? [Note: I tried to track down this Andeas Anderswo (Andrea Elsewhere???) at the University of Colorado but to no avail. However, someone in the know told me that Andreas Anderswo is the pen-name for none other than one of the local classical music critics, Wes Bloomster.]

As I sat listening, I wondered if, shortly after the premiere of this work, the composer, the performers, the patrons and some hangers-on didn't convene in a local tavern or palatial home and sit around and chat about the piece and the performance. They probably had port or something stronger and smoked their favorite tobacco and gabbed. At some point, someone probably mumbled something about "It sounded like horses" or "did you hear the loud horse's hooves rumble by during the first movement" and, wallah! a nickname was born.

I read the introduction by Anderswo and listened carefully to the opening and, for the life of me, could not get any perception of horses, riders, hooves, whatever in that opening movement. The name stuck with me and I kept wondering and, just perhaps, during the finale I might have heard something like restless horses. But what do I know?

Too often we hear on the FM radio pieces broadcast with their historical names? "Eroica", "The Prague", "The Surprise", etc, etc, etc. Sometimes they seem to mean something and sometimes not. I can understand where some of the names and tag-lines come from, but often not. It just causes me to wonder. and, in the case of "The Rider" ponder, how it all came to be named.

Symphonies tomorrow......

Last evening I went to another "Fusion" concert of the Boulder Philharmonic Orchestra. Over the past year they attempted to fuse music with art, cinema, dance, Shakespeare and pizza-flipping -- not really! Several friends agree that the evenings haven't been well received -- not exactly flops, but distractions to the music being performed. Next year, the Boulder Phil gives us an evening of Frank Sinatra style singing, one with the world premiere of a concerto for Tabla and orchestra, and a family concert "Alien encounter 2: Schnoodle meets Sch(n)ubert." Why?

The Colorado Music Festival, where I seldom miss any concert, has announced a season heavy with "World" music and extremes. How about a night of ukelele music; one of tap dance; the Brazilian Guitar Quartet and the stunt of performing all the Beethoven symphonies in one week? Is this intended to develop audience and generate donations? What is going on here? What happened to a balanced season of plain old classical and contemporary music? Chamber music? Piano soloists? Some new music? I give up. I can see the next CMF season: all 104 Haydn symphonies one long evening and a concerto for claves and washboard.

In the blog Alex Ross: The Rest is Noise Justin Davidson writing about the financing of symphony orchestras notes that "....this doesn't mean that the symphony orchestras are no longer viable, or that they're about to be extinct, only that they have to do everything right.". I have always supported my local orchestras, donating regularly (with a company matching grant) and buying a couple of full subscriptions. Now, looking at what I'm being offered I'm reluctantly deciding that I'll not subscribe but only selectively buy tickets. I'll let the ukelele fans in the area make the donations instead of me. The orchestras just aren't "doing everything right".

Am I being a stick in the mud? Am I failing to adapt? I look forward to contemporary classical music on the radio and love live concerts, but what's happening here?

Strauss had to be wrong.....

Last night I was listening to KVOD (Denver) when the announcer Charles Andrews mentioned that Richard Strauss considered the Mozart String Quintet in g, K 516 very highly. I don't remember the exact words Andrews used, but I thought to myself that if Strauss thought this to be the case, the String Quintet (apparently a string quartet with 2 viola) must really be pretty good. It was written in 1787, somewhere between the "Prague" and the 39th symphony and between the 20th and 21st string quartets. Much to my surprise I found the K 516 mundane. How could a fellow composer like Strauss have held this piece in such high esteem? Strauss comes across as a somewhat enigmatic character in Ross's "The Rest is Noise". I wonder if this comment about this particular Mozart quintet came after the war? I don't know, but to me the quintet was a bore.

Olivier Messiaen

I had the pleasure of attending a concert of all-Messiaen piano music at the University of Colorado the other night. Hsing-Ay Hsu, director of CU's Pendulum New Music series, performed 5 works, some with MinTze Wu on violin and Alejandro Cremaschi, piano. What a great concert and such interesting music. It's Messiaen's Centennial so over the next few weeks there will several local performances of his works.

In Alex Ross's "The Rest is Noise" Messiaen plays an important role. Ross writes about his influence and about his World War II imprisonment in an Nazi concentration camp where he wrote The Quartet for the End of Time. Surprisingly Ross is silent about the Turangalila Symphony and praises From the Canyons to the Star, which I've never heard and which has not be broadcast on any of the FM stations I catalog. Amazon has it, but the price is awfully high. I guess I'll have to wait on Canyons.

What I particularly liked at Hsing-Ay's concert were two excerpts from Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant Jesus. She gave a brief explanation of the setting of the work, and called it one of the greatest piano pieces in the 20th century. While I thought that might be a bit of hyperbole, I started to wonder what would be the greatest. The piano music of Ravel and Debussy would probably rank up there, but then what else? I'm not sure that Hsing-Ay's hyperbole might not just be correct.

While I guess it is not surprising, Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant Jesus, is seldom broadcast on the 7 all-classical FM radio stations I monitor. Only WQXR(New York) and KUSC(LA) have broadcast movements from it in the last 4 years. Here in Denver, nothing, though, for example, Debussy's Children's Corner Suite has been broadcast 103 times in the last 4 years. Now I really enjoy Debussy's piano music, but as I'm writing this, I'm also listening to an interesting performance by Madelaine Fort of six pieces of Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant Jesus with commentary by her husband Alan Forte. The Debussy suite or Ravel's Pavane for a Dead Princess (133 broadcasts in Denver) are, to me, just not that much better than the Messiaen. So why have the radio stations not chosen to allow us to hear him? Your guess is as good as mine.

On Ross's "The Rest is Noise"

I've just finished The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century by Alex Ross. Surprisingly I found it a tough read even though it was on the top of my Christmas wish-list, I had high expectations. What I can't quite put my finger on is how and why he chose to discuss some composers and essentially ignored others. Perhaps it was too broad a brush and too much for one book.

In particular, I was interested in his comments on the last 30 years of the 20th century. I was looking for pointers to new compositions and composers, but I wonder if I really want to hear some of them. Of La Mont Young, he suggests the Berkley music department gave him money 'to get him out of town', then quotes 3 supposed compositions. Do I really want to listen to him? There's a lot on Pierre Boulez and John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen, and of course Schoenberg, Berg and Webern, but tonal composers? He groups John Taverner and Michael Gorecki but says nothing about them. Gorecki's 3rd Symphony was a big commercial hit, but nothing more is said of him. There are interesting details about Stravinsky, Shostokovich, Copland, Sibelius, Britten and Richard Strauss and the effects of the world around them on their music.

I'm not a musician, so when Ross talks says it "ends in unambigous B-flat major" or "D-flat major, D major with B attached, E-flat major and the notes C and E" he leaves me cold. I can't imagine it and would need a keyboard to sound it out. Perhaps it's meaningful to a real musician, but it's nothing to me.

The historical coverage of the World War II impact on music was insightful. In an earlier post, I noticed the lack of broadcasting of Bruckner's symphonies. Perhaps I now understand it differently. Ross points out how frequently during the Nazi era Bruckner's works were performed. Apparently he was almost as popular as Wagner and Strauss. Is there some anti-German bias creeping into the broadcast selections? I've always concluded his omission had more to do with the length of the symphonies, but now I wonder a bit.

I'm lending my copy to a friend with similar interests. Let's see what he has to say, assuming that he takes the time to plow through the full 543 pages.

Poor Bruckner.

Before I begin, I want to incorporate one of the all time most famous pictures painted by a famous Italian, just to make a point:

Surely you recognize this! Now art is art and whatever the artist gives you is what you should get. You shouldn't be forced to accept an edited version chosen by someone who filters what you see. I shouldn't be putting in just part of of the Mona Lisa, though in your memory you probably see the rest with your mind's eye anyway. But what about this one:

Not as obvious, I suppose. Is your mind's eye missing something. It is a famous picture. or at least part of it.

Now what about music. When a composer produces a piece of art, it is what they write and should be view as a whole. But consider poor old Anton Bruckner, one of the composers ofter referenced as one who produces "Cathedrals of Sound": long majestic symphonies. He did 9 numbered symphonies, along with an early "Study" symphony and one number 0. Listen to it sometime and you'll pick out Bruckner right away.

Now look at this table of broadcasts of his symphonies from a sampling of classical FM radio stations around the country:

symphony:               "Study"  #0  #1  #2  #3  #4  #5  #6  #7  #8  #9
----------------------  -------  --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
Minneapolis, MN(CL24):                            *
Seattle, WA(KING):         1      2   5   2   6   3*  2   5   1*  2   4
Los Angeles, CA(KUSC):                1   7   1   6*  3*  1   2*  4   3*
Denver, CO(KVOD):                                 1   5           1   1
Birmingham, AL(WBHM):                                 1           1   1
Cincinnati, OH(WGUC):                             1*      1           1
New York, NY(WQXR):               2   5       1   3*      1   6*  1   1

Notice the asterisks, *, which indicated that the station chose not to broadcast the entire symphony, but rather just one or two movements. Those in the upper midwest listening to CL24 are only provided with a snippet like the second art fragment above, not the entire beautiful "Romantic" symphony that Bruckner worked so long and hard on. It's a shame that stations choose to do this. Why, I wonder, and can conclude that what Bruckner did was violate the station's operating premise, short works only.

Clearly the two coasts "appreciate" Bruckner more, and middle America needn't bother to listen to Bruckner.

Recognize the second art fragment? Its from "The persistance of memory" by Salvador Dali.

Stockhausen

Both The Week and The Economist had featured obituaries of Karlheinz Stockhausen on Saturday. The composer, called a "genius-madman" by one and "seeker of new sounds" by the other, died in early December at 79. Both magazines pointed out that his picture appears on the famous cover of the Beetle's Sgt. Pepper's Longly Hearts Club Band. I tracked down my copy of it but couldn't figure out which one was Stockhausen. Marilyn Monroe he was not!

With his death recent, KVOD chose to broadcast his Gruppen for three orchestras and Stimmung. I listened and wondered about them. Stimmung, a sextet for unaccompanied voices, made no sense whatsover and I was glad when it was over. For Christmas I've requested Alex Ross's The Rest is Noise: Listening to the 20th Century and I'm curious to read what Ross says about Stockhausen. I just couldn't get any enjoyment out of his music.

Not related, on Friday night I participated in a new Boulder "event" -- a group performance of Phil Klein's UnSilent Night. There were about 60-70 participants, mostly students from the CU school of music and others interested in the CU Pendulum program. Armed with boom-boxes and powered speakers attached to mp3 players, we wandered for about an hour along the Pearl Street mall, playing segments of Klein's performance piece. The sound, with percussion, bells, chorus and organ reflected off the walls of the buildings and merged with the crunch of feet on the frozen snow. We were all met with smiles of wonderment from shoppers and those wandering the decked-out mall on a cold evening. One woman came up to my wife and asked "What religion is this? It's great!". It was and let's hope it happens again next year.

Symphonies being broadcast.

I was curious about the broadcast frequencies of symphonies by some of the greatest symphonists. Here's a small table of the broadcasts of symphonies over KVOD (Denver, CO) for the years 2005, 2006 and 2007 (through yesterday):

Composers	Symphonies Composed	KVOD 2005	KVOD 2006	KVOD 2007
Beethoven	9	159	224	243
Schubert	9	139	195	156
Schumann	4	81	114	100
Mozart	42	384	451	401
Haydn	104	384	525	569
Saint-Saens	3	38	52	40
Brahms	4	63	96	80
Dvorak	9	48	99	94
Sibelius	7	56	60	66
Tchaikovsky	6	40	74	78
Mahler	10	26	12	7
Bruckner	9	14	9	3
Prokofiev	7	45	44	42
Shostakovich	15	16	35	22

Poor Mahler and Bruckner. Of course what this table doesn't show is the distribution of the broadcasts. For more details see
classicalfmradio.org and click on the button 'Show an interesting report on broadcast symphonies'.

PS: Working from a comcast connection can be a real pain. I've got a cron job which pings my comcast gateway regularly and I'm really getting a lot of dropped pings.
I sure wish there was some competition here -- and don't even mention qworst (qwest).

La Valse

One of the most played pieces on KVOD is Ravel's "La Valse", ranked 15th over the last 4 years. It's not one of my favorites, but I understand the need to broadcast it. It was written for orchestra and that's what is normally played. However, this past week I attended a concert at the University of Colorado where I heard a piano version, one that apparently Ravel arranged. I had never heard it done this way. The pianist was Vladimir Stoepel, a Russian pianist now living in Berlin. He preceded the performance with a brief explanation that Ravel was heart-sick at what had happened in World War I and wanted to reflect the coming darkness he felt was coming to Europe. It was, indeed, a dark and wrenching piece, full of power. Stoepel played with great passion. To sit and hear such a performance; to recognize the to-me syrupy themes and yet to sense the dispare was thrilling. Now if only some of the FM radio stations would broadcast this version instead of the incessant orchestra suite.

The Early Quartets Win

I've probably focused too much on orchestral music when I look at what's been playing.

On the day after Thanksgiving, rather than get wrapped up in Black Friday crap and football, I decided to take a look at Beethoven's String Quartets. I'm lucky to have the Takacs Quartet performing regularly in Boulder, very lucky. They've recorded on CD and won awards for their renditions of the Beethoven quartets. I must admit, though, that even though I love their CD's, nothing is as good as a live performance.

Anyway, here is a table of the broadcasts of the Beethoven String Quartets by KVOD for 2007 through November 24th.

KVOD Broadcasts	Beethoven String Quartet	Time in minutes
11	#01 in F Major, Op 18/1	27
7	#02 in G Major, Op 18/2	23
8	#03 in C minor, Op 18/3	24
10	#04 in A Major, Op 18/4	22
10	#05 in A Major, Op 18/5	28
12	#06 in Bb Major, Op 18/6	24
11	#07 in F Major 'Razumovsky', Op 59/1	40
1	#08 in E minor 'Razumovsky', Op 59/2	40
9	#09 in C Major 'Razumovsky', Op 59/3	32
1	#10 in E flat Major 'Harp', Op 74	32
1	#11 in f minor 'Serioso', Op 95	21
0	#12 in E flat Major [1825], Op 127	35
2	#13 in Bb Major, Op 130 with 'Grosse Fugue'	57
0	#14 in C# minor, Op 131	39
2	#15 in a minor, Op 132	43
1	#16 in F Major, Op 135	25

Now there are only 16 of them, and there are roughly 525,600 minutes each year, so why can't they all be broadcast? What about #12 and #14? And only 2 times for the great Opus 132? Interestingly they did broadcast this on Thanksgiving night, appropriately with it's 3rd movement marked by Beethoven with "Heiliger Danksgesang eine Genesenen and die Gottheit, in der lydischen Tonart." ("Holy Song of Thanksgiving by a Convalescent to the Divinity, in the Lydian Mode", thanks Wikipedia)

So it's the early quartets, a smidge of the middle ones and short shrift to the late quartets, arguably Beethoven's finest. I just can help but wonder why a public radio station can't do better?

It's almost Thanksgiving...

and it's turning into another dismal year for some poor composers of long works. It's just hard for me to understand why a classical radio station that is listener supported finds itself totally unable to broadcast any works of length. My favorite peeve is Beethoven. His first 8 symphonies have been broadcast on KVOD anywhere from 21 times thus far in 2007 (symphony #3) to 29 times (or more) for symphonies 1,2 7 and 8. Yet symphony number 9, the mighty Chorale has only been broadcast 3 times in all of 2007 -- and one of those times was on a special series that I caught that features "Listener Requests"!!!

Then there is Mahler. 2 broadcast each for symphonies 1, 2 and 5. Poor Bruckner has had only 4 symphonies broadcast, one each for 1, 4, 8 and 9. Bruckner has had only 14 pieces broadcast in total for 2007 including smaller religious works. Ravel, on the other hand, clearly a better composer by KVOD's broadcast standards, has had 362 broadcast.

In music appreciation classes (when there were music appreciation classes!) Berlioz's "Symphonie Fantastique" was often the example of programmatic music. Remember the
"Dream of the Witches Sabbath" and "March to the Scaffold"! Well, the 'all classical music - all the time' stations are broadcasting individual sections and not just the whole piece. KVOD broadcast the entire thing 4 times, WQXR 9 times and KING 6 times.

I cannot understand what causes stations that broadcast round the clock to have to limit pieces based on length. Forget opera, also -- but that's another issue. I also think it somewhat disrespectful to single out individual movements for separate broadcast. But who cares, the composers are dead and not complaining. Perhaps I'm the one complaining too much.