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I can’t remember the year – it must have been around 1980 – that I attended the Three Choirs Festival in England, held that year at Gloucester Cathedral. What I can clearly remember, however, was the feeling of being in a brief time warp. I had met up with the cathedral’s former organist and composer Read More …
There can be few pieces to rival the popularity of Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, be it performed from the ‘original score’ (it was itself an arrangement of an earlier string quartet movement) or in one of the plentiful arrangements of the piece for other forces. Such a level of popularity, however, frequently overshadows other Read More …
Quite by accident, I came across the fact that November 25, the date of this posting, also marks the 1955 premiere of American composer Walter Piston’s Sixth Symphony. Taking the lead from that touch of serendipity, I thought this edition might give a sketch of the composer and his output. Within my own sphere of Read More …
The previous edition of our Naxos blog focused on two symphonies that Brazilian composer Cláudio Santoro composed in the 1950s – the Fourth and Fifth – the latter written to mark the founding of the country’s new capital, Brasilia. Santoro (1919–89) was a member of the Brazilian Communist Party, which brought him major problems during Read More …
Cláudio Santoro features significantly in the Naxos Music of Brazil series, which is a joint undertaking with Brazil’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs to promote music by Brazilian composers in an extensive series of new albums. Santoro (1919–89) wrote fourteen symphonies, all of which feature on the project’s release schedule and represent the most significant set Read More …
Pater seraphicus is how the 19th-century pianist/organist/teacher/composer César Franck was known to his pupils. It might be fair to suggest that the consonant Panis angelicus, Franck’s setting of a verse from an ancient hymn, is how he’s best remembered by music-lovers with only limited knowledge of his output. Has the passing of time treated him Read More …
If you’ve already made your will, maybe you’ve also stipulated the music you would like to be played at the assembly for your funeral service. After a lifetime in music, and not once having been able to nominate a favourite piece, I’ve recently opted for a quiet cremation and a silent scattering of ashes. Stirred Read More …
When a composer’s work is marked as his or her Opus 100, it surely marks a milestone in their development. Some composers didn’t make it that far, of course, leaving us wondering what might have been, had they lived long enough or enjoyed circumstances that better facilitated a freedom to compose. Chopin falls into another Read More …
Labelling Beethoven’s Für Elise a mere trifle might appear insulting to such a household name and piano solo favourite. But that’s exactly what his Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor is, ’une bagatelle’ translating from the French as ’a trifling matter’. This blog examines the recipes composers have used for a selection of bagatelles over Read More …
Here’s a small selection of works celebrating August, not as an evocative month approaching Autumn, but as a dedicatee (August Bournonville), a composer’s name (August Baeyens, Friedrich August Belcke), a source of literary inspiration (August von Platen-Hallermünde, August Strindberg), and an arranger (August Eberhard Müller). Hans Christian Lumbye (1810–1874) began staging concerts in the manner Read More …
