Elliott’s Hardware, a favorite institution in Dallas and a long-time sponsor of The Dallas Wind Symphony, inspires people to create things.  Composer-in-Residence John Gibson is no exception.  His latest composition, “Man Dreams in Hardware,” is played on instruments constructed from items found on the shelves at Elliott’s.  Imagine the Sawsaphone, the Patuba and Batuba, and the PVCiccolo!  Join Professor Carol as she talks with Gibson about his sweeping theme: God, Man, and Hardware.

We take a journey through the Arabian Nights, visit the Roman Goddess of the Dawn, and thrill to the tragic fate of Spanish seductress Carmen.

Works discussed: Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade; John Mackey, Aurora Awakes; François Bourne, Carmen Fantasy

The Wind Symphony of the Greater Dallas Youth Orchestra is once again joining forces with The Dallas Wind Symphony. The music of Norman Dello Joio will be part of this traditional event, and has its own story to tell.

Frank Ticheli is a superstar composer in the world of Wind Music. Performers, audiences, and reviewers love the optimism, energy, and spontaneity of his music. Yet Professor of Composition at USC Ticheli must also teach the creative process. His observations offer insight into his works.

Professor Carol traces the path of film music up to the famous scores of master composer John Williams.  His ability to use “just a few notes” to intensify drama has captured our imaginations for four decades.

American composer William Bolcom has made a lot of ears happy through decades of composing, recording, and performing.  A triple-Grammy winner and tireless advocate for American music, he’s helped to revive the American songbook, particularly in league with his wife, mezzo-soprano Joan Morris.  He was instrumental in restoring Scott Joplin’s music to the public, and has created an eclectic and appealing legacy of compositions in all genres.

Works discussed: Charles Harris, After the Ball is Over; William Bolcom, Songs of Innocence and of Experience (texts William Blake), Concert Suite for Alto Saxophone and Band, Graceful Ghost Rag.

Titles are funny things, and Paul Richards knows how to grab your attention with titles like “A Butterfly Coughs in Africa” and “Falling on Lobsters in the Dark.” But he holds your attention with a rich palette of innovative and engaging sounds. The Dallas Wind Symphony will perform his concerto “Snake in the Garden” in its next concert, and you’ll be tempted to become a Richards fan.

Works discussed: Paul Richards, Snake in the Garden

What’s this program about?
Carl Orff selected vivid poems from a Medieval manuscript and super-charged them with color and energy to create the mega-hit “Carmina Burana” in 1937. An innovative music educator and proponent of Eurhythmics, Orff poured his understanding of natural melody and rhythm into this theatrical work, a spectacle for ear and eye.

Works discussed: Carl Orff, Carmina Burana

What’s this program about?
The Dallas Wind Symphony performs a concert entirely of American music running the gamut from show music to patriotic tunes to new pieces from some of America’s leading wind-band composers.

Works discussed
Stephen Bryant, Stampede; Morton Gould, American Salute; John Gibson, American Anthem; Fisher Tull, Rhapsody for Trumpet and Symphonic Band; Ron Nelson, Passacaglia on B-A-C-H; Leonard Bernstein, Three Dance Episodes from On the Town.

What’s this program about?
There isn’t exactly a Top 40 for the Band World. But if there were, every piece on this concert would be high on the list.

Works discussed:
Clifton Williams, Fanfare and Allegro; Vaclav Nehlybel, Symphonic Movements; Holst, Second Suite in F; Milhaud, Suite Francaise; Persichetti, Symphony for Band, Op. 69; Varese, Integrales

What’s this program about?

Enter the musical world of Sir Malcolm Arnold, a world of brisk expression and energy, evocative soundscape, precise instrumentation, and winsome melody. A world of richly colored, well crafted, deeply satisfying sound.

Many people discover Malcolm Arnold through his sets of appealing dances and through his film scores, especially Bridge on the River Kwai.

Technorati Profile

What’s this program about?
Vienna drew musicians from all over Europe, luring them with Imperial support for the arts and a public eager for music.  Mozart and Mahler came to work in Vienna more than a century apart, and both experienced success and frustrations in this opera-loving city so rich in architectural and cultural splendors. From the Turkish cultural influence to the passion of the waltz and operetta, Professor Carol surveys the musical history of Vienna and talks about Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5, Marriage of Figaro, and Mahler’s Fifth Symphony.

Works discussed: Mozart Violin Concerto in A Major, K. 219, Overture to Marriage of Figaro; Mahler, Symphony No. 5

What’s this program about?

Was it the great tunes, the snappy lyrics, or both? George Gershwin’s fabulous songs are a treasured part of American music. His Rhapsody in Blue, theater works American in Paris and Porgy and Bess, brought him celebrity status and changed the course of American music. After his premature death, his brother Ira carried on the legacy working with the Library of Congress to ensure that these musical treasures are ours today. Professor Carol surveys the life and works of Gerswhin.

Works discussed: Rhapsody in Blue, Songs, Three Preludes for Piano

Conductor and oboist Vladimir Lande talks with Professor Carol about the legacy of Evgeny Mravinsky and Soviet composers Shostakovich and Khachaturian, as well as the influence of folklore and the bells of the Orthodox Church on Russian composers. He discusses performances of music by John Corigliano, Gaetano Panariello, and Lorenzo Ferrero and his enthusiasm for performing contemporary music of Russia, America, and Italy at the St. Petersburg Musical Spring and Ravello Festivals.

In addition to his conducting career, Lande is a virtuoso oboist with the Poulenc Trio and the D’Amore duo. He began his career as principal oboist of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra (1984-1989), playing under such legendary conductors as Mravinsky, Mariss Jansons, Leonard Bernstein, Claudio Abbado, Valery Gergiev, and Yuri Temirkanov.

Lande has been awarded many prestigious prizes, including the First Prize of the Russian Republic Wind Competition. He was named principal guest conductor of the St. Petersburg Symphony Orchestra in Russia, as well as music director and conductor of the Washington Soloist Chamber Orchestra in Washington, D.C.

What’s this program about?

Russian music has tremendous audience appeal. Its sources are the very cornerstones of Old Russian Culture: the Orthodox Church, Russian history, Russian fairy tales and folklore, and Russia’s position between West and East. Liturgical chants and bells reverberate in the music of Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov, Mussorgsky, and Rachmaninov. Russian history and literature inspire the operas Prince Igor and Khovanshchina.

Works discussed: Rimsky-Korsakov, Russian Easter Overture; Mussorgsky, Pictures at an Exhibition, Prelude to Khovanshchina; Borodin, Prince Igor, Polovtsian Dances.

What’s this program about?

Richard Wagner was, and remains, one of the most intense and controversial figures of all time. For those who love Wagner’s music, Wagner becomes an obsession. Wagner understood and glorified the sound of wind instruments, especially brass, and transcriptions of Wagner’s operatic music have made highly effective and enjoyable arrangements for wind band. That’s how Wagner became a band geek.

Works discussed: Wagner’s Rienzi, Lohengrin, Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, Siegfried, Götterdämmerung

What’s this program about?

In today’s classical music world, there are not many composers who can stir up the excitement that might have accompanied the premiere of a new work by Brahms. But John Mackey is a composer who can. He has a popular following from all over the world. The Dallas Wind Symphony collaborated with a group of wind bands to commission Mackey’s new Concerto for Soprano Sax and Wind Ensemble. Mackey dedicated the work to Don Fabian, principal saxophonist of the Dallas Wind Symphony, and Professor Carol talks to Fabian about the upcoming premiere.

Works discussed: John Mackey’s Concerto for Soprano Sax and Wind Ensemble

In popular usage, “classical” means anything that lasts and is passed down from generation to generation. It also refers to the particular style of music, rich in contrast, that flourished in late 18^th-century Vienna. Professor Carol talks about classicism from Mozart to Brahms to Prokofiev.

Works discussed: Brahms: Symphony No. 1 in C Minor, Op. 68; Prokofiev: Symphony No. 1 in D Major, Op. 25, “Classical Symphony,” Lieutenant Kijé Suite, Piano Concerto No. 1 in D-Flat Major, Op. 10.

What’s this program about?
Ottorino Respighi was not at war with tonality or tradition, and his works have consequently been denigrated at times as “crowd pleasers.”  Although he wrote successful concertos, operas, and ballets that were widely performed in his day, he is known primarily for his Roman trilogy: Fountains of Rome, Pines of Rome, and Roman Festivals. Professor Carol takes a close look at Roman Festivals and the current revival of interest in Respighi’s works.

Works discussed: Respighi’s Roman Festivals, Pines of Rome, Fountains of Rome, Laud of the Nativity

The Respighi Foundation
The Resphigi Society

Further reading: Elsa Respighi. Ottorino Rspighi. His Life-Story Arranged By Elsa Respighi. Translated by Gwyn Morris. London: Ricordi, 1962.

Mahler expanded the orchestra to huge proportions, going beyond the already inflated forces of Wagner.  But Mahler simultaneously achieved an striking delicacy and transparency by using solo instruments to create “chamber music” in the midst of a his massive musical canvases. He drew his inspiration from the simple tunes of his childhood, military marches, folk songs, and village dances. But he also used the Viennese traditions of Beethoven, Schubert, and the Imperial Viennese waltz. He treated all of these elements as pieces of a mosaic, and placed them in a sophisticated symphonic frame. His great range of artistic expression and his choice to empower the instrumentalists with wonderful solo passages revolutionized music.

It’s true that musicians get excited about playing Mahler in a way that can’t be compared to other composers.  Their Mahler experiences stand out – their first awed encounters with his music and their experiences performing it.  Mahler demands constant attention from the musicians and pushes them to their limits of physical endurance.  So it makes sense to let the musicians themselves talk about Mahler and explain not only why it’s electrifying to play his music, but why so many listeners identify Mahler as one of their favorite composers.

This podcast features Michael Shih, Concertmaster, Ana Victoria Luperi, Principal Clarinet, Mark Houghton, Principal Horn, Steve Wegel, Principal Trumpet, Ron Wilson, Principal Trombone, Kathryn Perry, Violin, and Brian Perry, Bass.

The Fort Worth Symphony’s Mahler Cycle at Bass Hall opens August 23, 2007, with “The Man Behind the Music,” a spectacular multimedia experience led by Professor Carol Reynolds and featuring selections from Mahler’s vocal works with mezzo-soprano Jill Grove and pianist John Churchwell.

An American Evening features three aspects of American music: a symphonic tribute to American culture by Czech composer Antonin Dvorak, a ballet for Martha Graham by Aaron Copland, and two colorful pieces by the dynamic, contemporary composer John Corigliano.

Works discussed: Aaron Copland, Appalachian Spring; John Corigliano, Promenade Overture and To Music; Antonin Dvorak, Symphony No. 9 “From the New World”

What’s this program about?
Rossini, the master of bel canto opera, retired young, rich, and famous. Decades later, in old age and ill health, Rossini returned to composition and crafted a liturgical mass as his final work, a work both spiritual and theatrical, Petit Messe Solonnelle.

Works Discussed: Rossini’s Petit Messe Solonnelle

Where you can find:
Petit Messe Solonnelle

What’s this program about?
Tchaikovsky’s music holds a sacred place in Russian culture. Dmitri Shostakovich said, “Without Tchaikovsky we could not endure our sorrows.” Professor Carol examines his Fifth Symphony and considers his life, his personal struggles, and his professional successes.

Works Discussed: Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5, Symphony No. 4, The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, The Queen of Spades

What’s this program about?
Professor Carol discusses the history, customs, and geography of America that inspire our diverse choral music, from Colonial times to the present, emphasizing texts of John Stirling Walker and Eric Johns, tunebooks and hymnals, liturgy, folk song, and spirituals.

Works Discussed: Leonard Bernstein: Mass; Aaron Copland: The Tender Land; Randall Thompson: “Alleluia”; Choral works by David Conte, Hubert Bird, Ned Rorem, William Billings, Stephen Paulus

Where you can find:
Bernstein Mass
Copland The Tender Land
Randall Thompson “Alleluia”

What’s this program about?
John Gibson’s choral work “Mockingbird Sings” utilizes Native American texts of the Yuma, Zuni, Laguna, and Apache tribes. The title refers to the individual charged with remembering events and traditions and his recounting of this oral history in songs and stories. In this interview, Gibson explains his approach to setting these unusual texts to music and factors that distinguish American music from its European roots.

Works Discussed: John Gibson’s “Mockingbird Sings”

What’s this program about?
Chopin would have been surprised at the idea of a solo piano recital in a concert hall. Professor Carol talks about the programming of recitals and works of Bach-Busoni, Beethoven, Chopin, and Debussy.

Works Discussed: Bach-Busoni Chorale Preludes; Beethoven Sonata No. 21, Opus 53 (“Waldstein”); Chopin Sonata No. 2; Debussy “Children’s Corner”

Where you can find:
Bach-Busoni Transcriptions
Beethoven’s Waldstein Sonata
Debussy’s “Children’s Corner”
Chopin Sonata No. 2

What’s this program about?
Hollywood is heir to the European musical traditions. The classic films were scored by composers trained in Europe and schooled in the classical traditions and by immigrant composers who escaped Germany after their work was denounced by the Nazis as “degenerate music” (Entartete Musik).

Works Discussed: Bernard Herrmann: Psycho, Vertigo; Erich Korngold: Robin Hood; Aaron Copland: Red Pony; Virgil Thompson: The Plow that Broke the Plains

Where you can find:
The Film Music of Erich Korngold
Copland: The Red Pony Suite
Herrmann: The Film Scores
The Music Survives! Music Suppressed by the Third Reich

What’s this program about?
Professor Carol gives a biography of Schumann’s early years, comparing Schumann’s youthful work Papillons with his later Fantasy in C Major against the backdrop of his courtship of the young pianist Clara Wieck and the emerging Romantic image of the artist.

Works Discussed: Schumann: Papillons, Op. 2; Fantasy in C Major, Op. 17

Where you can find:
Sviatoslav Richter
Wilhelm Kempff
Leon Plantinga, Schumann as Critic

What’s this program about?
Military music inspires the troops, facilitates maneuver, intimidates the enemy, sends signals, marks daily events of camp life, entertains the troops in their leisure time, and comprises an important part of the pageantry and tradition of military life.

Works Discussed: Scotland the Brave, Yankee Doodle, Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio, Bugle Calls, The Army Song

Where you can find:
U.S. Army Field Band: From Sea to Shining Sea
Frederick Fennell: Music of the Civil War
The Edinburgh Military Tattoo: Bagpipe Marches of Scotland
Farmer, The World of Military Music

What’s this program about?
Carol interviews Dean Bouras, arranger for the Dallas Wind Symphony Big Band concerts, and John Trapani, leader of the John Trapani Big Band about the era, the music, and its popularity today.

Works Discussed: Glenn Miller, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Woody Herman, Norman Leyden

Where you can find:
Big Band Collection
Big Band Magic

What’s this program about?
Beethoven sliced and diced his themes, using musical rhetoric that rebelled against the natural melodic style of Mozart and that charted a path into 19th-century Romanticism. Professor Carol uses the Piano Sonata in E-Flat, Op. 31, to show how he did it.

Works Discussed: Beethoven: Piano Sonata in E-Flat, Op. 31

Where you can find:
Beethoven Piano Sonatas Op. 31

What’s this program about?
A youthful Brahms finds his signature style early in the Opus 10 Ballades based on the Scottish Ballad “Eduard” by Herder.

Works Discussed: Brahms: Four Ballades, Op. 10

Where you can find:
Brahms Op. 10 Ballades

What’s this program about?
Slavic composers Smetana, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Rachmaninov cared deeply about their national roots and national identity, and each knew how to seduce the ear of listeners with gorgeous melody, ravishing orchestration, and a heart-racing sense of the dramatic.

Works Discussed: Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2, Smetana’s The Moldau, and Rimsky-Korsakov’s Sheherazade

Where you can find:
Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No. 2
Smetana: The Moldau
Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherezade
A History of Russian Music: From Kamarinskaya to Babi Yar

What’s this program about?
Slavic composers Smetana, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Rachmaninov cared deeply about their national roots and national identity, and each knew how to seduce the ear of listeners with gorgeous melody, ravishing orchestration, and a heart-racing sense of the dramatic.

Works Discussed: Smetana’s The Moldau, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Sheherazade, and Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2

Where you can find:
Smetana: The Moldau
Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherezade
A History of Russian Music: From Kamarinskaya to Babi Yar
My Musical Life by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

What’s this program about?
The tone poem of the late romantic era painted pictures and portrayed stories with a rich orchestral style that became the model for film music. In Part 2, Professor Carol explains features of John Williams’ famous film scores and how we hear music differently when it accompanies drama.

Works Discussed: John Williams, E.T., Schindler’s List, Jaws, Superman, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Harry Potter

Where you can find:
Holst “The Planets”
Williams on Williams: The Classic Spielberg Scores

What’s this program about?
The tone poem of the late romantic era painted pictures and portrayed stories with a rich orchestral style that became the model for film music. In Part 1, Professor Carol explains Gustav Holst’s The Planets and some of the techniques that lead to the style of John Williams.

Works Discussed: Gustav Holst, The Planets; John Williams, Olympic Theme and Fanfare

Where you can find:
Holst “The Planets”
Williams on Williams: The Classic Spielberg Scores

What’s this program about?
The final segment of Glenn Mitchell’s interview of Carol on KERA Radio turns to the Library of Congress’s American Memory Project, Bill Monroe, John Fogerty, Harry Partch, and Scott Joplin.

Where you can find:
The Harry Partch Collection (Vol. 1)
Ricky Skaggs & Friends Sing the Songs of Bill Monroe
Bill Monroe: Blue Moon of Kentucky
Piano Rags

What’s this program about?
Glenn Mitchell’s interview of Carol on KERA Radio continues in Part 2 with a discussion of the Sacred Harp (shape-note singing), Stephen Foster, American film music, Louis Armstrong, Broadway, and Ernest Tubb.

Where you can find:
American Folk Hymns from the Sacred Harp Collection
Tubb: Waltz Across Texas
King Oliver with Louis Armstrong
Songs of Stephen Foster

What’s this program about?
Carol pays tribute to the late Glenn Mitchell with a reprise of her appearance in September 2000 on his radio program, reproduced here as a three-part podcast courtesy of KERA Radio. Carol and Glenn begin their discussion of America’s highly varied musical heritage with reference to William Billings, Jimmie Rodgers, Charles Ives, and Frank Zappa.

Where you can find:
Ives: An American Journey
Zappa: Trance-Fusion
The Essential Jimmie Rodgers

KERA Radio
Glenn Mitchell
Harry Partch
American Memory Project (Library of Congress)
Jimmie Rodgers
Shape-Note Singing

What’s this program about?
Professor Carol continues her interview of John Corigliano and Jerry Junkin. Corigliano talks about his approach to composition and how he, and other top composers, are turning to wind bands for an exciting new sound.

Works Discussed: Corigliano, Circus Maximus

What’s this program about?
Professor Carol interviews two friends and collaborators, composer John Corigliano and Maestro Jerry Junkin. Circus Maximus, Coriglian’s explosive third symphony, vividly portrays ancient Rome’s fascination with perpetual entertainment and our own culture’s similar obsession.

Works Discussed: Corigliano, Circus Maximus

Where you can find:
John Corigliano’s Altered States
John Corigliano’s Red Violin
John Corigliano’s Concerto for Clarinet

What’s this program about?
In post-revolutionary France, the piano had replaced the harpsichord and the driving force behind the arts was moving from the court to the salons of Paris high society. Two composers, Liszt and Chopin, capitalized on these changes in very different ways and between them defined the future of piano music.

Where you can find:
Twelfth International Cliburn Piano Competition
Parisian Worlds – Chopin

What’s this program about?
Percy Grainger’s life story reveals a most unusual personality who left an enduring legacy as a virtuoso pianist, an inventor of instruments, a collector of English folk songs, and a composer of music for wind band.

Works Discussed: Grainger, Lincolnshire Posy, The Immovable Do, Molly on the Shore.

Where you can find:
Percy Grainger’s Great Symphonic Band Music
Frederick Fennell – Eastman Wind Ensemble
Percy Grainger Biography – John Bird

What’s this program about?
Professor Carol explains various uses of dance forms: the light-hearted dances used by Rossini to strike a contrast with the serious dramatic action of William Tell, the tango combined by John Mackey with machine music, and the Renaissance dance forms comprising Susato’s Danserye.

Works Discussed: Rossini, William Tell; Mackey, Redline Tango; Honegger, Pacific 231; Susato, The Danserye.

Where you can find:
The Best of Rossini
Redline Tango
Pacific 231
Susato Danserye

What’s this program about?
A ballad tells a story, and this popular literary form was appropriated by Romantic composers into songs. Carol explains how the ballad was transformed by Chopin into solo piano works.

Works Discussed: Chopin, Ballade No. 4 in F Minor; Chopin, Impromptu No. 2; Schiller, Der Taucher (The Diver).

Where you can find:
Chopin Nocturnes and Ballades
Chopin Impromptus

What’s this program about?
Carol discusses Jeffrey Kahane’s performance with the Fort Worth Symphony, performance practices of piano concertos in Mozart’s time, cadenzas, and how stylistic conventions of the Classical era affected the ability of one person to take the dual role of soloist and conductor.

Works Discussed: Mozart, Overture to The Magic Flute; Mozart, Piano Concert No. 24 in C Minor (K. 491)

Where you can find:
Mozart – Piano Concertos #22 & 24
The Mozart Album – Canadian Brass