This week you will be listening to Solfeggietto, a short but energetic piece written by C. P. E. Bach ( 1714-1788), one of J. S. Bach’s more famous composer-sons.

With this piece, a single line of notes propels us breathlessly forward until it’s urgency is underscored by the octaves mid-way through.  But then the octaves leave us as suddenly as they appear with the single melody line reappearing and then disappearing as quickly as it came. Is this piece in major or minor tonality?  Does it start one way and then change?  What is the meter?  What is the character or mood of this piece?

You will have three different performances of this very short piece.  As you listen and enjoy the differences between them ask yourself how the piece changes in character with being played on the different instruments.  One is played on a pipe organ, one on a harpsichord and one on a piano.  Which instrument do you prefer?

Franz Liszt (1811-1886) was the rock star of his day.  His piano skills and stage presence dazzled his audiences with sounds and emotional drama that had not been experienced before by concert goers.  People would toss handkerchiefs onstage and  climb over each other to try and grab a piece of his clothing.  Fainting at his concerts was not uncommon.  Because of all these theatrics, Liszt was not taken as seriously as a composer in the years following his death up until fairly recently.  Now scholars are taking another look at his compositions and discovering that they do hold up to the passing of time and critical scrutiny.  And furthermore, his music is still very rewarding to play and enjoyable to hear!  While many of his compositions do have in them the gratuitous “show-off” passages, there is still enough real substance and emotional depth to make them worth studying, and the skills they require from the pianist, if gained, will equip one with a formidable technique.

This week’s piece is La Campanella, or the little bell, which is No. 3 of the six Paganini Etudes.  It begins with the sound of this little bell which continues to grow with both range of the piano and intensity.  See if you can find the pitch of this bell on the piano. Can you guess the time signature?  Listen carefully to the wide range of dynamics that this piece demands.  I’ve posted two different performances of the same piece.  Can you hear any differences between the two?  Imagine yourself, someday playing this wonderful piece!

What if your life depended on your being able to tell one incredible story after another for a thousand and one nights?  That was the predicament that Scheherazade found herself in and the stories she told to the Tsar became known as the 1001 Nights or The Arabian Nights.  That folk-talk inspired Rimsky-Korsakov, a Russian composer of the late 19th c. to write Scheherazade, an orchestral work, written loosely in four sections described as: I The Sea- Sinbad’s Ship,  II The Kalendar Prince,  III The Young Prince and Princess,  IV Festival at Baghdad.

This particular version of Scheherazade has been arranged and performed by Alvin Moisey.  As you listen what images do you see?  What stories does the music tell?

This week’s musical story is called The Cat and the Mouse written by American composer, Aaron Copeland.  In this very descriptive musical tale we can hear the mouse being chased by the cat, running here and there frantically trying to escape.  Then in the quieter portion of the piece we hear the cat biding its time, seeming to doze off and then. . .the final pounce!  What isn’t clear is whether or not the mouse escapes or is caught by the cat.  Are those funeral bells at the end, or does the mouse get the better of the cat as so often happens in the Tom and Jerry episodes?  How do you think the story ends?

Aaron Copeland lived from 1900 – 1990 and is best known for his orchestral pieces such as Appalachian Spring, Fanfare for the Common Man, and Billy the Kid.

This week you will be listening to a composition called, Jeux d’Enfants, or Children’s Games for Piano Four Hands written by George Bizet.  Bizet was a French Romantic composer who lived from 1838-1875.  He is best known for his opera, Carmen, which continues to be popular and frequently performed to this day.

As you listen to each “game” try and figure out how Bizet captured the mood or character of each one.  For instance, in the first one called The Swing, what rhythm does he use to create a sensation of swinging?  How are dynamics engaged to create each character for instance contrasting between No.3 and No. 6? Compare the Blind Man’s Bluff (No. 9) in this selection with the Blind Man’s Bluff that you listened to last week.  Would you re-name any of them?

The duo who are playing these pieces is called The Swingle Fingers Duo and they are amazing!  Their ensemble makes them sound like one person playing.  Below is a list of the titles of the 12 different games.  Enjoy!

1.)The Swing  2.)The Spinning Top  3.)The Doll  4.)Merry-Go-Round  5.)Flying  6.)Trumpet and Drum  7.) Soap Bubbles  8.) Cat in the Corner  9.) Blind Man’s Bluff  10.) Leapfrog  11.) Little Husband, Little Wife  12.)The Ball

This month you will be listening to music that tells stories.  Music is a form of communication, like language, but it uses combinations of sounds instead of words to convey emotional content.  Sometimes the emotional idea will be more abstract and less defined by the composer and other times the composer will give a title to his/her work that will clearly indicate what the music is describing.

This week’s selection is from Robert Schuman’s Scenes from Childhood, the first seven of them (there are thirteen altogether).  Each one is quite short and has a descriptive title which are the following:  1.)Of Foreign Lands and People, 2.) A Curious Story, 3.)Blind Man’s Bluff, 4.)Pleading Child, 5.) Happy Enough, 6.) An Important Event, 7.) Dreaming

Listen to each one and see if you agree with the title or do you have a different idea in mind when you hear them?  The pianist is Vladmir Horowitz, one of the great pianists of the 20th century and his performance of Dreaming is considered by many to be the ideal to which all others can only aspire.

The early years of the twentieth century were a time of upheaval with new ways of thinking about society and one’s place in the world. Two world wars brought about changes of government and also social transformation.  These changes took place in South America as well as in North America and Europe.

One of the less violent, yet significant revolutions that took place was in music with an interest in native folk music that developed in the second half of the 19th century.  Our composer for this week is Heitor Villa-Lobos, a Brazilian composer who lived from 1887-1959.  He, like many others of his time, was interested in the native music of the indigenous people of Brazil and spent about a decade traveling and listening and absorbing the sounds and stories of the native people.  This then became the material that he used for many of his compositions.   Villa-Lobos felt a tension between the tradition of European music and his desire to incorporate the nationalistic music of Brazil and tried to find a way to blend the two traditions.

You will be listening to two of his compositions one for piano taken from a collection called, Prole do Bebe, or the Baby’s Family and the second piece is for cello taken from a suite called Bachianas Brasileiras.  This composition demonstrates his attempt at blending his love and admiration for J.S.Bach with his own sensibilities as a Brazilian composer.

Borzinho de Chumbo-

Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 arranged for cello and guitar

Manuel de Falla was a Spanish composer and pianist who lived from 1876-1946.  His early musical training was with the piano which he continued to study while at the conservatory in Madrid, earning there first prize in a piano competition. But it was also  during his time at the conservatory that he began to develop his compositional skills.  While there he entered several compositions in contests that gained him notoriety as an upcoming composer.

He was interested in native Andalusian music, an area in Spain, south of the Iberian Peninsula, and in particular the Andalusian Flamenco dance.   Other influences on his work came from the time he spent in Paris during the early part of the 20th century.  While living there he heard the music of Ravel, Debussy and Dukas, which influenced his own writing style.  He also met Igor Stravinsky and made a brief excursion to London.

He eventually returned to Spain, and while living in Granada composed many different types of pieces including a puppet opera and a harpsichord concerto- the first to be written in the 20th century.  He moved to Argentina in 1939 after Franco’s victory in the Spanish Civil War.  He died while living in Argentina but his remains were brought back to Spain and he is entered in the Cathedral of Cadiz.  While not a prolific composer, his music continues to speak to us today, with the flavors and rhythms of Spanish culture

The piece you will be listening to this week is called Ritual Fire Dance, which comes from a ballet called, Bewitched Love, for which he wrote the music.  Ritual Fire Dance exhibits the drive and energy so characteristic of de Falla’s music. It is played by Mauricio Nader.  The second link is to an orchestral version of this same piece.

While music knows no cultural boundaries and speaks a universal language, there are definitely however, influences from composers living in different parts of the world.  The music “accent” varies from culture to culture.

This month you will be listening to music written by composers from Latin America and hopefully begin to recognize the sound and rhythms of music from that part of the world.

Ernesto Lecuona y Casado was a Cuban composer and pianist who lived from 1895-1963.  His father was from the Canary Islands and his mother was Cuban.  Ernesto showed remarkable talent at an early age, attending the National Conservatory of Havana and graduating from there at the age of sixteen.  He wrote over 600 compositions, many for the piano but also for voice.  He left Cuba in 1960, unhappy with the rule of Castro and lived out the remainder of his life in the United States.  His music was popularized in the United States by a fellow Cuban and actor by the name of Desi Arnaz.

Malaguena is a Spanish dance, similar to the Fandango, which originated in the Spanish port of Malaga.  Notice how the piece is paced building dynamically and with rhythmic tension from the very beginning to an exciting finish