music Archives - Page 68 of 264 - Ramblin' with Roger

My daughter’s musical tastes

The day before a momentous one

I’ve noted that my daughter’s musical tastes include 1990s soul, developed without much input from me, though I approve.

She’s been involved in a few musicals at church, so she knows The Lion King. Her parents have let her know about West Side Story and Fiddler On The Roof. She discovered Grease on her own.

Recently, she’s been playing the Studio Cast Recording to the musical Six, about the six wives of Henry VI. The first song, Ex-Wives, repeats the bromide to remember their fates: Divorced, Beheaded, Died, Divorced, Beheaded, Survived. It could be useful in a history class.

Indeed, her affection for Hamilton, long before I was aware of it, has helped her in that manner. She knows who ran in the election of 1800, e.g. Likewise her knowledge of Assassins, the interesting Sondheim musical about people who killed Presidents, or tried to, has helped. Musicals aren’t history, of course, but they can be useful.

Her father, as noted, gave her Beatles #1s when she was five. So I was amused with one of those periodical articles, this showing up in the local paper, by a guy named Michael Gorelick. His commentary was titled “Fab Four music seriously flawed” The writer says nausea overwhelms him “three seconds after hearing a Beatles song.”

I would disagree, of course, as did at least four readers of the Times Union. But he did say one thing that was true of me. I used Beatles music to babysit my child, unapologetically. Compare Adam@Home.

More of the road trip songs

I’m continuing with songs she picked out on the road trip.

Take On Me -A-ha
No Scrubs – TLC
Stand Up – Cynthia Erivo. This is from the movie Harriet, which she did not see, but her parents did.

Jugaste y Sufri – Eslabon Armado ft. Danny Lux
Lover Is A Day – Cuco
Not Allowed – TV Girl
t r a n s p a re n t s o u l – Willow Smith ft. Travis Barker

Cupid’s Chokehold/Breakfast In America – Gym Class Heroes ft. Patrick Stump. I love that Supertramp album
Redbone – Childish Gambino
Moral Of The Story – Ashe. “You can think that you’re in love when you’re really just in pain.”
Daddy Issues – The Neighbourhood. Hmmm…

Albany Symphony: two Russian composers

Hannah Kendall

The Albany Symphony held a concert at the Palace Theatre in the city on February 12, featuring two Russian composers. My friend Lee was supposed to go, but he and his spouse were out of town. He gave us their tickets, and my wife and I went in their stead. We attended the pre-concert talk with conductor David Alan Miller and piano soloist Wei Luo.

The first piece was the 10-minute piece The Spark Catchers by the non-Russian Hannah Kendall (b. 1984). It was inspired by Lemn Sissay’s poem of the same name. It concerned the Bow Matchwomen’s Strike in East London of the late 1880s. Kendall was struck by the linguistic parallel of striking a match and a worker cessation.

The Spark Catchers as performed by Chineke! Orchestra c. 2020

This was followed by the Concerto for Piano No. 3 by Sergei (1891-1953) from 1921. In the notes, the initial section shows “everything a pianist is done: cross-handed work… crashing chords, reaches to both ends of the keyboard and staccato playing.” No wonder Wei Luo, dressed in a very shiny red outfit, presumably for Valentine’s Day weekend, got an ovation after only the first movement.

Prokofiev died the same day as Joseph Stalin, two days before I was born. Thus the news of the composer’s death was somewhat muted in the Soviet press. Or maybe it was that the Communist Party had censured his work in 1948, seeking a “new style,” whatever that means. Possibly they thought it was his beautiful melodies that had “become distorted, and conventional tonality gives way to harmonic dissonance.”

Piano Concerto No. 3. Martha Argerich at the Singapore International Piano Festival 2018

And tell Tchaikovsky the news

Pytor Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) was one of the first composers whose work I could identify, first the 1812 overture, then the Nutcracker. I’m sure I have at least one recording of his Symphony No. 6, “Pathetique.” I did not know that he died nine days after the symphony’s debut, which the composer conducted.

His brother Modest blamed Pytor’s death on the composer drinking unboiled water during a cholera epidemic. But David Alan Miller doesn’t buy it. Was it suicide? The man was old before his time.

The second movement is in the unusual 5/4 meter. The theme of the third movement appears very early and it is very familiar to me. But doesn’t reach its full vigor until relatively near the end. It sounds like the end of the piece, and many patrons at ASO applauded. No, there is a fourth, slow movement that “fades away into nothingness.”

Pathetique, Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, Op. 74, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra with Yuri Temirkanov, conductor. Recorded in 1990

March rambling: Believe in Freedom

Have a little heart.

Thanks for all of the birthday wishes!

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*ABA – The Goodest Language Universal

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Kelly Sedinger, fka Jaquandor, has been blogging for 20 years!

Wordle cartoon
Wordle 263 4/6

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Infinity cartoon

RIP

William Hurt (Broadcast News, The Big Chill, The Accidental Tourist, Altered States, The Incredible Hulk)

Tim Considine (My Three Sons, Spin and Marty)

Johnny Brown (Good Times, Laugh-In)

Alan Ladd Jr. (greenlit Star Wars, produced Braveheart)

Conrad Janis (Mork and Mindy, trombonist

Farrah Forke (Wings)

Sally Kellerman (Hot Lips Houlihan in MAS*H movie)

Emilio Delgado (Luis on Sesame Street)

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Ukraine

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A Beautiful Resistance

Boston Globe culture columnist, Jeneé Osterheldt, created this to celebrate and center Black Joy and Black lives and the lives of other folks of color, too. Mental health resources compiled by Jeneé:

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National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

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The Trevor Project – Supporting Transgender and Nonbinary Youth

Invitation

Friends & Foundation of APL National Library Week Luncheon
April 5, 2022, at 12pm

The Kitchen Table | 300 Delaware Ave | Albany, NY

Join us on Tuesday, April 5th to gather with friends old and new.
We will celebrate our past president, Holly McKenna, and wish her the best of luck in her next endeavors.
And we will remember our dear Friends, Paul Hacker and David Colchamiro, who passed away last year.

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MUSIC

Prayer for Ukraine from Clare College, Cambridge

Beyond Context by Svitlana Azarova

Telnyuk Sisters

Luminescent (new song!) and Sign Of The Times – Petula Clark

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Rock The Boat – Hues Corporation

The Circle of Life from The Lion King

The music of my parents

Ed Sullivan?

When I was talking with my sisters earlier in the year, I asked them about the music of my parents, our parents. Were there tunes listened to and/or sung by both Les and Trudy? I have mentioned at length what my father listened to and sang.

My mom had 78s of Nat Cole and big band artists. I associate my mother’s LPs as soundtracks of movie musicals and Broadway plays, sometimes the originals, such as the movies West Side Story and The Sound of Music. But more often it was some off-brand version, some presented by Ed Sullivan, almost certainly including Pal Joey and Kiss Me, Kate. Here’s Always True To You In My Fashion from the latter album.

Mom also used to sing around the house. She had a pleasant voice, with a slightly Betty Boop timbre. One song she particularly must have liked was A, You’re Adorable, a 1949 #1 hit for Perry Como. Though her version was more like the take by Jo Stafford and Gordon MacRae, #4 in that same year.

I understand that, before she was married to my dad, Mom sang in the choir at Oak Street Methodist Church. As far as I know, she never sang at Trinity AME Zion, though my father did for years.

One year I bought Joe’s Jackson’s Jumpin’ Jive album (title song) for my mom. Soon thereafter, she asked me why on earth I bought her THAT. A miss.

Wes? Slam?

One suggestion of music my parents listened to together was Wes Montgomery, which I had put in my dad’s category. Here’s The Incredible Jazz Guitar.

My sisters also thought of Slam Stewart. While I don’t recall my parents hearing him together, he was well known in our hometown of Binghamton. His humming bass was very affecting. Somewhere in my attic, I have an LP that was recorded as a benefit for the Binghamton Sertoma Club. Here’s Slam Jam by Slam Stewart. I saw him perform at SPAC in the late 1970s or early 1980s.

Did they have “Our Song”? If they did, we never heard about it. I suppose I wish they had, like those folks in that Alexa commercial dancing to I Only Have Eyes For You by the Flamingoes, a song that BTW I greatly adore.

Ultimately, Les and Trudy Green would probably agree, the music they were most fond of was that of Les Green. My mother said often that someone needs to be in the audience, and she was an enthusiastic participant in that role.

My parents wed on March 12, 1950, and were married for 50 years before my father died.

1922: King Tut’s tomb; these #1 hits

Fanny Brice

As the book says, “The discovery of King Tut’s tomb in 1922 opened up new realms of the ancient world.” More relevant to music, “radio swiftly evolved from a novelty into a nationwide phenomenon, with 500 stations established by 1922 and over 1,000 three years later.”

April Showers – Al Jolson, eleven weeks at #1, gold record. He was on Columbia Records. The song was written for the Broadway musical “Bombo.” It has also been covered by Cab Calloway, Bing Crosby, and Judy Garland.

Three O’Clock in the Morning – Paul Whiteman, eight weeks at #1, gold record. A waltz. All of the Whiteman hits were instrumentals. I wrote about him last year. Almost all of the remaining hits on this list were on Victor.

Hot Lips (He’s Got Hot Lips When He Plays Jazz) – Paul Whiteman, six weeks at #1. This is labeled a blues foxtrot. Foxtrot is always spelled fox trot on the labels.
Stumbling – Paul Whiteman, six weeks at #1. A foxtrot.
Mister Gallagher and Mister Shean “Positively, Mr. Gallagher?” – Ed Gallager/Al Shean, six weeks at #1, gold record. This is a “comedy” record. Shean was an uncle of the Marx Brothers. The dialogue is transcribed and contains…problematic references to blacks and especially women.

Angel Child – Al Jolson, five weeks at #1

In The Alamo – Isham Jones, four weeks at #1. An instrumental on Brunswick Records. A foxtrot.

Gershwin

Do It Again! – Paul Whiteman, two weeks at #1. The George Gershwin-Buddy DeSylva song was introduced on-stage by Irene Bordoni in the 1922 Broadway comedy “The French Doll.”
Mr. Gallagher and Mr. Shean – Billy Jones/Ernest Hare, two weeks at #1. A comedy record on Okeh Records

My Man (Mon Homme) – Fanny Brice (pictured). Originally the French-language song “Mon Homme,” Fanny performed it with the new English lyrics in “Ziegfeld Follies Of 1921”. Music-Maurice Yvain, English lyric by Channing Pollock. Orchestra conducted by Rosario Bourdon. “Thirteen years after her death, she was portrayed on the Broadway stage by Barbra Streisand in Funny Girl.”
My Buddy – Henry Burr. Gus Kahn and Walter Donaldson wrote this melancholy post-WWI ballad. This is the song I best recollect of this bunch.

THEN I come across the article about recorded music from 1922 and earlier, which touts pieces now in the public domain, with many of the same songs.