Category Archives: On Music

Tone Poem Tuesday

Sometimes it’s interesting to compare performances by the same conductor, but separated by decades. Here we have Leonard Bernstein conducting his own Overture to Candide, which is likely the most enduring of his own works. The first performance is from one … Continue reading

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Tone Poem Tuesday (Farewell, Seiji Ozawa)

Maestro Seiji Ozawa died last week, aged 88. Ozawa was best known for his long tenure as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, all twenty-nine years of that tenure–the longest of any of that great orchestra’s many amazing conductors. … Continue reading

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Something for Thursday: Happy Birthday, John Williams!

John Williams turns 92 today…and he’s still working. In his honor, let’s listen to some of his work! Williams won a Grammy just the other night for this: “Helena’s Theme” from Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. It’s a typically gorgeous … Continue reading

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Tone Poem Tuesday

Ugh! I don’t know why this didn’t publish. I could swear I clicked the right thing on here. Anyway, this should have run the day before yesterday. Admittedly, this is one of my “Fallbacks because I’ve been having a busy … Continue reading

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Something for Thursday

Phil Collins turned 73 the other day. Collins no longer performs due to age and health reasons, which is very sad…but there was a time when he was ubiquitous to a staggering degree. From the mid-80s to around 2000 or … Continue reading

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Tone Poem Tuesday (PDQ Bach edition)

Peter Schickele died on January 16 of this year. He was a composer and a comedian who was best known as the self-styled musicologist responsible for “unearthing” the music of “P.D.Q. Bach”, the “21st of J.S. Bach’s 20 children”. Over … Continue reading

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Eddie

Born this date: Edward Van Halen, in 1955. This is what I wrote when he died, in 2020–but I’d rather honor him on the day on which he was born. It took me a while to start loving rock music. … Continue reading

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Something for Thursday: Robert Burns Edition

Robert Burns, the great poet troubadour of Scotland, was born this date, 1759. For a basic primer on Burns, this article is a good place to start. For some true appreciation, though, skip the basic intro and go right to … Continue reading

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Tone Poem Tuesday (National Pie Day edition)

Today is National Pie Day, which no one seems to really observe anymore seeing as how we’ve adopted March 14, “3.14”, as the quasi-official Pi Day on which we celebrate pie in addtion to pi. But anyway, that being the … Continue reading

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Tone Poem Tuesday

Chinese composer Tan Dun always interests me, and yet I always feel like I haven’t heard enough of his music! Here’s a fascinating tone poem, based on a three-note motif. And where does the motif come from? Well: Imagine if … Continue reading

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