Tag Archives: Tone Poem Tuesday

Last week I featured a work by Florence Price, and this week I’m going to do it again, because Price was a fascinating composer whose work is increasingly captivating me. This is a three-movement orchestral transcription of an earlier piano … Continue reading →

Florence Price was a Black composer who lived from 1887 to 1953. Her work was always held in fairly high regard–she was the first Black woman to have a work performed by a major symphony orchestra, in 1933, when her … Continue reading →

This, by Black composer William Grant Still, is one of the most evocatively titled works I’ve ever heard, and I only heard it for the first time yesterday. Its title makes clear why I am featuring it today, after I … Continue reading →

Three works today. I leave as an exercise to the reader what the composers have in common.  

An interesting piece today that I had forgotten about, by American composer Frederick Shepherd Converse. Converse lived from 1871 to 1940, and he was a fairly prolific composer who wrote in a late-Romantic style, not unlike Richard Strauss, but his … Continue reading →

In honor of yesterday’s 40th anniversary of the major eruption of Mt. St. Helens, a musical work devoted to that very mountain. Alan Hovhaness was an American composer of Armenian descent, and he was very prolific, eventually producing over 500 … Continue reading →

Wow, am I stretching the idea of a tone poem to the breaking point today. This isn’t even an entire work, just an excerpt from one…and it’s not even a complete excerpt, just a part of the excerpt! Let me … Continue reading →

Film music fans often notice how frequently their favorite composers are tasked with writing wonderful music for movies that really aren’t very good. Jerry Goldsmith in particular seems to have made a career of suffering this fate; the poor guy … Continue reading →

No excuse, I just didn’t get to it yesterday. You get what you pay for, folks! But anyway, a repeat of a favorite work of mine. This twenty-minute concert overture by Edward Elgar is lyrical and exciting. It reminds me … Continue reading →

Baroque music hasn’t always been my cup of tea, but I’ve made strides in its direction over the years. And even when I wasn’t a big Baroque fan, I’ve always rather liked the music of George Frideric Handel. There’s a … Continue reading →