Archive for the ‘Toccata’ Category
This week on “Toccata.”
I hope you can join me for “Toccata,” this Sunday. In addition to music for 2 Pianos by Adolf Busch, and a Magnificat for organ by Scheidemann, I’ll feature a 1955 recording of Heitor Villa-Lobos conducting The French National Radio Orchestra with Pianist Felicia Blumental in his Piano Concerto No. 5. He dedicated the work … Read More »
05/05/13 – Toccata Rundown
PLAY DATE: Sun, 05/05/2013 6:00 PM 48231 Girolamo Frescobaldi Toccata Sesta (Secondo Libro) MSR 1334 SOLO SooHwang Choi, organ 5:51 C 1 1-1 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 6:05 PM 14294 Girolamo Frescobaldi Toccata quarta (Secondo Libro) MSR 1334 SOLO SooHwang Choi, organ 5:35 C 1 2-2 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 6:15 PM 21216 Johannes Brahms Souvenir de la Russie Op 151 … Read More »
04/28/13 – Toccata Rundown
6:00 PM 7739 Sergei Prokofiev Sarcasms Op 17 MCA 10155 SOLO Oleg Volkov,piano 12:11 C 1 5-9 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 6:16 PM 47239 Herbert Sumsion Intermezzo Naxos 550773 SOLO Donald Hunt, organ 5:59 C 1 17-17 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 6:21 PM 47240 Herbert Sumsion Ceremonial March Naxos 550773 SOLO Donald Hunt, organ 3:47 C 1 18-18 ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 6:28 PM … Read More »
Revision, revision…
Brahms set very high standards for himself. It was not uncommon for him to write a complete work, a string quartet, for example, only to destroy it because it felt it wasn’t up to his standards. Any other composer would have been proud to have written music that he threw away, and that, alas, we … Read More »
Bach–a real smart-aleck!
Once a person asked J.S. Bach how it was possible to get such sound from the organ. Bach told the person, “All one has to do is touch the right keys at the right time, and the instrument practically plays itself.” Well, I guess so! I once saw a made for tv (perhaps HBO) movie … Read More »
Big Doin’s
Here’s a conversation I had with Henry Lowe and Michael Britt about the Organ Dedication Recital at church of the Redeemer.
01/22/12 – Beethoven and Liszt
Franz Liszt was a great admirer of Beethoven. He played Beethoven’s Sonatas and Concertos regularly, and did several arrangements of Beethoven’s music, including arranging the symphonies for piano solo. One might very well ask, “why do such a thing?” Well, we take so much for granted in our time. In Liszt’s day, the opportunity to … Read More »
11/27/11 Believe it or not…
It may seem hard to believe, but Beethoven’s Violin Concerto was not a big hit in it’s day. It wasn’t until many years after Beethoven’s death that the work was championed by the great violinist Joseph Joachim, and it was his “star power” that got people listening to this work, which had been terribly neglected. … Read More »
11/20/11 A long walk
According to the old story, the young J.S. Bach walked 100 miles from Arnstadt to Lubeck to study with the great Danish-born organist and composer Dietrich Buxtehude. Well…there’s a bit more to it than that. Bach started out on foot, but almost certainly got rides from passing wagons and carts. Not unusual in those days. … Read More »
11/13/11 Jumping to conclusions
We have become accustomed to hearing music by Spanish composers played on the guitar. We often associate the guitar with Spain, but it’s interesting to note that until Fernando Sor arrived on the scene, the leading guitarists in Europe were Italian, and the instrument was associated with Italy. Many Spanish composers with whom we often … Read More »
