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(Note: See "Music Mountain" Broadcast
Information Listed Below)
May 11
William Grant Still
Birth: May 11, 1895 in Woodville, MS
Death: December 3, 1978 in Los Angeles, CA
William Grant Still, "the Dean of African American composers",
was only three months old when his father, the town bandmaster,
died. Soon after, his family moved to Little Rock, AR. His mother,
grandmother and stepfather influenced his character, instilling
in him a love for the arts. Still's formal education began at age
16 at Wilberforce University and continued at the Oberlin Conservatory,
where he studied theory and composition. After serving in the U.S.
Navy in 1918, he wrote arrangements for W. C. Handy and Paul Whiteman,
played oboe in the famous Noble Sissle-Eubie Blake revue Shuffle
Along, and began a long association with radio, arranging and producing
programs for the Mutual and Columbia networks. His early compositions
were quite dissonant and complex, but he made a major breakthrough
when he started incorporating African American and popular musical
styles into his works. His first big triumph, and his best-known
work to this day, is his Symphony #1 "Afro-American", which was
premiered in Rochester, NY in 1931, and was soon performed worldwide.
After moving to Los Angeles in 1934, Still turned his attention
to film, providing the scores for Lost Horizon and the original
Pennies From Heaven. Later he also scored a number of television
shows, including Perry Mason and Gunsmoke. Still wrote politically
and racially conscious works throughout his life, such as the narrated
work And They Lynched Him on a Tree, and In Memoriam: The Colored
Soldiers Who Died for Democracy. In 1981, Still's opera A Bayou
Legend was the first by an African American composer to be performed
on national television. He was also the first African American to
conduct a major U.S. orchestra (the Los Angeles Philharmonic in
a Hollywood Bowl concert of his own music), and the first African
American composer to have his works performed by major American
orchestras and opera companies.
May 18
Karl Goldmark
Birth: May 18, 1830 in Keszthely, Hungary
Death: January 2, 1915 in Vienna, Austria
One of 21 children, Karl was born into an affluent Jewish family.
The family moved to the outskirts of Ödenburg in 1834, and 7 years
later Goldmark began to study the violin. After two years at the
local music school the talented but untrained 14 year-old went to
Vienna for serious violin training. For monetary reasons, he discontinued
the lessons after a little over a year, but still gained admittance
to the Vienna technical school and, in 1847, to the city's conservatory.
Political turmoil in 1848, which closed many Viennese schools, forced
Goldmark to abandon further studies after just a year. Working as
a theater violinist and music teacher, Goldmark began composing,
and in 1858 relocated to Budapest, where he immersed himself in
the music of Bach, Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven. On his return to
Vienna, Goldmark found considerable and immediate success, and by
the 1870s a series of successful works, including the opera The
Queen of Saba and the Rustic Wedding Symphony, had placed Goldmark
at the forefront of Austro-German composers. Goldmark's musical
influences were many and varied, beginning with his exposure to
local folk dances while a child in Hungary, and later moving through
Wagner towards a blend of German classicism and impressionism. Despite
the objections of many leading musicians, who considered him to
be just another second-rate Wagnerian, Goldmark remained an honored
and very visible part of Viennese musical life until his death in
1915.
June 8
Robert Schumann
Birth: June 8, 1810 in Zwickau, Germany
Death: July 29, 1856 in Endenich, Germany
Schumann's father was a bookseller who encouraged Robert¹s musical
and literary talents. Robert began piano studies at the relatively
late age of ten. In 1828, he enrolled at the University of Leipzig
as a law student, although he found music, philosophy, and Leipzig's
taverns more intriguing than the law. He also began studies with
a prominent Leipzig piano teacher, Friedrich Wieck. There was serious
mental illness in Schumann's family, and Robert most likely suffered
from a manic-depressive condition. A compulsive womanizer and a
heavy drinker, Schumann led a life that aggravated his psychological
problems. He failed as a concert pianist after he developed partial
paralysis of his right hand. According to legend, the injury resulted
from Schumann's obsessive use of a finger-strengthening device,
but more recent research suggests mercury poisoning due to treatment
for syphilis. Schumann settled on a career as a composer and musical
writer, co-founding the influential Neue Zeitschrift für Musik.
Wieck's highly talented pianist daughter, Clara, grew up and fell
in love with Schumann, to her father's dismay. Despite the father's
opposition, Clara and Robert gained the legal right to marry in
1840, a day before Clara's twenty-first birthday. During this period
Schumann composed feverishly. Spellbound by a musical thought, he
would work himself to exhaustion. He was among the first to create
the short, poetic, descriptive Romantic piano work, and produced
a multitude of such works in the late 1830s. Schumann tackled larger
forms in the 1840s, partly at Clara's urging and his four numbered
symphonies remain in the standard repertoire. He held several jobs
- teacher at the Leipzig Conservatory and music director in Düsseldorf
- but without great success. In February 1854, he threw himself
into the freezing waters of the Rhine. After his rescue, he voluntarily
entered an asylum. Although he had periods of lucidity, his condition
deteriorated, and he died there in 1856, probably of tertiary syphilis.
One of the great composers of the nineteenth century, Schumann was
the quintessential artist whose life and work embody the idea of
Romanticism.
Erwin Schulhoff
Birth: June 8, 1894 in Prague
Death: August 18, 1942 in Wülzbourg
Only since the turn of the 21st century has the music of Erwin Schulhoff
begun to be recognized. One of many composers whose works the Nazi
regime dubbed as "Entartete Musik" (degenerate music), he was essentially
silenced by the brutal political and social devices of fascism in
the 1930s and 1940s. Schulhoff held radical ideas, both political
and musical, and was a founding member of the Dresden-based Werkstatt
der Zeit (Workshop of the Time), but he is now known to be a composer
of variety and invention whose works bridged the gap between the
late romanticism of Reger and Scriabin and the experimental modernism
of John Cage. During the thirty years of his active career he wrote
sonatas, quartets, sextets, jazz piano pieces, stage music, an opera,
eight symphonies, and at least one oratorio. Schulhoff's works divide
roughly into four periods that manifest wildly different stylistic
and ideological principles. His early works, composed after his
studies at the Prague Conservatory, show a great debt to Reger,
Dvorák, and Brahms, and are in a generally serious manner. Following
his service in World War I, he embraced the ideas of the Second
Viennese School, but soon adopted the emerging trend of Dadaism.
This second period shows allegiance to these two influences, resulting
in austere serial works as well as more vigorously anti-establishment
works that included experimental notation systems and a sense of
musical humor. By 1923 Schulhoff had entered into yet a third creative
phase that was partly inspired by his exposure to American jazz.
This new influence was woven into a maturing synthesis of European
trends, combined with a renewed interest in the music of his native
Czechoslovakia. During this time many of his works emerged in uncomplicated,
almost Neo-classical sound. Schulhoff's final creative phase was
precipitated by a visit to the Soviet Union in 1933, and his resulting
political conversion to Stalinism. His late works communicate in
plain, unpretentious ways to glorify the ideals of communism. Arrested
during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, Schulhoff was imprisoned
in 1941 in the Wülzbourg concentration camp, where he died only
months later of tuberculosis.
June 15
Franz Danzi
Birth: June 15, 1763 in Schwetzingen, Germany
Death: April 13, 1826 in Karlsruhe, Germany
Franz Danzi was the third musical child of Innozenz Danzi,
an Italian cellist and member of the famous Mannheim Orchestra.
Franz took cello, keyboard, and singing lessons from his father
and obtained a job as cellist himself at Mannheim when he was only
15. In 1778 the orchestra moved to Munich, but Franz stayed behind
to become a member of the newly organized National Theater orchestra.
The effort to establish a German theater meant work for talented
composers, and Danzi was commissioned to write incidental music.
In 1783 Danzi's father retired as cellist in the orchestra at Munich,
and Franz went there to become his successor. With his previous
theatrical experience, Danzi was asked to compose an opera in Munich,
In the Midnight Hour, which became a great success. In 1790 Danzi
married and he and his wife toured widely in Europe for several
years. He would become Kapellmeister in Venice and she prima donna
of the Guardasoni company. Danzi returned to Munich and in 1798
took a job managing German musical theater and church music at the
court. In 1807 he was appointed Kapellmeister to the court of King
Frederick II of Württemberg in Stuttgart. There he formed a close
association with the young Carl Maria von Weber, who was the secretary
to the King's brother. Although they were of different generations,
Danzi and Weber became close personal and professional friends.
Danzi championed Weber's early operas, Silvana and Abu Hassan. In
1812, after Weber fled Stuttgart to escape his father's debts, Danzi
was given the additional duty teaching composition at the new Institute
of Art. He concluded his career as Kapellmeister at the Baden court
in Karlsruhe, continuing to promote and produce Weber's works. Danzi's
operas were well known in his time and he also wrote many songs
and orchestral and chamber works.
Edvard Grieg
Birth: June 15, 1843 in Bergen, Norway
Death: September 4, 1907 in Bergen, Norway
The greatest Norwegian composer, Edvard Grieg left his home
at age 15 to study at the Leipzig Conservatory with Ignaz Moscheles
and Carl Reinecke. While in school, the composer witnessed the premiere
of his first work, a String Quartet in d. Following graduation,
Grieg relocated to Copenhagen to study with Niels Gade. In 1867
against his family's better judgment, Grieg married his cousin Nina
Hagerup, a talented pianist, but whose vocal talents captivated
the composer even more. Shortly after their wedding, the couple
moved to Oslo, where Grieg supported them by teaching piano and
conducting. He and his wife traveled extensively throughout Europe
and it was in Denmark, the composer wrote his landmark opus, the
Piano Concerto in a. The piece was received with an enthusiasm that
secured the composer's reputation for the remainder of his career.
Grieg admired his literary contemporaries and forged a productive
partnership with Bjornstjerne Bjornson, playwright and poet. Grieg
also met and befriended Henrik Ibsen. Their collaboration would
prove fruitful for both, as Grieg would supply incidental music
to Ibsen's Peer Gynt. As a result of the success of Peer Gynt, Grieg
enjoyed tremendous celebrity and continued to travel extensively,
often meeting internationally renowned composers including Tchaikovsky,
Brahms, and Liszt. In addition to a State grant he was awarded in
1874, Grieg was able to earn the majority of his money from to a
vigorous schedule of recital tours. In 1885, Grieg and his wife
relocated once again, this time to his native Bergen, where he built
their celebrated home, Troldhaugen. He and his wife summered in
Norway and departed each fall for European tours that would last
the remainder of the year. Grieg also conducted extensively throughout
his country. Grieg was adored wherever he traveled and lived at
a pace that would eventually catch up with him. Edvard Grieg died
of chronic fatigue, exacerbated by to his lifelong health problems,
in his hometown of Bergen.
June 22
Etienne-Nicola Méhul
Birth: June 22, 1763 in Givet, Ardennes, France
Death: October 18, 1817 in Paris, France
Méhul was the greatest French symphonist before Berlioz and
an important and prolific composer of operas comiques. His musical
style was rooted in Gluck's tradition of opera and in Haydn's and
Beethoven's tradition of choral and instrumental writing. His use
of large forces and unusual and striking effects anticipated Berlioz.
Méhul also developed the technique of the reminiscence-motif, which
was to have a great influence on Weber and, later, Wagner. Méhul's
primary teacher was Jean-Frédéric Edelmann, with whom he began studies
in 1779. During the next decade, Etienne produced two sets of piano
sonatas and taught keyboard for a living. His second opera, Euphrosine,
however, literally made him famous overnight. Two other operas followed
in the successive years. His comedy Le jeune sage et le vieux fou
was Méhul's last opera for many years to be unaffected by the imminent
political crisis in France. The remaining operas of the 1790s, all
contain political overtones and a "republican" message. During this
period, Méhul also composed many anthems and instrumental works
for the Institut National de Musique. This activity eventually brought
him to Napoleon's notice, for whom he composed several works after
1800, including the opera L'irato and the Chant national du 14 juillet
1800, an important forerunner of Berlioz's Requiem. Méhul turned
to a series of minor comedies over the next years. The only important
opera to emerge from this decade was Joseph, probably his greatest.
After this, Méhul turned to symphonic composition for a brief time,
producing two extraordinarily successful works in and a series of
Napoleonic cantatas. Although his works are seldom performed, his
influence on Berlioz, Beethoven, Mendelssohn and Weber was profound.
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WWUH TO BROADCAST
MUSIC MOUNTAIN CONCERTS
We are pleased to announce that we have
arranged to broadcast recordings of live chamber music performances
from the 2005 season at Music Mountain. These will be presented
on Wednesday evenings, beginning March 8, from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Music Mountain, located in the scenic hills
of northwest Connecticut (Falls Village), is the oldest continuing
summer chamber music festival in the United States. It was founded
in 1930 by Jacques Gordon as the permanent home of the Gordon String
Quartet, a base from which it could tour and then return to teach,
study, and perform in Gordon Hall.
Each year, concerts present the great quartet and quintet
masterpieces by leading performers before a public audience. Music
Mountain's 2006 season will begin on Sunday, June 11, and chamber
music concerts will continue on Sunday afternoons and occasional
Saturday evenings through Sunday, September 3.
The season also includes Friday evening choral concerts and
Saturday evening jazz concerts. For more information, visit musicmountain.org.
These broadcasts are made possible by the cooperation of Music Mountain
and the WFMT Radio Network, and are underwritten by Edward R. Hamilton
Bookseller, Falls Village, CT.
The broadcasts on WWUH will include:
May 3
Bergonzi String Quartet; Melvin Chen, piano
Debussy: String Quartet in G Minor, Op. 10 Dvorak: Five Bagatelles,
Op. 47 Hefty: Li'l Darlin' Espin-Yepez: Danza Equatoriana Franck:
Piano Quintet in F Minor
May 10
St. Petersburg String Quartet; Sergei Roldugin, cello; Anton Jivaev,
viola
Brahms: Viola Quintet in G Major, Op. 111 Brahms: Sextet in B-Flat
Major, Op. 18
May 17
St. Petersburg String Quartet; Sergei Roldugin, cello
Natalia Medvedovskaya: String Quartet No. 1 (1992) Brahms: String
Quartet in C Minor, Op. 51, No. 1 Schubert: Cello Quintet in C Major,
Op. 163, D. 956
May 24
Raphael Trio
Haydn: Piano Trio in G Major, Op. 73, No. 2 Schubert: Piano Trio
in B-Flat Major, Op. 99, D. 898 Beethoven: Piano Trio in B-Flat
Major, Op. 97, Archduke
May 31
Arianna String Quartet; Anton Nell, piano
Mozart: String Quartet in B-Flat Major, K. 458 Beethoven: String
Quartet in F Minor, Op. 95, Serioso Dvorak Piano Quintet in A Major,
Op. 81
June 5
Bard Festival String Quartet;
Beethoven: Quartet in C Minor, Op. 18, No. 4 Beethoven: Quartet
in e Minor, Op. 59, No. 2 Beethoven: Quartet in E-Flat Major, Op.
127
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WWUH: Program Guide 2006
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