Modern-day Commentary
“Very sophisticated style” is how this story was described by my teacher. Three pluses attached to the “A” is how this story was graded by my teacher.
Sibelius-Karelia Suite first page (Breitkopf & Härtel, 1906)
It was a bit of a circuitous route choosing this week’s piece. I’ve enjoyed when it’s possible to theme a piece around a current event or anniversary, and so I set out to find something that would complement my journey to the White Mountains.
Modern-day Commentary
Long before I discovered choral singing and conducting, two passions which will never be removed from my life, I mangled clarinet parts for school credit. I was dreadfully bad at it. So bad, in fact, that’s it is hard for me to believe that a lifelong interest in music would stem from these early experiences.
Copland: Billy the Kid first page (manuscript)
It’s always exciting to come across a piece that’s instantly approachable, especially when it is one that I’m not previously aware of. That is the case with Billy the Kid by Aaron Copland. It’s a title, at least, that I’ve heard of for a while, but not until this morning had I ever said, “Ya’know, I’m gonna sit down and listen to Billy the Kid now.”
Modern-day Commentary
Okay, here’s another hard-to-believe high-horse memorandabum. First off, there may in fact have been an earnest effort in 1989 to stave off my worrying tendencies, but I’m here to tell you it didn’t take.
Wagner: Siegfried Idyll first page (Breitkopf, 1900)
This week, I’ve chosen a piece which I was first introduced to last fall when Andris Nelsons came to conduct his first concert at Symphony Hall after being named the incoming Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Modern-day Commentary
Look, I’ll be straight with you. I think I made this up. I do remember writing this paper, but have no recollection of the event itself. Let’s start from the top. That downtown Milford Cinema rocked. It was the biggest piece of garbage you could imagine.
Stravinsky-Pulcinella Suite first page (Chester, 1920)
It’s been an unusual past few weeks, and I haven’t written a Snooch’s Silly Symphony post in about a month. Hopefully, I will get back on track with the current one, and backfill what I missed. Pulcinella is a piece I first learned of in college in either a Music Theory IV listening list, or briefly in Music History II.
Every four years, I enjoy the World Cup season. That sentence has been carefully crafted, so as not to be a lie. Instinctively, I’d have written “look forward to” or “anxiously await”, but in actuality, the World Cup has a way of sneaking up on me, making it all the more enjoyable when the games finally roll around.
World Cup everywhere at InfoComm
Modern-day Commentary
I hardly have any recollection of writing this story. In sixth grade, my English teacher wanted us to write stories, articles, and essays every week. He was a big part in my interest in writing all these years later. Because we wrote so frequently, many of the papers were “throw-away” stories, and this certainly seems to fall into that category.