#ClassicsaDay #FunintheSun Week 5

We couldn't let the season go by without having some kind of summer-related theme. The Classics a Day team chose to catch some rays this August. And to find out how many classical composers did so with their music. 

Of course, any summer-related topic is fair game, too. Here are my posts for the fifth and final week of #FunintheSun.

8/29/22 Frederick Delius - A Song of Summer

Delius completed this tone poem in 1931. It was based on a 1918 work. Delius had lost most of the score, and his reconstruction became "A Song of Summer." 

8/30/22 Ferde Grofé - Grand Canyon Suite

The opening and closing movements of this suite are "Sunrise" and "Sunset." Grofé wrote this piece in 1929, and it was premiered by Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra. 

 

8/31/22 Frederick Delius - Summer Night on the River

This is part of Delius' "Two Pieces for Orchestra." It premiered with its companion piece "On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring" in 1913. It wasn't long before each was programmed separately, as they often are today. 

 

Next month:

#ClassicsaDay #FunintheSun Week 4

We couldn't let the season go by without having some kind of summer-related theme. The Classics a Day team chose to catch some rays this August. And to find out how many classical composers did so with their music. 

Of course, any summer-related topic is fair game, too. Here are my posts for the fourth week of #FunintheSun.

8/22/22 Sergei Prokofiev: Summer Day Suite Op. 65b

This suite was originally part of a collection of piano pieces for children. Prokofiev selected seven of them for this orchestrated suite in 1941.

8/23/22 Alexander Glazunov: The Seasons (Summer)

Glazunov provded the music for a ballet by Marius Petipa. This 1899 work is now most often heard as a concert piece, rather than a staged ballet.

8/24/22 Samuel Barber: Summer Music for Wind Quintet

Barber composed this work for the Chamber Music Society of Detroit. It was originally intended for strings and woodwinds, but the final version, which premiered in 1953, became a wind quintet.

8/25/22 John Playford - Upon a summer's day

This is one of the many tunes published in the 1651 English Dancing Master. Playford's book provided dance steps and music to accompany them. The book was extremely popular, running four editions over a period of 77 years.

8/26/22 Ned Rorem - End of Summer

Rorem composed this three-movement suite for the Verdehr Trio, which premiered it in 1986. Rorem writes that the suite "was suggested by musical works of yore."

#ClassicsaDay #FunintheSun Week 3

We couldn't let the season go by without having some kind of summer-related theme. The Classics a Day team chose to catch some rays this August. And to find out how many classical composers did so with their music. 

Of course, any summer-related topic is fair game, too. Here are my posts for the third week of #FunintheSun.

08/15/22 Ernest J. Moeran - Summer Valley

Moeran was inspired by the music of Frederick Delius. He wrote this 1925 work in homage to Delius, in loose imitation of his style.

8/16/22 Frederic Delius - In a Summer Garden

This 1908 work was partially inspired by Dante Gabriel Rossetti's poetry: "All are my blooms; and all sweet blooms of love. To thee I gave while Spring and Summer sang."

8/17/22 Zoltan Kodaly - Summer Evening

This 1906 is considered Kodaly's first major orchestral work. It was premiered at a music academy graduation with Kodaly conducting. He revised it in 1929, and this is the version performed today.

8/18/22 George Crumb: Music for a Summer Evening (Makrokosmos III)

Crumb completed this work in 1974. The instrumentation of two pianos and percussion was inspired by Bartok. Although Crumb expanded the number of percussion instruments and amplified the pianos.

8/19/22 Benjamin Britten: Holiday Diary, Op. 5

Britten wrote this suite when he was 21. He said it was an impression of "a boy's pre-war seaside holiday."

#ClassicsaDay #FunintheSun Week 2

We couldn't let the season go by without having some kind of summer-related theme. The Classics a Day team chose to catch some rays this August. And to find out how many classical composers did so with their music. 

Of course, any summer-related topic is fair game, too. Here are my posts for the second week of #FunintheSun.

08/08/22 Jean Baptiste Lully - Overture to "Phaeton"

Lully wrote this 1683 lyric tragedy for Louis XIV, the Sun King. It tells the story of Phaeton, son of the Sun God who takes dad's chariot out for a spin.

08/09/22 David Matthews - The Music of Dawn

This 1990 work was inspired by its namesake, a painting by Cecil Collins.

08/10/22 Camille Saint-Saens - Phaeton, Op. 39

Saint-Saens wrote this tone poem in 1873. It illustrates the disastrous ride of Phaeton, son of Helios. Helios reluctantly agrees to let his son ride the Sun chariot across the sky. Phaeton loses control, and Zeus is forced to destroy him before the sun burns the earth. It's all there in Saint-Saens' score!

08/11/22 Christopher Rouse - Phaeton

Rouse completed his score in 1986. It's one of several orchestral works he wrote inspired by Greek mythology. "Phaeton" was commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra.

08/12/22 Mark O'Connor - Summer from "The American Seasons"

O'Connor's inspiration for his season-themed orchestral was Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons." This 1999 work is based on folk idioms, particularly those of Appalachia.

#ClassicsaDay #FunintheSun Week 1

We couldn't let the season go by without having some kind of summer-related theme. For this August, the Classics a Day team chose to catch some rays. And, to find out how many classical composers did so with their music. 

Of course, any summer-related topic is fair game, too. Here are my posts for the first week of #FunintheSun.

08/01/22 Franz Joseph Haydn: String Quartet Op. 20, No. 1

The six Op. 20 quartets are collectively known as the Sun Quartets. The name comes from the 1774 printing which featured a rising sun on the cover.

08/02/22 Carl Ruggles: Sun-treader

Ruggles based his 1926 work on Robert Browning's poem "Pauline" In it, the poet writes, "Sun-treader, light and life be thine forever."

08/03/22 Thomas Arne: 'The Glitt'ring Sun'

This aria comes from Arne's cantata, "The Morning." Arne used a text based on John Milton's writings for this 1755 work.

08/04/22 Carl Nielsen: Helios Overture Op. 17

Helios was the Greek sun god. He drove a horse-drawn chariot across the sky daily, from east to west. Nielsen's 1903 score was inspired by Greek art he studied during a trip to Athens. Art that, of course, depicted Helios in flight.

08/05/22 Franz Joseph Haydn: String Quartet, Op. 76, No. 4

This quartet is nicknamed the "Sunrise" quartet. But not by Haydn. The rising theme supported by sustained chords seemed to suggest the rising sun (to somebody).