Jan 27, 2022

In May of 1937, R. Nathaniel Dett’s oratorio “The Ordering of Moses” was premiered by the Cincinnati Symphony. The performance was carried live on national radio by NBC, but about 3/4’s of the way through the piece, the broadcast was halted due to unspecified scheduling conflicts, the origins of which...

Jan 20, 2022

“I never really thought of them as walls. I thought of them more as boundaries. Walls are a much more serious matter. You're not supposed to be able to get through, while boundaries at least you can crossover and I think the whole crossover thing is basically what the history of music in the second part of...

Jan 13, 2022

Sibelius never gets mentioned on “most” lists, the most innovative, modernistic, romantic, beautiful, conservative, ugly, violent, peaceful etc. In fact, no one is ever sure where to put him on these lists, and that’s partly due to that lifespan that began when Brahms was 32 and ended when Pierre Boulez was also...

Jan 6, 2022

Last week I told you the story of the genesis of Shostakovich’s 5th symphony. We talked politics, but we also talked about just the music itself. Today, I’ll take you through the second half of the symphony, again first from a musical point of view. But by the end of the piece, the political conversation and the...