The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: On Thursday and Friday nights, brass music and a modernist homage to Martin Luther King round out UW-Madison concerts before spring break
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By Jacob Stockinger
Spring Break at the University of Wisconsin-Madison starts on Saturday. But there are noteworthy concerts right up to the last minute.
THURSDAY
On this Thursday night, March 14, at 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall, the acclaimed Wisconsin Brass Quintet (below, in 2017, in a photo by Michael R. Anderson) will perform a FREE concert.
The program by the faculty ensemble includes music by William Byrd; Isaac Albeniz; Leonard Bernstein; Aaron Copland; David Sampson; Anton Webern; Joan Tower; Ennio Morricone; and Reena Esmail.
For more details, including the names of quintet members and guest artists who will participate as well as the complete program with lengthy notes and background about the quintet, go to:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/wisconsin-brass-quintet-3-14-2019/
FRIDAY
On this Friday night, March 15, at 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall, UW-Madison bassoonist Marc Vallon (below, in a photo by James Gill) – who worked in Paris with the renowned 20th-century composer and conductor Pierre Boulez – will host another concert is his series of “Le Domaine Musical” that he performs with colleagues.
Vallon explains:
Every year, I put together a concert devoted to the masterpieces of the 1950-2000 period. We call it “Domaine Musical,” which was the group founded in Paris by Pierre Boulez in the 1950s. Its subtitle is : “Unusual music for curious listeners.”
“The series offers Madison concert-goers an opportunity to hear rarely performed music of the highest quality, played by UW-Madison faculty, students and alumni.
“The program features a deeply moving piece by Luciano Berio, O King, written in 1968 after the murder of Martin Luther King Jr.” (You can hear “O King” in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
The all-modernist program is:
Pierre Boulez (below), Dialogues de l’Ombre Double (Dialogues of the Double Shadow) for solo clarinet and electronics.
Luciano Berio (below), O King and Folk Songs.
Also included are unspecified works by Karlheinz Stockhausen and Timothy Hagen.
Guest performers are Sarah Brailey, soprano (below); Alicia Lee, clarinet; Leslie Thimmig, basset horn; Sally Chisholm, viola; Parry Karp, cello; Timothy Hagen, flute; Yana Avedyan, piano; Paran Amirinazari, violin; and Anthony DiSanza, percussion.
For more information, including a story about a previous concert in “Le Domaine Musical,” go to:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/le-domaine-musical-with-marc-vallon/
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Classical music: Today is Sept. 11. Here are 10 pieces by 10 different composers inspired by the terrorist attacks of 2001
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By Jacob Stockinger
Today is Sept. 11, 2018.
That makes it the 17th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the U.S.
Two of the attacks took place on the Twin Towers (below) of the World Trade Center in New York City.
One took place on the Pentagon (below) in Washington, D.C.
And one, with an unknown target but perhaps either The White House or The Capitol, was thwarted on board Flight 93 when passengers forced the plane to crash in a field (below) in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
In past years, The Ear has chosen certain pieces to play or link to.
This year he found a list of 10 pieces of new music, with photos of the composers and short paragraphs of background as a program note, on the website for Classic FM digital radio.
Some of the pieces and the composers he already knows – and suspects you do too. They include John Adams, Steve Reich, Joan Tower, Eric Ewazen, Ned Rorem and John Corigliano.
But there are also quite a few new titles and names, including Robert Moran, Anthony Davis, Howard Goodall and Michael Gordon. (You can hear Howard Goodall’s “Spared” in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
You can find recordings on YouTube.
Here is a link to the story to help you to listen in remembrance – although silence is also perfectly appropriate:
https://www.classicfm.com/discover-music/occasions/memorial/classical-music-inspired-911/
Of course, lots of old music and historic composers can be suitable without being new music directly inspired by 9/11.
So please tell us: What music would you play to mark the occasion?
Leave your choice and the reason for it in the COMMENT section along with, if possible, a link to a YouTube performance.
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The Well-Tempered Ear 
Classical music: Today is the Fourth of July. Here is patriotic music to help celebrate, including a portrait of a truly presidential president for the purpose of comparison
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By Jacob Stockinger
Today is the Fourth of July – a celebration of Independence Day when the United States officially declared its separation from Great Britain in 1776.
The day will be marked by picnics and barbecues, by local parades and spectacular fireworks – and this year by armored tanks and fighter jets in yet another expensive display of military power by You Know Who: that loudmouth man who overcompensates for dodging the draft by acting more like King George than George Washington.
The “Salute to America” sure looks like it is really going to be a “Salute to Trump.”
But whatever your politics, your preferences in presidents or the festive activities you have planned for today, there is classical music to help you mark and celebrate the occasion. Just go to Google and search for “classical music for the Fourth of July.”
Better yet, tune into Wisconsin Public Radio, which will be featuring American classical music all day long.
In addition, though, here are some oddities and well-known works that The Ear particularly likes and wants to share.
The first is the Russian immigrant composer and virtuoso pianist Sergei Rachmaninoff playing his own version of our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” something he apparently did out of respect for his adopted country before each recital he played in the U.S.:
And the second is by another Russian immigrant and piano virtuoso, Vladimir Horowitz, who was a friend and colleague of Rachmaninoff. Here he is playing his piano arrangement, full of keyboard fireworks that sound much like a third hand playing, of “The Stars and Stripes Forever” by American march king John Philip Sousa. Horowitz used the patriotic march to raise money and sell war bonds during World War II, then later used as an encore, which never failed to wow the audience:
For purposes of artistic and political comparisons of presidents, you will also find Aaron Copland’s “A Lincoln Portrait” – with famous actor and movie star Henry Fonda as the narrator of Honest Abe’s own extraordinary oratory and understated writing — in the YouTube video at the bottom.
And in a ironic twist The Ear can’t resist, here are nine pieces — many orchestral and some choral –chosen by the official website of the BBC Music Magazine in the United Kingdom to mark and honor American Independence Day. It has some surprises and is worth checking out:
http://www.classical-music.com/article/nine-best-works-independence-day
If you like or favor other works appropriate to the Fourth of July or have comments, just leave word and a YouTube link if possible, in the Comment section.
The Ear wants to hear.
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