Week of January 6, 2025 - With a little bit of Pluck This week’s title is a play on words inspired by the song "With a Little Bit of Luck” from the musical My Fair Lady. Bill replaces the word "luck" with "pluck" to refer to instruments where the strings are plucked, such as the guitar, lute, mandolin, and pipa. There are approximately 170 plucked instruments around the world that fit this description. Wouldn't it be lovely to hear Bill explore the history of these instruments and listen to as many compositions and players as we can fit into this week of Exploring Music?
Week of January 13, 2025 - Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) A child prodigy later hailed by Liszt as "the greatest organist in the world," Camille Saint-Saëns led a fascinating life filled to the brim with music. We will sample his five symphonies, five piano concertos, operas, operettas, incidental music, and chamber music, as well as many piano and solo organ works. Bill’s playlist will delight you, including the Carnival of The Animals performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy, with solo pianists Claude Frank and Lillian Kallir.
Week of January 20, 2025 - Maiden Voyages Ludwig van Beethoven, Joseph Haydn, Felix Mendelssohn, and Dmitri Shostakovich are titans of music, but, as Bill considers their first symphonic efforts, he reveals the adversities and ordeals of each composer attempting to develop their individual musical voices. Maiden voyages into the deep of music, include Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 1, Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, and Symphony No. 1 by Sergei Prokofiev.
Week of January 27, 2025 - The Violin Concerto There is a saying in much of Eastern Europe, “Every child is born with a violin under their pillow.” Parents dream of their child becoming a great violinist, not a doctor or a lawyer as so many do in America. Most composers have written at least one violin concerto hoping to challenge the soloist while creating a work of beauty. We will listen to many of today’s most popular concertos by Beethoven, Mozart, Sibelius, and Tchaikovsky, and listen to Bill tell the stories of some concertos that were originally rejected by the soloists as being technically unplayable.
