Silent Steps – Rabindranath TagoreTitle: “Sacred Steps” from Song Offerings (Gitanjali) Text: Rabindranath Tagore Music: Greg Smith Instrumentation: SATB Product medium: PDF score Sample:
Baroque they are notBetween 1910 and 1938 the Austrian violin virtuoso Fritz Kreisler produced some arrangements of works by Boccherini, Martini, Couperin, Vivaldi and Porpora. They were positively achieved by the crticis. In 1935, Kreisler revealed that there were not arrangements at all, but in fact works which he had written from scratch. Suddenly critic’s attitudes to the […]
Handel’s speedy methodMorrell gave Handel the words of Cleopatra’s air “Convey me to some peaceful shore” in Alexander Balus, he cried out “Damn your Iambics!”. Morell offered to change them to trochees and went into the next room to do so, only to find about three minutes later that Handel had set them as they stood.” Dean, […]
Simon on improvisation“Improvisation is too good to leave to chance.” -Paul Simon, singer & composer Cited at Aphorism.ru. Accessed 31 March 2013.
Beethoven and the candlesitcksBeethoven once gave a performance of a new piano concerto in which he forgot he was the soloist and began to conduct instead. At the first sforzando he threw out his arms so vehemently that he knocked both candlesticks off the piano. The audience burst out laughing, which enraged Beethoven. He made the orchestra start […]
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Music stirred him“Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather another chaos, that it created in us.” – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey.
Too much pedalJohannes Brahms could be incredibly rude, even to his friends. While playing a Beethoven sonata with a cellist friend one day, he applied his piano’s pedals with more enthusiasm than the friend had hoped. “Softer,” he pleaded, “I can’t hear my cello.” “You are lucky,” Brahms replied. “I can.” Source: N. Slonimsky, Book of Musical […]
Sondheim on expressionMike Brown interviewers musical theatre composer Stephen Sondhiem: When I venture that his songs might suggest that he has a somewhat jaundiced view of love, he momentarily flares into irritation. ‘How can you tell? Every single song I’ve ever written is sung by a character created by somebody else. Some might have a jaundiced view […]
A concise rehearsalHans Knappertsbusch (1888-1965) was a German conductor. However, he had a dislike of rehearsals. Karajan recalled: One time he was going over Tchaikovsky’s Fifth with the Vienna Philharmonic. He came to the second movement, with the horn solo, and said, “Let’s start.” He did a few bars, stopped, and said, “See you this evening. You […]
