aworks :: "new" american classical music

"a" works listening log :: virgil thomson

"a"

• The Feast of Love
• The River

"other"

• Pilgrims and Pioneers. Sonata Da Chiesa. Stabat Mater. String Quartet No. 1. String Quartet No. 2. Symphony No. 2. Symphony No. 3. Symphony on a Hymn Tune.

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Although I proposed to actually listen to new music, today it's back to the works of Virgil Thomson.

Pilgrims, Symphony No. 2 and Symphony on a Hymn Tune are all too much Americana and/or lightness. Maybe I should have instead continued with the overly serious Max Richter from earlier in the day as apparently The River fulfilled my wholesomeness quota.

Symphony No. 3 is a mildly interesting orchestration of Thomson's String Quartet No. 2, and for some reason more captivating than the original. I wasn't expecting that.

I've got a links post re: Feast of Love.

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• lala: max richter. james sedares conducting. leonard slatkin conducting symphony no. 2.
• last.fm: james sedaris conducting. Note that Thomson has a surprisingly low number of listeners on last.fm.
• amazon: chamber works. james sedares conducting. the complete film scores.

The Feast of Love (1964). Virgil Thomson /links/

1. Virgil Thomson, Richard Kostelanetz: The work is a setting in the composer's free translation of the Pervigilium Veneris, a collection of rhymed Latin stanzas from the second or fourth century A.D. celebrating the three-day festival of Venus.
2. Steve Schwarz: the incredibly beautiful Feast of Love for baritone and chamber ensemble (a real lesson in how to vary orchestral texture and how to continue a musical line)
3. Avian Music: a rarely performed setting of an anonymous second century erotic Latin poem in praise of Venus
4. Paul Wittke: The music is never openly bacchantic, but as in Lord Byron, its not-so-hidden passions are expressed in civilized, Olympian terms.
5. Virgil Thomson: The rhythm is a simultaneous six-against-four, the instrumentation percussive.
6. Amazon: Virgil Thomson: Chamber Works

String Quartet No. 2 (1932/1957). Virgil Thomson /virgil and the 5.6/

For the record, I was greatly enjoying Virgil Thomson's Second String Quartet when we had a local earthquake.

You can hear what I heard via Art of the States. You can feel what I felt by shaking your dining room table for five seconds. I only give the quake three stars, but the music five...

Symphony No. 3 (1932/72). Virgil Thomson /how long is the standing test anyway?/

Just so I don't get a reputation as the contemporary curmudgeon, I'll point out my post yesterday applies to concerts but for recordings, not as much.

Let the record show that one of my last purchases at Tower Records was a disc of Virgil Thomson symphonies. I found the Third Symphony particularly American and optimistic.

I still need to think about what would entice me to see an equivalent live since modernclassical says Copland's Third is one of his favorites and just today, walking by the California Theatre in San Jose, I noticed Symphony Silicon Valley is playing it in March:

Copland's landmark Third Symphony, built around his stirring Fanfare for the Common Man, has been called the quintessential American symphony. It closes the concert on a note of warmth and broad humanity.

I may prefer my humanity narrower, though. Or more likely, I need concerts to feel more like an event of the magnitude of the Terry Riley birthday concert, the Doctor Atomic premiere, or Radiohead in Berkeley. The latter was, by my terms, fun and interesting, both before that night via bootlegs of prior shows, during the show on what happened to be a cool and foggy night, and after the show with bootlegs of that night. Mabye SSV needs to covertly seed some Copland MP3s onto the Internet so it feels like I am discovering something rather than just consuming it.

For all its entertainment and creativity, I'm also working out why I think Radiohead's music is not important and yet Copland's is. "Stood the test of time" is not an argument I particularly want to use, at least on this blog.

On the other hand, modernclassical is relieved I didn't consider Charles Ives as the greatest American composer. There's something about Ives not being popular at the time that detracts, although of course I can't make the same argument with Radiohead. I've now come full circle.

So, for my next conundrum, who's music is more important -- Charles Ives or Thom Yorke?

For that matter, who is more distinctive looking, Charles or Thom? And to really get back to where I started, this is my favorite cover photo of Virgil Thomson. The music is fine as well.

recent tracks: harrowdown hill - thom yorke. bassa kele - mamou sidibé. the pond (remembrance) - charles ives. on alligators - charles wuorinen. the boomin' system (the underground mix) - ll cool j. l'exode - ali farka touré.

We Cannot Retrace Our Steps (1946-47). Virgil Thomson

Via tingilinde, Apple and Stanford University combine to present Stanford on iTunes. From the link, click on Open Stanford on iTunes, then from iTunes click on Music, click on the Concerts tab and finally, click on the Get Tracks button. Voila, thirty free downloads of concert music presented at Stanford for the Daniel Pearl concerts including tracks by Mark Applebaum, Virgil Thomson, Mozart et al:

Stanford on iTunes provides university-related audio content via the iTunes Music Store, Apple’s popular music jukebox and online music store.  Stanford on iTunes gives alumni and the general public free access to a wide range of Stanford-specific digital audio content.

Only one Stanford Marching Band track though (and it was sedate)...