We couldn't resist putting these two videos together this week. Zoltán Kodály's music for Háry János (1926) is a classic and quite unusual in featuring a cimbalom, the Eastern European version of a hammered dulcimer. Other composer who have used the instrument include Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók Pierre Boulez, Peter Maxwell Davies and even Frank Zappa and Elvis Costello in concert works of theirs. And so it is that we find film composer Hans Zimmer using it in his 2009 score for Sherlock Holmes. To celebrate the musicians who helped perform the music for Sherlock Holmes we're given this quite fun music video of music from the film score . . . this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS. Enjoy!
Jennifer Higdon started late in music, teaching herself to play flute at the age of 15 and then beginning formal musical studies at 18, with an even later start in composition at the age of 21. Higdon makes her living from commissions and her music is known for its technical skill and audience appeal. Hailed by the Washington Post as "a savvy, sensitive composer with a keen ear, an innate sense of form and a generous dash of pure esprit," the League of American Orchestras reports that she is one of America's most frequently performed composers. From a PBS special called Being Creative in Philadelphia we hear Higdon talk about her life and her music . . . it's our current COMPOSER PORTRAIT. And by the way, her Violin Concerto just won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in Music. Congratulations Ms. Higdon!
According to Art Lange (Fanfare Magazine), "Rumor has it that there's a big chunk of the classical music listening public that is afraid of contemporary music. When it's played with the passion and conviction that violinist Jennifer Koh generates on behalf of these 21st-century scores, the skeptics have nothing to fear. She displays impeccable technique and a flawless tonal range regardless of their degree of difficulty, and more important, uncovers the lyrical impulse at the music's core. Jennifer Koh is a hell of a violinist (sorry, couldn't resist), and this is a most impressive collection." Check out Jennifer Koh's CD Rhapsodic Musings - 21st Century Works for Solo Violin . . . this week's FEATURED RECORDING.
Sinfonía India (1936) by Mexican composer Carlos Chávez is one of the best examples of his forays into musical nationalism. Based on mestizo music from Chávez's childhood as well as including a massive array of native percussion, this is one of the most impressive and accessible pieces in the composer's repertoire. Watch a fabulous performance of the Sinfonía India (1935-36) by Gustavo Dudamel and the Berlin Philharmonic . . . this week's FROM THE
PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Showing posts with label Zimmer. Hans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Zimmer. Hans. Show all posts
Friday, April 30, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
The Ground Beneath Her Feet (2007) is a full-length work for orchestra (including a rock trio), singers and narrator by composer Victoria Borisova-Ollas with a libretto by Edward Kemp based on the novel by Salman Rushdie. The work features a film directed by Mike Figgis. The attraction of the novel for this treatment lies in its combination of central action, linguistic and geographical colour and underlying mythic elements. The fact that many of the earliest operas and oratorios dealt with the Orpheus myth makes this millennial re-imagining a particularly attractive source for a contemporary engagement with the form. Check out a performance of this unique work . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
Hans Zimmer is a composer and keyboard synthesizer player who made popular music history then became one of the most successful film score composers. Raised and educated mainly in England, he has no formal musical education; he says the most he ever got was about "two weeks of piano lessons." Nevertheless, he took an early interest in electronic musical synthesizers in the 1970s, when these were large, bulky analog devices programmed usually by means of patch cords and individual oscillator settings. He found work writing tunes and electronically scoring music for television commercials and, still in his early twenties, joined two British musicians named Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes to form a rock group called The Buggles. They produced a world-wide hit called Video Killed the Radio Star, which made music history as the first piece ever broadcast on America's music network MTV. Zimmer became interested in film music, mostly through the influence of Italian composer Ennio Morricone, but it was a meeting with another film composer, Stanley Meyers, that led Zimmer into scoring for films and into a style using classical and electronic techniques. He has scored such well known films as My Beautiful Laundrette, Rain Man, Driving Miss Daisy, Black Rain, Days of Thunder, Thelma and Louise, Crimson Tide, and two of the Pirates of the Caribbean films. Zimmer's best known work is the score to The Lion King, Disney's most popular animated film, which won the Academy Award. Hear Has Zimmer talks about his music . . . our COMPOSER PORTRAIT for the week.
If you want to know what contemporary ballet looks like check The Wheeldon Company’s Polyphonia (2001). That sense of modernity — the feeling that you are watching dancers of today in works of today — is what Christopher Wheeldon hopes to offer audiences. Polyphonia, set to piano pieces by Gyorgy Ligeti, delivers just such modernity. From its opening moments, when four couples move separately with spiky intensity to the thorny rhythmic thickets of Ligeti’s Désordre, you can see why: Mr. Wheeldon mirrors the sense of simultaneous chaos and order in the music, creating a thrilling what-will-happen-next? excitement . . . check this all out at our current DANSES PYTHEUSES.
Alberto Ginastera was among the most prolific and successful composers to emerge from Latin America. His music is heavily, though not universally, peppered with folk influence. His abundance of compositions for the cello is due in no small part to his second marriage to cellist Aurora Natola, who was instrumental in the composition or revision of nearly all of Ginastera's output for her instrument. Check out a performance of his delightful Pampeana No. 2 (1950) . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Hans Zimmer is a composer and keyboard synthesizer player who made popular music history then became one of the most successful film score composers. Raised and educated mainly in England, he has no formal musical education; he says the most he ever got was about "two weeks of piano lessons." Nevertheless, he took an early interest in electronic musical synthesizers in the 1970s, when these were large, bulky analog devices programmed usually by means of patch cords and individual oscillator settings. He found work writing tunes and electronically scoring music for television commercials and, still in his early twenties, joined two British musicians named Trevor Horn and Geoff Downes to form a rock group called The Buggles. They produced a world-wide hit called Video Killed the Radio Star, which made music history as the first piece ever broadcast on America's music network MTV. Zimmer became interested in film music, mostly through the influence of Italian composer Ennio Morricone, but it was a meeting with another film composer, Stanley Meyers, that led Zimmer into scoring for films and into a style using classical and electronic techniques. He has scored such well known films as My Beautiful Laundrette, Rain Man, Driving Miss Daisy, Black Rain, Days of Thunder, Thelma and Louise, Crimson Tide, and two of the Pirates of the Caribbean films. Zimmer's best known work is the score to The Lion King, Disney's most popular animated film, which won the Academy Award. Hear Has Zimmer talks about his music . . . our COMPOSER PORTRAIT for the week.
If you want to know what contemporary ballet looks like check The Wheeldon Company’s Polyphonia (2001). That sense of modernity — the feeling that you are watching dancers of today in works of today — is what Christopher Wheeldon hopes to offer audiences. Polyphonia, set to piano pieces by Gyorgy Ligeti, delivers just such modernity. From its opening moments, when four couples move separately with spiky intensity to the thorny rhythmic thickets of Ligeti’s Désordre, you can see why: Mr. Wheeldon mirrors the sense of simultaneous chaos and order in the music, creating a thrilling what-will-happen-next? excitement . . . check this all out at our current DANSES PYTHEUSES.
Alberto Ginastera was among the most prolific and successful composers to emerge from Latin America. His music is heavily, though not universally, peppered with folk influence. His abundance of compositions for the cello is due in no small part to his second marriage to cellist Aurora Natola, who was instrumental in the composition or revision of nearly all of Ginastera's output for her instrument. Check out a performance of his delightful Pampeana No. 2 (1950) . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
"Here, in a nutshell," Carl Nielsen wrote, "is what I demand of all art: opposing forces which meet and glow, appearing one but remaining two, embracing and caressing like rippling water over pebbles, yet never actually touching and breaking the delicate interplay." That is the spirit of his Flute Concerto of 1926. Watch a performance of this often joyous work by flutist Ulla Miilmann . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
Stephen Paulus is one of America’s most talented composers, having achieved notable success with performances of operas as well as works for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles and piano. As a composer for the stage, he has been most closely associated with the Opera Theater of St. Louis, which commissioned and premiered The Village Singer (1979), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1982, based on James M. Cain’s novel) and The Woodlanders (1985, after Thomas Hardy). He has received commissions from such noted ensembles as the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Cleveland Quartet. He was a co-founder in 1973 of the Minnesota Composers Forum, and is also a member of the Board of Directors of ASCAP and co-founder and a current Board Vice President of the American Composers Forum, the largest composer service organization in the world. Hear him talk about his life and works with Alison Young of Minnesota Public Radio . . . our current COMPOSER PORTRAIT at Pytheas.
German born Hans Zimmer has composed music for over 100 films, including such Hollywood blockbusters as the Pirates of the Caribbean series, Gladiator, The Lion King, The Dark Knight and most recently Sherlock Holmes. Notable in his work is his integration of electronic music sounds with traditional orchestral arrangements. Hear part of his score for director Ron Howard's The Da Vinci Code (2006) . . . this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.
According to composer Michael Colgrass, Old Churches (2000) was one of the most challenging pieces he can remember writing. His goal was to create music that was interesting, expressive and demanding, yet playable by students in the early stages of performing on their instruments and who are also unfamiliar with modern music techniques. His solution was to write a work based on Gregorian chant. The chant unfolds through call and response patterns. One instrument intones a musical idea, then the rest of the group responds by playing it back. This musical conversation continues throughout the piece. Hear a performance of Michael Colgrass' Old Churches . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Stephen Paulus is one of America’s most talented composers, having achieved notable success with performances of operas as well as works for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles and piano. As a composer for the stage, he has been most closely associated with the Opera Theater of St. Louis, which commissioned and premiered The Village Singer (1979), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1982, based on James M. Cain’s novel) and The Woodlanders (1985, after Thomas Hardy). He has received commissions from such noted ensembles as the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Cleveland Quartet. He was a co-founder in 1973 of the Minnesota Composers Forum, and is also a member of the Board of Directors of ASCAP and co-founder and a current Board Vice President of the American Composers Forum, the largest composer service organization in the world. Hear him talk about his life and works with Alison Young of Minnesota Public Radio . . . our current COMPOSER PORTRAIT at Pytheas.
German born Hans Zimmer has composed music for over 100 films, including such Hollywood blockbusters as the Pirates of the Caribbean series, Gladiator, The Lion King, The Dark Knight and most recently Sherlock Holmes. Notable in his work is his integration of electronic music sounds with traditional orchestral arrangements. Hear part of his score for director Ron Howard's The Da Vinci Code (2006) . . . this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.
According to composer Michael Colgrass, Old Churches (2000) was one of the most challenging pieces he can remember writing. His goal was to create music that was interesting, expressive and demanding, yet playable by students in the early stages of performing on their instruments and who are also unfamiliar with modern music techniques. His solution was to write a work based on Gregorian chant. The chant unfolds through call and response patterns. One instrument intones a musical idea, then the rest of the group responds by playing it back. This musical conversation continues throughout the piece. Hear a performance of Michael Colgrass' Old Churches . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
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