This montage is no longer be available on Pod-O-Matic. It can be heard or downloaded from the Internet Archive at the following address / Ce montage n'est plus disponible en baladodiffusion Pod-O-Matic. Il peut être téléchargé ou entendu au site Internet Archive à l'adresse suivante:
pcast023 Playlist
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English Commentary - le commentaire français suit
The September equinox occurs at 09:04 (or 9:04am) Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) on September 23, 2011. It is also referred to as the autumnal or fall equinox in the northern hemisphere, as well as the spring or vernal equinox in the southern hemisphere (not to be confused with the March equinox). This is due to the seasonal contrasts between both hemispheres throughout the year.
So here we are, today, on what is astronomically the beginning of the Fall season, as well as the day where the Sun crosses the celestial equator and moves southward in the northern hemisphere giving rise to (theoretically) equal day and night.
Fall itself is a beautiful season here in the boreal forest area, with the leaves changing, and the days drawing cooler temperatures. We may get, here in Canada, another few days of “Indian Summer” – a last jolt of warm days before the temperatures start turning, the birds begin migrating and (ah, yes) the snow starts falling.
As I review the playlist for our montage today, I find we have a strog Canadian content – the first few works are Canadian, beginning with Godfrey Ridout’s Fall Fair, a work commissioned by the CBC as part of a celebration of the 15th Anniversary of the signing the United Nations Charter, and premiered during special ceremonies in the Great Hall of the UN General Assembly (New York) on Tuesday, October 24th , 1961. [Click on this link for a CBC archival recording of parts of the premiere with Lorne Greene announcing.]
Jean Papineau-Couture returns (he who supplied an original work on our This Day in Music History blog a few days ago) with another MSO commission, Clair Obscur. Thiis is an intriguing concertante piece for the unusual duo of double bass and double bassoon, with two of the MSO’s principal chairs as soloists. The recoirding is an airplay capture of the premiere of the work.
Rather than re-hashing Vivaldi’s Autumn from the Four Seasons (see French commentary for a vintage performance by Louis Kaufman), I thought I would choose Autumn from André Gagnon’s hommage to baroque and Quebec singer-songwriters Mes quatre saisons (My four seasons). Autumn was dedicated to a baroque rendition of three songs by Claude Leveillée, singer, songwriter, actor and himself a piano prodigy. Two of the original songs are embedded in the French commentary below, for comparison.
If we in Canada know something about Autumn, so do Russians – as illustrated by the work of Alexander Glazunov and Peter Tchaikovsky. Both composers’ Seasons offerings (one a ballet, the other a series of 12 piano pieces) capture the mood quite memorably – the Glazunov also has a Canadian connection, having been the theme to the long-running television series Les Belles Histoires des Pays d’En Haut, which ran on French Radio-Canada from 1956 to 1970.
Finally, we close with Arnold Bax’s post-romantic tone poem, November Woods. Enshrining some of the composer’s own personal experiences in this floating picture of Buckinghamshire woods (where the idea of this work came to him), November Woods is a series of impressions of the dank and stormy rain, of nature in late autumn. It naturally suggests the Waldweben of "Siegfried", but there is no echo of Wagner in it, or indeed anything of the elemental grandeur of the nature-music of "The Ring."
Keep warm, and rake those leaves!
I think you ill love this music too.
English Commentary - le commentaire français suit
The September equinox occurs at 09:04 (or 9:04am) Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) on September 23, 2011. It is also referred to as the autumnal or fall equinox in the northern hemisphere, as well as the spring or vernal equinox in the southern hemisphere (not to be confused with the March equinox). This is due to the seasonal contrasts between both hemispheres throughout the year.
So here we are, today, on what is astronomically the beginning of the Fall season, as well as the day where the Sun crosses the celestial equator and moves southward in the northern hemisphere giving rise to (theoretically) equal day and night.
Fall itself is a beautiful season here in the boreal forest area, with the leaves changing, and the days drawing cooler temperatures. We may get, here in Canada, another few days of “Indian Summer” – a last jolt of warm days before the temperatures start turning, the birds begin migrating and (ah, yes) the snow starts falling.
As I review the playlist for our montage today, I find we have a strog Canadian content – the first few works are Canadian, beginning with Godfrey Ridout’s Fall Fair, a work commissioned by the CBC as part of a celebration of the 15th Anniversary of the signing the United Nations Charter, and premiered during special ceremonies in the Great Hall of the UN General Assembly (New York) on Tuesday, October 24th , 1961. [Click on this link for a CBC archival recording of parts of the premiere with Lorne Greene announcing.]
Jean Papineau-Couture returns (he who supplied an original work on our This Day in Music History blog a few days ago) with another MSO commission, Clair Obscur. Thiis is an intriguing concertante piece for the unusual duo of double bass and double bassoon, with two of the MSO’s principal chairs as soloists. The recoirding is an airplay capture of the premiere of the work.
Rather than re-hashing Vivaldi’s Autumn from the Four Seasons (see French commentary for a vintage performance by Louis Kaufman), I thought I would choose Autumn from André Gagnon’s hommage to baroque and Quebec singer-songwriters Mes quatre saisons (My four seasons). Autumn was dedicated to a baroque rendition of three songs by Claude Leveillée, singer, songwriter, actor and himself a piano prodigy. Two of the original songs are embedded in the French commentary below, for comparison.
If we in Canada know something about Autumn, so do Russians – as illustrated by the work of Alexander Glazunov and Peter Tchaikovsky. Both composers’ Seasons offerings (one a ballet, the other a series of 12 piano pieces) capture the mood quite memorably – the Glazunov also has a Canadian connection, having been the theme to the long-running television series Les Belles Histoires des Pays d’En Haut, which ran on French Radio-Canada from 1956 to 1970.
Finally, we close with Arnold Bax’s post-romantic tone poem, November Woods. Enshrining some of the composer’s own personal experiences in this floating picture of Buckinghamshire woods (where the idea of this work came to him), November Woods is a series of impressions of the dank and stormy rain, of nature in late autumn. It naturally suggests the Waldweben of "Siegfried", but there is no echo of Wagner in it, or indeed anything of the elemental grandeur of the nature-music of "The Ring."
Keep warm, and rake those leaves!
I think you ill love this music too.
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Commentaire français
L'équinoxe d'automne aura lieu à 9h04 UTC ce matin.
Commentaire français
L'équinoxe d'automne aura lieu à 9h04 UTC ce matin.
L'équinoxe - la traversée de l'équateur par le Soleil - est l'événement astronomique qui marque l'arrivée de l'automne, et se veut le point ou jour et nuit sont d'égale durée. Tant qu'à l'automne, il s'agît de la saison la plus colorée, et marque la fin des temps doux et l'arrivée inévitable de la neige dans notre climat boréal.
En passant en revue les sélections choisies pour notre montage d'aujourd'hui, je remarque une présence canadienne et québécoise en lever de rideau: depuis la pittoresque ouverture de concert Fall Fair de Godfrey Ridout, passant par une commande de l'OSM du compositeur Momtréalais Jean Papineau-Couture, et terminant avec une contribution d'André Gagnon.
Le Papineau-Couture (comme fut le cas illustré lors de notre éphéméride de cette semaine) est une piàce concertante, cette fois pour le duo inusité de la contrebasse et du contrebasson, contrastant les textures aigues (claires) de l'orchestre avec les sons graves (obscurs) des solistes. La prestation présentée est croquée de la première radioduffusée de l'oeuvre en 1986.
Le Gagnon est in extrait de son hommage baroque à quatre chansoniers québécois, Mes quatre saisons. De ces quatre concerti pour piano et cordes, j'ai choisi l'Automne, dédié à l'auteur-compositeur-interprète et collaborateur de 1962 à 1969, Claude Léveillée (qui nous a quitté plus tôt en 2011). Des trois chansons utilisées par Gagnon, j'ai trouvé les deux plus célèbres, Frédéric et Les vieux pianos, sur YouTube, que j'ai combiné ci-bas avec une piàce pour deux pianos de Léveillée, Poisson (1966), qui fut endisqué par le duo de Gagnon et Léveillée lui-même.
Notre montage propose deux oeuvres (ou plutôt, des extraits) de compositeurs Russes: des Saisons de Glazounov et Tchaïkovsky. Le Glazounov sera familier pour plusieurs auditeurs du Canada, puisque l'adagio du Glazounov fut le thème musical de la continuité Les Belles Histoires des Pays d’En Haut, qui fut à l'affiche de la télévision d'État de 1956 à 1970.
Pour clore le montage, j'ai programmé le poème symphomnique d'Arnold Bax, November Woods. La pièce évoque les bois du Buckinghamshire, avec une série d'impressions des temps pluvieux, et de la nature en général de la fin de l'automne. Peut-être un hommange indirect aux murmures de Siegfiied de Wagner, sans toutefois citer la musique du Ring.
Pour clore le montage, j'ai programmé le poème symphomnique d'Arnold Bax, November Woods. La pièce évoque les bois du Buckinghamshire, avec une série d'impressions des temps pluvieux, et de la nature en général de la fin de l'automne. Peut-être un hommange indirect aux murmures de Siegfiied de Wagner, sans toutefois citer la musique du Ring.
En complément, pour les inconditionnels de Vivaldi, un autre extrait de l'enregistrement historique des quatre saisons par Louis Kaufman
Restez au chaud, et bonne écoute!
Restez au chaud, et bonne écoute!
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