If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.
Wilfred Josephs is a composer we hear little if anything of these days. In the early part of his output is a piece titled Concerto a Dodice (1960), strictly written in the 12-tone serial method, in which nevertheless he manages to obtain oompah harmonies out of it. Hilarious.
The bit in the finale of Rodion Shchedrin’s Suite from Bizet’s Carmen where the Toreadors’ music comes in on xylophone Great joke.
Heard today (towards the end of Afternoon Concert) for the first time... and I’m sure it’s intentionally funny. Loved the twist on a hackneyed piece (the whole Suite isn’t bad).
I keep hearing Shchedrin pieces I like... such as his Concerto for Orchestra No 1 “Naughty Limericks” on TTN a few months back
"...the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices..."
Thanks for this, Petrushka - I missed that series being still away at boarding school.
They really knew how to write them in those days!
No, not 'they' ( many) but JOSEPHS, who in his own way was a genius, having the amazing ability ( like Liz Lutyens) to write 'retail music ' , wonderfully ( Hammer Horror for LL) ) but still retained the ability to write his own genuine 'creative music'. I will always remember being on a 6-week 'world tour' playing with the English Chamber Orchestra in about 1973 when we played WJ's Concerto for 2 violins, conducted by Barenboim. Not exactly a masterpiece but a 'gem'!
Ralph Vaughan Williams - the concertina effect in the third movement of the London Symphony and the waddling penguins in the second movement (I think) of the Sinfonia Antartica.
Comment