Happy 70th birthday Composer of the Week

[Suffolkcoastal]

Some of the composers listed have only been done in combination with others I would suspect. At least a third haven't featured in the last 30 years or so there's plenty of scope for a more contemporary view on them. Perhaps it would be good to have a whole year of COTW without any of the 'big' names being featured for once.

[Serial_Apologist]

Some of the composers listed have only been done in combination with others I would suspect. At least a third haven't featured in the last 30 years or so there's plenty of scope for a more contemporary view on them. Perhaps it would be good to have a whole year of COTW without any of the 'big' names being featured for once.

[KipperKid]

Which Scarlatti?

? The Italian one? I dunno

[umslopogaas]

I'm sure someone has already suggested Ernest Bloch, though I cant find the post: anyway, I second it.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I'm sure someone has already suggested Ernest Bloch, though I cant find the post: anyway, I second it.

Sorry - Ed Milliband wants to abolish the Bloch vote.

[gurnemanz]

Definitely second Randy Newman (maybe also Uncle Alfred).

Paul Dessau: A more likely candidate than the Newmans and often neglected in the shadow of Eisler and Weill (both of whom have been done).

[umslopogaas]

fhg, if Ed Milliband abolishes the Bloch vote, he wont get mine! Anyway, a vote for Labour around here (east Devon) is a waste of time, the only way to rattle the Tories is to vote Lib Dem.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Paul Dessau: A more likely candidate than the Newmans and often neglected in the shadow of Eisler and Weill (both of whom have been done).

Good call, gurnie - in fact a week concentrating on Dessau (with contributions from his English pupil David Blake) followed by a week devoted to David Blake himself would be worth hearing. (Blake is so neglected these days that he's even been neglected on the "Neglected Brits" Thread!)

[AmpH]

Good call, gurnie - in fact a week concentrating on Dessau (with contributions from his English pupil David Blake) followed by a week devoted to David Blake himself would be worth hearing. (Blake is so neglected these days that he's even been neglected on the "Neglected Brits" Thread!)

I certainly like David Blake's music fhg, but has enough of it been recorded ( either performances or on disc ) for a viable CoTW ? I'm not aware of many recordings. Still, I would settle for R3 playing Iona Brown's recording of the glorious violin concerto - not sure if it has been broadcast by R3 but it certainly should be. Think I'll dig it out and play it in the next few days.

[Serial_Apologist]

I certainly like David Blake's music fhg, but has enough of it been recorded ( either performances or on disc ) for a viable CoTW ? I'm not aware of many recordings. Still, I would settle for R3 playing Iona Brown's recording of the glorious violin concerto - not sure if it has been broadcast by R3 but it certainly should be. Think I'll dig it out and play it in the next few days.

BTW it was Eisler under whom Blake studied, not Dessau.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

BTW it was Eisler under whom Blake studied, not Dessau.

Well done, Wilson. I wondered who'd be the first to spot that one.

(Shameless, I am, I say: shameless!)

[gurnemanz]

I certainly like David Blake's music fhg, but has enough of it been recorded ( either performances or on disc ) for a viable CoTW ? I'm not aware of many recordings. Still, I would settle for R3 playing Iona Brown's recording of the glorious violin concerto - not sure if it has been broadcast by R3 but it certainly should be. Think I'll dig it out and play it in the next few days.

I first heard of Dessau 40 years ago. I was doing a PGCE at York in 71-72, prior to being a modern language teacher. Some of us were keen music fans and the Music Department was quite dynamic at the time with Wilfrid Mellers along with David Blake ruling the roost. In our short time there we took in many good things, including Prof Mellers' famous Beatles Lectures and an evening with John Cage. I also went to a lecture called Brecht and his Music by Fritz Hennenberg from East Germany. When we chatted to him afterwards, he was very friendly and said we should look him up if we were in Leipzig. I duly did this and it transpired that he was a significant musicologist and Chefdramaturg at the Gewandhaus. I got to know him quite well, and his wife, Roswitha Trexler, who was a specialist interpreter of the Eisler/Weill/Dessau repertoire. When she was due to go to the Proms in 1975, he asked me to accompany her around London, because her English was not great and they were not both allowed by the regime to leave East Germany at the same time! The Prom in question is on the archive and contains quite a few Proms premieres. I had a nice time showing her the sights, but also as a hanger-on going to rehearsals, backstage and the post-concert party. I have several of her LPs, including Dessau.

[ahinton]

I'm sure someone has already suggested Ernest Bloch, though I cant find the post: anyway, I second it.

I have, though I don't think that I was the first to do so (no time to check, though).

[ahinton]

Sorry - Ed Milliband wants to abolish the Bloch vote.

In "earnest"? But who cares? at least in the context of CotW at 70?! He and his crowd seem unlikely even to get much of a mandate at the next UK General Election, so his stance on this in terms of CotW is surely a still greater irrelevance (and, although "milli" as a prefix is a mere one thousandth of anything worth talking about, Ed of that ilk has but one "l", just as Elliott Carter has two "t"s - also sprach ein pedant!)...

[Serial_Apologist]

In "earnest"? But who cares? at least in the context of CotW at 70?! He and his crowd seem unlikely even to get much of a mandate at the next UK General Election, so his stance on this in terms of CotW is surely a still greater irrelevance (and, although "milli" as a prefix is a mere one thousandth of anythig worth talking about, Ed of that ilk has but one "l", just as Elliott Carter has two "t"s - also sprach ein pedant!)...

Shouldn't Pedant be written with a capital P?