July 4

[richardfinegold]

It’s a big day on this side of the pond, as we celebrate our Declaration of Independence from a certain despotic European power that was taxing our beverages in an effort to have us reimburse the Crown for what was being spent to administer this place. Of course, the tax levied by our own Government on each bottle of beer consumed to celebrate makes the Stamp and Tea taxes of George III look piffling by comparison....
So our local Classical Station here is celebrating with American themed Music, currently Dvorak’s American String Quartet. The John Phillips Sousa will start later. My favorite Sousa album...not I have many...is by a band from the land of the old oppressor, the Phillip Jones Brass Ensemble.
The big Mercury Records reissue boxes contain several albums of Americana that I have never listened to; perhaps today is the day.
Last weekend we were at an outdoor concert featuring this type of fare, with a local mother and neighbor who has sung with the Lyric Opera in years past giving stirring renditions of America the Beautiful and God Bless America. It is hard to believe that it has only been a few generations since Music like this could be written without irony or protests in mind.

[Serial_Apologist]

It’s a big day on this side of the pond, as we celebrate our Declaration of Independence from a certain despotic European power that was taxing our beverages in an effort to have us reimburse the Crown for what was being spent to administer this place. Of course, the tax levied by our own Government on each bottle of beer consumed to celebrate makes the Stamp and Tea taxes of George III look piffling by comparison....
So our local Classical Station here is celebrating with American themed Music, currently Dvorak’s American String Quartet. The John Phillips Sousa will start later. My favorite Sousa album...not I have many...is by a band from the land of the old oppressor, the Phillip Jones Brass Ensemble.
The big Mercury Records reissue boxes contain several albums of Americana that I have never listened to; perhaps today is the day.
Last weekend we were at an outdoor concert featuring this type of fare, with a local mother and neighbor who has sung with the Lyric Opera in years past giving stirring renditions of America the Beautiful and God Bless America. It is hard to believe that it has only been a few generations since Music like this could be written without irony or protests in mind.

I can't for the life of me think who!

It's good to hear your news and that you and us stay in touch. Have some great celebrations, Richard.

[Padraig]

Happy Fourth of July, Richard. It's nice to have an old oppressor at a time like this - tell me about it - to take the pressure off our own failings. But it's a day for celebration and I wish all Americans a peaceful and a happy day. Too bad about the savage tax on beer.
Everyone will have a favoured piece of American music which does not exclude the choices of others. I have many but I have chosen one which I feel represents some of the aspects of America which readily come to my mind (today at least). It's Judy Collins singing The City of New Orleans - encompassing folk, country music and the city where Jazz was born.
Link to follow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emmRdmvuvX8

[Serial_Apologist]

Happy Fourth of July, Richard. It's nice to have an old oppressor at a time like this - tell me about it - to take the pressure off our own failings. But it's a day for celebration and I wish all Americans a peaceful and a happy day. Too bad about the savage tax on beer.
Everyone will have a favoured piece of American music which does not exclude the choices of others. I have many but I have chosen one which I feel represents some of the aspects of America which readily come to my mind (today at least). It's Judy Collins singing The City of New Orleans - encompassing folk, country music and the city where Jazz was born.
Link to follow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emmRdmvuvX8

And here's "Kim" by the Charlie Parker quartet as my tribute to American music. Hearing this was the very first time I heard about "bebop", and it was while at school, aged 16 I think. I was an instant convert!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-nVTvIfuPo

[Joseph K]

And here's "Kim" by the Charlie Parker quartet as my tribute to American music. Hearing this was the very first time I heard about "bebop", and it was while at school, aged 16 I think. I was an instant convert!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-nVTvIfuPo

I am currently listening to Miles Davis' In a Silent Way, for me a record with a 'died and gone to heaven' feel about it - it takes exquisiteness to new levels, despite the presence of Old World musicians on it.

[doversoul1]

Sousa’s marches and Stephen Foster’s songs were a big part of my introduction to classical music. Happy Independent Day.

[LMcD]

IMHO, one of the USA's greatest gifts to the world was the Great American Songbook, especially in the hands of Ella Fitzgerald.
Happy Independence Day!

[richardfinegold]

Happy Fourth of July, Richard. It's nice to have an old oppressor at a time like this - tell me about it - to take the pressure off our own failings. But it's a day for celebration and I wish all Americans a peaceful and a happy day. Too bad about the savage tax on beer.
Everyone will have a favoured piece of American music which does not exclude the choices of others. I have many but I have chosen one which I feel represents some of the aspects of America which readily come to my mind (today at least). It's Judy Collins singing The City of New Orleans - encompassing folk, country music and the city where Jazz was born.
Link to follow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emmRdmvuvX8

The Judy Collins version features very much in our non Classical listening around here, as we are huge fans of Judy, but for me, Arlo Guthrie is the one who really nailed the Steve Goodman song.
Btw, I’ve taken the City of New Orleans train a few times, but not all the way to NOLA—just from Chicago to downstate Illinois

[LezLee]

Sousa’s marches and Stephen Foster’s songs were a big part of my introduction to classical music. Happy Independent Day.

How different people are! If I'd heard Sousa and Foster before any other music, I'd never have listened to classical music, ever! To me, they don't come near what I consider 'classical'

[richardfinegold]

IMHO, one of the USA's greatest gifts to the world was the Great American Songbook, especially in the hands of Ella Fitzgerald.
Happy Independence Day!

Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett not to far behind...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The sheer arrogance of the British government of the time is astonishing even by their standards - the need for more money for the administration and defence of the colonies wasn't unreasonable (especially given the expenditure of the wars with the French in Northern America just a few years before). There were enough American colonialists loyal enough to the crown to have kept the territories "on side", if the British Government hadn't made clear that they considered them to be peevish children who should just do what they were told as soon as they were told what to do.

Fun - if pointless - to fantasise what might have happened if the British had been more ... well, "civil", and allowed greater self-government early in the 1770s. Would abolition have happened earlier in America? Would American interests have prevented/held up abolition in Britain? Or would abolition itself have been the catalyst for a War of Independence, just 30 years later than the one that did?

Anyway - I hope the celebrations have been greatly enjoyed by all American Forumistas and their families & friends.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=488TeVH2q24

[jayne lee wilson]

If I were to program a celebration, it would have to include Ives 2nd as the finale.... my first encounter with that (1990s, Radio 3 live...) changed my view of "classical music"....

Three Places in New England and Orchestral Set No.2 in Part One....

***
Here's a very witty celebration of your big day.....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48851152

[doversoul1]

Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett not to far behind...

John Ford.

[richardfinegold]

The sheer arrogance of the British government of the time is astonishing even by their standards - the need for more money for the administration and defence of the colonies wasn't unreasonable (especially given the expenditure of the wars with the French in Northern America just a few years before). There were enough American colonialists loyal enough to the crown to have kept the territories "on side", if the British Government hadn't made clear that they considered them to be peevish children who should just do what they were told as soon as they were told what to do.

Fun - if pointless - to fantasise what might have happened if the British had been more ... well, "civil", and allowed greater self-government early in the 1770s. Would abolition have happened earlier in America? Would American interests have prevented/held up abolition in Britain? Or would abolition itself have been the catalyst for a War of Independence, just 30 years later than the one that did?

Anyway - I hope the celebrations have been greatly enjoyed by all American Forumistas and their families & friends.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=488TeVH2q24

Fascinating to speculate. Given the active role of G.B. in attempting to eliminate the slave trade decades prior to our Civil War, one possibility is that they could have allied with the Northern Colonies and localized a Rebellion to the Deep South. Then the manufacturing in GB. That relied upon Southern cotton would have suffered, producing a countervailing pressure to avoid such a conflict, so who knows.
I recently read John Meachem biography of Thomas Jefferson in which he emphasized the indebtedness of both the Southern Plantar Class and the larger Northern Industrialist and Merchants to English Banks. Those debts would apparently disappear if the Rebellion succeeded. So apparently a lot of the high falutin rhetoric about freedom and the Rights of Man were invoked to create a rebellion to stave off the Repo Man. And of course the people doing the fighting and suffering, on both sides, were from commoner walks of life, doing the bidding of the Captalists who were disguising their motives something more transcendent, appeals to Patriotism. The actors change, but the story remains the same...

[richardfinegold]

If I were to program a celebration, it would have to include Ives 2nd as the finale.... my first encounter with that (1990s, Radio 3 live...) changed my view of "classical music"....

Three Places in New England and Orchestral Set No.2 in Part One....

***
Here's a very witty celebration of your big day.....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48851152

So our local station has been playing American Composers all day, and the bulk has been the Music of Copland, Gershwin, and Bernstein. All the descendants of Russian Jews, two of whom fell afoul of the House of UnAmerican Activities (HUAC), and perhaps that would have been 3 for 3 had Gershwin lived longer.
The World is an interesting place