Choral

Remembering Composer Bern Herbolsheimer

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(Photo above by Rosetta Greek Photography) This Sunday, Seattle’s musical community will pause to remember the life of one of its most esteemed composers. American composer Bern Herbolsheimer passed away on January 13 following a battle with cancer. He was 67. Herbolsheimer served on the faculty of Cornish College and the University of Washington. His works include a Symphony which was premiered in 1989 by conductor Kenneth Jean and the Florida Symphony Orchestra, two …

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Sounds of Candlemas: Thomas Tallis’ Videte miraculum

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Candlemas, also known as The Feast of the Purification, is observed on or around February 2 on the Christian calendar. It’s a liturgical celebration that has inspired numerous works of art, such as the Byzantine painting above and at least three of J.S. Bach’s cantatas: Erfreute Zeit im neuen Bunde (BWV 83) (1724), Mit Fried und Freud ich fair dahin (BMV 125) (1725), and Ich habe genug (BWV 82) (1727). The last of the three remains the most recorded of all of Bach’s …

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Remembering Kurt Masur: Five Great Recordings

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Conductor Kurt Masur passed away on December 19, following a battle with Parkinson’s disease. He was 88. Masur will be remembered for his 26-year association (beginning in 1970) with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, a storied ensemble once led by Felix Mendelssohn. Kurt Masur brought powerful political, as well as musical, leadership to Leipzig. In 1981, following the destruction of the previous Gewandhaus in the fire-bombings of the Second World War forty years earlier, he …

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Merry Christmas

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  Wishing all Listeners’ Club readers a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! As you enjoy the day, take a moment and listen to the Wells Cathedral Choir’s performance of Peter Griton’s arrangement of Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. This comes from their 2007 recording called Christmas from Wells.

Your 2015 Christmas Playlist

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It’s that time of year again…time for the annual Listeners’ Club Christmas playlist. As with last year’s post, this is a collection of music guaranteed to get you in the holiday spirit. Pour some eggnog, light the tree and listen: Thomas Tallis: Christmas Mass We’ll start with music written for an important political occasion. The Christmas Mass by English composer Thomas Tallis (c. 1505-1585) may have been written for Christmas Day, 1554 when Phillip II of …

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Samuel Barber’s Twelfth Night

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The promise of spring amid the darkest, gloomiest depths of winter…that’s the Christmas metaphor of cyclic rejuvenation found in Laurence “Laurie” Lee’s poem, Twelfth Night. American composer Samuel Barber had fallen into his own personal depths of depression when he created this chilling setting in December 1968. His second opera, Antony and Cleopatra, commissioned for the opening of the Metropolitan Opera house at New York’s brand new Lincoln Center, had been poorly received by critics. …

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Christmas at Wanamaker’s

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In celebration of the official start of the holiday season, let’s swing by the grand old former Wanamaker’s department store (now Macy’s) in the heart of Philadelphia. The store is home to the largest fully functioning pipe organ in the world, with 28,604 pipes, 463 ranks, and six manuals. Originally built for the 1904 Saint Louis World’s Fair, the instrument found a home in Wanamaker’s seven-story Grand Court in 1909. It took thirteen railroad cars …

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