Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras No. 9 (Version for Choir): Valentina Peleggi and the São Paulo Symphony Choir

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In a 1945 letter to the Bach Society of São Paulo, composer Heitor Villa-Lobos wrote, The music of Bach is without question the most sacred gift to the world of art…Since Bach expressed his thoughts of God and the universe through his musical creations originating from his own country, he gave the most spiritual expression of human solidarity, we should also understand, love and cultivate the music that is born and lives, …

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Remembering Norman Carol

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Norman Carol, the legendary American violinist and concertmaster of the Philadelphia Orchestra from 1966 to 1994, passed away on April 28 in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania. He was 95. Born in Philadelphia to Russian immigrant parents, Carol began playing the violin at age six, and performed his first concert at nine. Following initial studies with Sascha Jacobinoff, he entered the Curtis Institute of Music at 13, where he was a student of Efrem Zimbalist. …

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Dvořák’s Carnival Overture: A Vibrant Celebration of Life

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In 1892, Antonín Dvořák composed three concert overtures (In Nature’s Realm, Carnival, and Othello) inspired by poetic visions of “Nature, Life, and Love.” After examining the composer’s notes, the biographer, Otakar Šourek, wrote, Dvořák wished in this cycle to draw in overture-form musical pictures of three of the most powerful impressions to which the human soul is subjected: the impression of the solitary, wrapped about by the exalted stillness of the summer night; …

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Stravinsky’s Eight Instrumental Miniatures: The Land of Children at Play

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In 1921, Igor Stravinsky composed a set of simple piano pieces for children titled, Les cinq doigts (“The Five Fingers”). Charmingly spare and neoclassical, each of the eight whimsical keyboard exercises are built on five notes, played in the right hand. Stravinsky returned to this music in 1962 to create the 8 Instrumental Miniatures for 15 Players. It is music which inhabits the innocent, magical land of children at play. The brief …

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Dvořák’s “Rusalka”: Four Key Excerpts

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First performed on March 31, 1901 in Prague, Antonín Dvořák’s enduring fairytale opera in three acts, Rusalka, Op. 114, blends Slavic mythology with the story of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid . Rusalka is a water nymph who falls in love with a human—a Prince who happens one day to swim in her lake. She tells her father, the water goblin, that she wishes to become human to be with the …

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Remembering Sir Andrew Davis

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Sir Andrew Davis, the renowned English conductor, passed away on April 20 following a brief battle with leukemia. He was 80. Davis served as music director of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra from 1975 to 1988, and later as chief conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (2013–2019). From 1989 until 2000, he led the BBC Symphony Orchestra, becoming the longest-serving chief conductor of that ensemble since Adrian Boult. As an opera conductor, Davis …

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Mozart’s Symphony No. 27 in G Major: Salzburg Sunshine

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Symphony No. 27 in G Major, K. 199 is sunny, youthful music of the 17-year-old Mozart. Completed in April of 1773, it is among a group of four symphonies Mozart wrote after returning home to Salzburg following his second trip to Italy. (His opera, Lucio Silla, was being performed in Milan). Two months later, Mozart and his father would set out for the imperial capital of Vienna. Scored for two flutes, two …

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