Samuel Barber's birthday

[Story]

Golden era composer Samuel Barber would have turned 100 this month.
http://whyy.org/cms/radiotimes/2010/03/05/happy-100th-samuel-barber/

In January of 1938, the composer Samuel Barber sent the conductor Arturo Toscanini a piece he'd written. It was called Adagio for Strings. Toscanini sent the score back to Barber without comment. Barber was annoyed, the story goes, and avoided the conductor. Toscanini sent word through a friend that he was planning to perform the piece. He had returned the score simply because he had already memorized it. On November 6, 1938, Arturo Toscanini, conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra, presented the debut of Adagio for Strings. The performance was broadcast on the radio. Luckily, that broadcast was recorded.
http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=6427815

See also
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Barber

Placed here, for it's continued use in movies.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRMz8fKkG2g

 

[R.A. Stewart]

Thank you so much. Barber is one of my favorite composers, and the Adagio one of the most heartbreaking and sublime pieces of music ever written, in my opinion. I had the organist play it at my wedding these many years ago, and if and when I start putting together requests for my funeral, I may ask that it be played again--if I can claim in good conscience to have lived in a way that in any measure deserves such a memorial.

Listening to the clip you linked right now. Dang it, I seem to have something in my eye.

~Rcih

 

["Skeet" McD]

He GOT it....

And, for my money, he's the ONLY composer who ever actually understood James Joyce's efforts with the Wake...and did so RIGHT after it was published.

By the Wake, Joyce had pretty much made his language into music...Barber got that, as well as continuing many of the technical aspects of what Joyce was doing (circular construction; puns; allusion/quotation; and many more).

Sadly, the song is not well-served in performance. I don't claim that mine is the be-all-and-end-all either...but its a good effort, and I stand by it:

http://www.james-joyce-music.com/cd_jewelcase2.html

Happy Birthday, Sam.

"Skeet"

 

[dhermann1]

Here's his Wikipedia article. I know a lot of younger generation musicians who really revere him. He made some wonderful music.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Barber
The article mentions his second symphony, which he wrote for the Army Air Corps during the war, and which he later suppressed. I heard it recently on the radio. Very interesting. He was trying to musically recreate the sound of a large fleet of bombers taking off, a pretty tough task. He was never satisfied that he had achieved this, through several attempts and revisions. He ultimately destroyed the work, but it was reconstituted from various instrumental parts. You can really hear what he's trying to do, and you can also understand why he was frustrated with it. But I'm glad it was saved, it's a great piece, notwithstanding the fact that he couldn't reproduce with 100 musicians the sound of hundreds of giant radial engines taxiing.

 

[skyvue]

Adagio for Strings is my favorite orchestral piece. It began as the second movement in his String Quartet No. 1, Op. 11, which was written in 1936.

 

[Story]

So via the magic of Youtube, listen to this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ed8cXENTiPA
while watching this, with the sound off.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jwf3zBOacVU

Does it work?

 

[Jedburgh OSS]

I recommend this CD

http://www.amazon.com/Barbers-Adagi...=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1268170529&sr=1-5

Click on the image of the backside of the jewel case for a listing of artists.

It has only the adagio 8 different ways: including strings, flute, brass, choir, clarinet, and organ. The recordings span 40 years. I've played this while touring Antietam Battlefield during its annual Illumination the first Saturday in December at sundown. Over 23,000 luminaries are set up, each representing an American casualty from that single day of battle. You really have no idea what 23,000 of anything looks like until you've seen this. The numbers and the flickering glow will leave you speechless. A truly awesome experience. I live just 20 miles away from it.

 

["Skeet" McD]

So via the magic of Youtube, listen to this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ed8cXENTiPA
while watching this, with the sound off.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jwf3zBOacVU

Does it work?

Dear Story: Yes, it most assuredly does, on a Mac at least...and I expect elsewhere. I called up the pages the moment I read your post, but have only now had the leisure to sit down and watch/listen. Quite remarkable: not quite "objets trouvées"....but certainly these two things were never intended to be experienced together. Which makes it remarkable that--if you didn't know that--you might well be convinced that they had been.

Very clever of you...and very moving. Thanks!

"Skeet"

PS: does any WWII aviation-type out there recognize the footage, specifically: do we know what the target was?

 

[dhermann1]

WQXR is right now playing a recording of his singing. Very interesting.
They played his first violin concerto earlier this evening. And Bill McLaughlin will devote another hour to him tonight at 11.