Composers and Musicians

From Cave to Cavern: The History of Percussion Instruments

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The remarkable history of percussion instruments is traced through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance to the Classical Period. Hosted by James Blades, consultant Professor of Percussion at the University of Surrey.

Contemporary Music 1945-1980

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Post-war music has seen a wealth of innovations—many of then strikingly original, some exceedingly complex. This illuminating appraisal features illustrations from the music of such composers as Stockhausen and Peter Maxwell Davies. Hosted by Hugh Wood, composer, lecturer, and Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.

PART ONE:

Expression and Extravagance: The Romantic Period 1830-1900

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The speakers examine the meaning of romanticism in music, while exploring the rise of Nationalism within the period and tracing the development of the orchestra. Hosted by conductor Norman Del Mar and broadcaster/musician John Amis.

PART ONE:

Sonata and the Creative Ideal: The Classical Period 1750-1830

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The principle and importance of classical Sonata Form is aided with keyboard examples on an eighteenth-century traveling square piano. We move to Vienna for a discussion of opera and the reforms of Gluck, before looking ahead to the Romantic period through the music of Schubert and Weber. Hosted by Alan Hacker, lecturer of Music at the University of York. The recordings are performed by Peter Wilson, Associate Director of London's Lyric Theatre Hammersmith.

PART ONE:

Great Performances George Gershwin

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1.   Rhapsody in Blue (16:26)
       Columbia Symphony Orchestra
       Leonard Bernstein, Piano

2.   An American in Paris (18:22)
       New York Philharmonic

Great Performances Aaron Copland

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APPALACHIAN SPRING
1.   Very Slowly (2:42)
2.   Allegro (2:42)
3.   Moderato (3:52)
4.   Fast (3:35)
5.   Subito allegro (3:44)
6.   As at first (Slowly) (1:15)
7. Doppio movimento (Shaker melody "The Gift to be SImple") (6:46)
8.   FANFARE FOR THE COMMON MAN (2:01)
9.   EL SALON MEXICO (10:56)
10. DANZON CUBANO (6:46)

Leonard Bernstein - New York Philharmonic

Classics for Children - CD 2

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Music of uninterrupted entertainment and imagination -- every piece on this program will have an immediate appeal to all children.

1.  Peter and the Wolf Prokofiev (26.18)
       Sir Ralph Richardson narrator
       London Symphony Orchestra
       Sir Malcolm Sargent

Classics for Children - CD 1

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1.   The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra Britten (16.32)
       London Symphony Orchestra
       Benjamin Britten

Duke Ellington

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Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington, "King of the Keys," was born on April 29, 1899, in Washington, D.C. "He was a smooth-talkin', slick-steppin', piano-playin' kid," writes master wordsmith Andrea Pinkney in the rhythmic, fluid, swinging prose of this excellent biography for early readers. It was ragtime music that first "set Duke's fingers to wiggling." He got back to work and taught himself to "press on the pearlies." Soon 19-year-old Duke was playing compositions "smoother than a hairdo sleeked with pomade" at parties, pool halls, country clubs, and cabarets. Skipping from D.C.

Lexile: 
AD800L

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