SUNDAY MORNING CLASSICS ON TBP

A collaboration of: “The Classic Music Mafia”
Anthony Aaron, and Steve C.

Steve C / Classic Music Mafia: Here is the image depicting “The Classic Music Gangsters,” a whimsical and imaginative group of classical musicians with a playful gangster twist. The scene is set in an old-world music hall with rich, vintage decor, where the musicians are performing in stylish 1920s-era gangster attire. The atmosphere is mysterious yet sophisticated, capturing the unique blend of classical music and a lighthearted gangster theme. – aka.attrition

Every Sunday morning we present selections for our TBP family to enjoy.

We present symphonies, ensembles, quartets, octets, etc.

Not all of our music is strictly ‘classical’. We may stray a little, but we strive to make all of our selections ‘classy’.

We offer tips on proper ‘symphony etiquette’ and even some selections that are a bit light-hearted and fun aimed at a younger audience. Those pieces will be so designated, and might be a good way to introduce kids to a world of music that they might not have been exposed to or think of as old and ‘stuffy’.

A full symphony will run as long as it will. We don’t want to cut a symphony short. However, we also include some shorter pieces that we try to keep under fifteen minutes in length. You can sample each and hopefully find one or more that pleases you.

We hope that you enjoy our Sunday selections.

Anthony Aaron

Continuing with Leonard Bernstein’s 1970s Mahler cycle …

Mahler Symphony no. 6 “Tragic”

Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra – Leonard Bernstein

Gustav Mahler said,

“My Sixth will be asking riddles that can be solved only by a generation that has received and digested my first five.”

In fact, Mahler’s Symphony No. 6 in A minor remains an unsettling enigma. Completed in 1905 at one of the happiest times in the composer’s life (he had married Alma Schindler in 1902 and they already had two young daughters), the Sixth Symphony is Mahler’s most dark and terrifying work. The conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler called it “the first nihilist work in the history of music.” Its final bars offer none of the triumph or celestial transcendence we hear the other symphonies. We are not even left with the Ninth Symphony’s serene acceptance. Instead, as Mahler described it, by Alma’s account, “the hero…is assaulted by three hammer-blows of fate, the last of which fells him as a tree is felled.” Bruno Walter, the conductor and friend of Mahler, avoided conducting the Sixth, noting that it “ends in hopelessness and the dark night of the soul.” In his memoir, Walter claims that Mahler gave the Sixth its frequent subtitle, “Tragic,” although the word does not appear on any of the scores published durning the composer’s lifetime.

The Next Nine Come To Us Thanks To Anonymous.

Iphigénie en Aulide, Wq. 40: Ouverture (Arr. Wagner)

The original orchestra regular performs . . . in trees:

Yma Sumac claimed that the birds in the mountains of Peru taught her to sing.

Yma Sumac In Her Duet With A Flute – Insane Harmonization

In the mid-Nineties I was somewhere at the top of Cape Cod, Mass., and heard the most complex birdcall repeatedly, and named this unknown bird, which I could not see in the trees, a “saxbird”. It was channeling John Coltrane with talons. Life is filled with unfulfillable desires; if only I could place a recording of it here, I would. It was breathtaking.

Yma Sumac ‎– Flame Tree ℗ 1972

Yma Sumac With Les Baxter – Tree Of Life

Yma Sumac, The Peruvian Songbird, sings “Chuncho.”

Morning Pro Musica – birds and music intro

The late, great WGBH-FM Radio host, Robert J. Lurtsema’s intro to his 7-day-per-week classical show, which he recorded himself in the woods and multitracked in the studio, decades ago:

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in G Minor: III. Vivace

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in G Minor: III. Vivace

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in G Minor: II. Cantabile

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in G Minor: II. Cantabile

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in G Minor: I. Allegro assai

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in G Minor: I. Allegro assai

The next Three Come To Us Thanks To difrangia.

Kristan Harvey & Nicola Benedetti – Leaving Lerwick Harbour

My humble contributions for St. Paddy’s:

Natalie MacMaster & Thomas Dolby: Fiddling in reel time

And now for a little foot-stompin’. Stick with this one and you’ll be rewarded.

Loreena McKennitt/Huron ‘Beltane’ Fire Dance (Live) – Loreena McKennitt.

And from a self-made master of worldwide Celtic historical culture & music, Loreena McKennitt, at the Alhmbra Palace in Grenada Spain, in 2006. Where else can you find an assembly of such an array of seldom seen instruments played so magnificently ?? If you like this seek out the concert vid ‘Nights From the Alhambra’ and it will probably make a fan out of you.

This One Comes To Us From Current Mafioso Anthony Aaron.

Loreena McKennitt – Caravanserai

I came across Ms. McKennitt’s music about a decade ago … absolutely magnificent … so many great songs in her repertoire.

This is one of my favorites … it has a certain ‘exotic’ quality, what with the hurdy curdy and the other arabic instruments.

This Next One Comes To Us Thanks To Leah.

Conor McGregor Song – Official Video – Mick Konstantin

Not classical but is Irish and fun to share anyway. Happy St. Patrick’s Day. Thanks for everything.

Anthony Aaron

Johann Sebastian Bach, Harpsichord Concerto no. 6, BWV 1057

Ensemble Odyssee

Live Recording

Andrea Friggi – Solo Harpsichord

Anna Stegmann, Georg Fritz – Recorders

Eva Saladin, Ivan Iliev, Nadine Henrichs – Violins

David Alonso Molina – Viola

Agnieszka Oszanca – Cello

Fred Uhlig – Violone

Benjamin Britten – Four Sea Interludes from “Peter Grimes”

These orchestral pieces from Benjamin Britten’s first successful opera, Peter Grimes, are scene changes by a master of the scene change. They not only take the listener from one physical location to another (at times seeming to go out to sea and back), but also explore the turmoil in the characters’ minds as coastal villagers hound the misanthropic loner fisherman Grimes to self-destruction after the mysterious, but accidental, deaths of two of his apprentices. Because each Interlude in the opera leads into the following scene without pause, Britten rewrote their endings to make them self-contained concert pieces.

– Four Sea Interludes from “Peter Grimes”, Op. 33a

I. Dawn
II. Sunday Morning
III. Moonlight
IV. Storm

Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra

Paavo Järvi

Bartók: Kossuth

The symphonic poem was composed as a tribute to Hungarian politician Lajos Kossuth, hero of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848 and musically chronicles his failed attempt to win Hungary’s independence from Austria in 1848–49. Bartók has himself penned detailed commentaries on the score, etching out a programme and subjecting it to close thematic analysis. Although the work is written as a single movement, it is nonetheless complex in its orchestration, with ten interrelated movements or sections. The piece begins with Bartók sketching a portrait of his hero and ends with a funeral march.

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra

Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Dirigent

Alte Oper Frankfurt, 11. Juni 2015

I’ve been listening to the musical performances of Keith Jarrett for almost 50 years … I first heard his 1975 album, ‘Koln Concerts’ when it came out … I was ‘awakened’ by his brilliance.

Keith Jarrett – Bordeaux Concert Part III

Bordeaux Concert is a special document from Keith Jarrett’s last European tour. Each of Jarrett’s 2016 solo piano concerts had its own strikingly distinct character, and in Bordeaux the lyrical impulse is to the fore. In the course of this improvised suite, many quiet discoveries are made, and there is a touching freshness to the music as a whole, a feeling of intimate communication.

Reviewing the July 2016 performance, the French press spoke of hints of the Köln Concert and Bremen-Lausanne in the flow of things, and extended sections of Bordeaux are beguilingly beautiful. Tender songs are pulled from the air, “rousing a community of listening at the edge of silence”, as Le Monde put it, “an awareness of time out from the noise and weariness of the world.”

Steve C.

And now another visit with Brendan Kavanagh.

Teenage Girl Is Awed By Boogie Woogie Piano

Teenage girl is amazed when she learns about boogie woogie piano for the first time….

Maria Played Elvis For Her Public Piano Exam

13 year old Maria from Belfast plays some Elvis at the public piano.

Charlotte’s Got Talent At The Public Piano

14 year old Charlotte shows up at the piano again to show her amazing, blossoming talent.

Fur Elise Gets Rocked – Girl Gets A Surprise

Beethoven would roll over if he heard this version of his classic piano solo.

Four Man Boogie Woogie Explosion At The Piano

Dr K bumps into Terry, Jared and Reece at the public piano.

Crowd Appears Magically When The Boogie Starts

The forbidden piano gets royally bashed but Mr Misery was nowhere to be seen….

Introducing Girls To Rock and Roll Piano

17 year old Elinor plays rock and roll for the time.

Schoolgirl Stops By The Piano On The Way Home

15 year old Jasmine was on her way home from school when she passed the public piano and played Clair de Lune. The station was very busy and the piano was not in the best condition for Debussy, but she managed to eclipse the noise and the chaos with her wonderful piano skills.

The Classic Music Mafia – Adding some class to this joint one Sunday at a time.

Heaven help us…

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