Your Classical Coffee Break

The coffee break continues the journey to the dark side through music. Our first take is from Verdi's Don Carlos, a powerful sound of religious retribution, with a mighty chorus of the Spanish Inquisition. Then we hear Bach with his spiritual, reflective composition on the death of Jesus, in his B minor Mass. Ultimately our journey leads us to Tuonela, the Finnish Hades where we hear glorious spirits rising up into the heavens.

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This coffee break tackes a BIG Topic--how music interprets death and mourning. But it's not a gruesome journey because we listen to some gorgeous music, especially Mozart's Don Giovanni and Beethoven's Egmont. Mr. Somers discusses the structures composers use to denote passing away, particularly the use of half-notes. Benjamin Britten's use of groaning in his opera Billy Budd can be startling, but generally we listen to some perfectly lovely dirges.

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Mr. Somers leads us on a journey of American folk music, exploring the partnership between Dvorak and the great American musician Harry Burleigh. Burleigh was an African American composer, arranger, and singer of spiritual and sacred music who later arranged these pieces in a more classical form. We listen to Roy Harris and Aaron Copland, and attempt to answer the question What is American Music?

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This coffee break continues our exploration of how folk tunes were the basis of much classical music. Some composers went into the fields to hear the music of the common folk and transform it into high art, including, believe it or not, The Cricket is Getting Married, Ethnomusicology was born. Lindeman often used Norwegian folk music. Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, and Stravinsky used Russian. This coffee break is a wonderful reminder of the wide palette of sounds composers use to compose great music.

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Beethoven, a Folkie? Maybe not in the Woodie Guthrie sense, but his use of folk songs supported numerous works, especially Wellington's Victory. He even arranged some lyrical, classic Welsh tunes. Tchaikovsky was a great adapter of classic Russian folk tunes. This coffee break goes way, way back to hear a very early recording of Tchaik #4, then back later still to Hungarian fields to find the source material for a Kodaly piece.

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The coffee break finishes its exploration of the Brahms Symphony #4. Mr. Somers gets into the nuts and bolts of musical construction with an analysis of Brahms powerful, yet subtle construction of the 4th movement. We compare Brahms and Bach and their use of half-steps, then unpack Brahms' toolbox to see how he constructed his musical maze. This is a deep listen to one of the great symphonies.

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During the first part of our Brahms Symphony #4 journey, we listened to less than 30 seconds and found powerful depth and passion. We continue the Brahms exploration by discovering how he created the sounds of elation and anxiety through his use of chord changes, especially through the use of half steps and surprising instrumentation. We hope that this discussion helps you enjoy this amazing symphony.

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This coffee break comes out of the sunlight discussions and delves into the complicated genius of the Brahms Symphony #4. We look at the game Brahms is playing in the composition. What is home? And what is our journey that makes us yearn for home.

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For our final coffee break about sunrises, we revisit Hadyn's The Creation and the Big Bang, just because it's so amazing. We listen to how the human voice recreates the sunrise in a contemporary work, Dazzle of Day. Then we step back in time to Charles Ives' Decoration Day to hear the melancholy, layered sound of memory, then listen to the mystery of the first Easter morning. For our last sunrise, we hear Louis Spohr's invocation of the dawn after the Apocalypse.

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This coffee break continues the exploration of music depicting sunrise, this time from a spiritual perspective. We listen to a variety of music from the Native American (Deer Spirit Welcomes the Dawn) and Moravian traditions, as well as contemporary music. We talk about what techniques composers use to depict lightness and even check in on the Alpine Symphony to hear how night falls.

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