Detroit Symphony Orchestra; Rossini, Mozart, Smetana, and Stravinsky, part 2

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Good for the performance of the Symphony Number 39 in the plank 540 Maestro sicced of knowing how much because you ask a master musician to rise. Thank you second portion of today's broadcast as composed of major works by Smith and Stravinsky for introducing them to pause briefly for station identification. This is the national educational radio network. Why. We were listening to the six than a series of broadcasts of regular subscription concerts especially selected from the archives of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Today's concert is being conducted by Sexton elling a permanent musical director and conductor of the orchestra. Our concert continues with a

performance of a work by the Czech composer Beatrix Mehta not. The Modahl the symphonic poem and the second part of the monumental symphonic psycho bearing the name my fatherland. Is regarded as the founder of the National School of Czech music which had as its renowned advocate and Janine foreshock a composer upon whom Smetana had a profound influence. His life was marked by one tragedy after another. The greatest of these was complete deafness which suddenly struck in October of 1874. Thus like Beethoven Smetana suffered the greatest affliction which can befall a musician. Although Beethoven could hear music with an ear trumpet Smetana his affliction was complete even for the loudest of sounds. By this time 1874 Smetana had written only two of his universally acknowledged masterpieces. The trio in G minor in 1855 and the rustic opera comedy The Bartered Bride in 1066. To follow in spite of his affliction were two operas.

The kiss and the secret both considered fine works. The string quartets the symphonic cycle my fatherland and some excellent piano pieces. It's almost pathetic to note that Smetana signed the completed score of my fatherland with the phrase in the state of a recorder in from a day. The composer wrote about the mote out of two springs gushed forth in the shade of the Bohemian forest the one warm and swift flowing the other cool and tranquil where waters joined and rushed joyously down the rocky bed glistening in the light of the morning sun. This hurrying forest Brook becomes the river mode hour which flows across the land of Bohemia widening as it goes. Passing through dark forests. The songs of the hunter's horns are heard ever nearer. Through meadow lands it passes what a wedding feast is being celebrated by peasants with song and dance at night. What an imps play in its gleaming depths in which are reflected fortresses and castles from the glorious past. But the rapids of St. John the stream becomes a roaring cataract beating its way through rocky chasms whitening at last into the majestic river that flows through Prague

greeted by the mighty old fortress when it vanishes over the horizon. Lost to the poet's sight. That's right the composer about his composition the Modocs. Maestro elling now comes to the podium to continue our concert with a performance of spec no symphonic poem no mo doubt. And. I am.

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Thank you. For the right Symphony Orchestra the urban performance of Smetana symphonic poem the most. In this. Order story right Ellie has chosen one of the broadest forbid species popular settings of music for the ballet the Socred you frank talk. Stravinsky is probably without question the most voluble of contemporary composers has written extensively on music subjects via spoken frequently and in depth about practically all of

his compositions that background and their meaning. This trait has bothered some musicologist but generally it's considered a most fortunate circumstance. Certainly Stravinsky will not become an enigma to historians or musicologist in the years ahead. And just as certainly the composers words about his compositions do assist many laymen in their understanding and appreciation of his creations. Stravinsky tells us that the idea came to him while he was busily engaged on a score for another ballet The Firebird. At that time he conceived the idea of a scene of pagan ritual in which a chosen sacrificial virgin dances herself to death. But it was only an idea and before I could take musical shape the composer's attention was taken up with the story and musical ideas which culminated in Patricia first before and in June of 911. Shortly thereafter the composer and his family rented a small home in Switzerland and it was here that the entire score of less awkward to prime talk was composed in a tiny room and ate by a closet rather. It was only

furniture was a small upright piano which I kept muted. A table and two chairs relates the composer. Although the first before months of listen I was both a sensation and a scandal. The work is now generally considered a part of the standard orchestral repertoire. Our concert by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra concludes seeks to Manning conducts a performance of Igor Stravinsky's ballet music. Thank you pronto. Thank you. Thank. You.