November is the eleventh month. And so the Classics a Day team opted to make eleven the month’s then. The challenge is to post works that are numbered 11 in some fashion, either an opus number, a series number, or even a suite number. It turns out that there’s a lot of great music associated […]
Felix Mendelssohn
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#ClassicsaDay #OctoberOctet Week 1
The Classics a Day team decided October was the month to feature octets. Granted, it is the tenth month of the year, but the word “detects” isn’t as alliterative. The mix of instruments that make up an octet varies. Some composers wrote for double string quartet, some for wind instruments, and some for a blend […]
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#ClassicsaDay #ClassicalChristmas Week 1
For the past four years, the #ClassicsaDay team has adopted Classical Christmas as its theme for December. And why not? We have a rich body of music related to the season dating back to the Middle Ages. A good deal of it is religious, but not all — many works are simply inspired by the […]
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Solomiya Ivakhiv Double Concerto Project spans labels
This is something unusual — a recording series spread across different labels. Violinist Solmiya Ivakhiv and pianist Antonio Pompa-Baldi wanted to record the double concertos of Haydn and Mendelssohn. While preparing, they discovered two other neglected works. Johann Nepomuk Hummel, a contemporary of Haydn, had also written a double concerto for violin and piano. And […]
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Charlottesville Symphony concert just misses the mark
One phrase characterizes my impression of the Charlottesville Symphony’s November 16th concert: “it was great, except for…” The program itself, “Romantic Titans” was first-rate. The first half of the program featured two orchestral works; the second two large-scale choral works. Maestro Benjamin Rouse freely admitted “Caught by the Wind” was something of an outliner. Composer […]
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#ClassicsaDay #ClassicalEleven Week 1
Numbers have meaning. But meaning can depend on context. The Classics a Day team made “eleven” the theme for November, the eleventh month. The challenge is to post performances of classical music that involve the number. I chose a mix. Some pieces involve eleven players. Some are the eleventh type of piece by a composer. […]
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Marcy Rosen’s Mendelssohn album welcome reissue
Felix Mendelssohn didn’t write many pieces for cello and piano. Most of them were composed for his younger brother, an amateur cellist (and professional banker). Judging by the complexity of the two cello sonatas, Paul Mendelssohn must have been a very accomplished amateur. The Sonata No. 1 in B-flat, Op. 48 is a large, three-movement […]
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#ClassicsaDay #SummerClassics Weeks 1 and 2
It was a busy summer for the Classics a Day team. In June, we marked African-American Music Appreciation Month. In July we celebrated national holidays in the U.S. and Canada. So that just left August to have a summer theme. For my part, I chose to choose anything except Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons.” In the process, […]
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Charlottesville Symphony Thrill with Bartok and Mendelssohn
Bela Bartok’s Violin Concerto No. 2 is a challenging work for both soloist and ensemble. Audiences were treated to a fine performance by violinist Joseph Lin, maestro Benjamin Rous, and the Charlottesville Symphony March 23 and 24th, 2019. Lin possessed all the technical ability necessary for this difficult piece. He played with a clean, pure […]