Concert on the Green: Wind Orchestra

On July 26, 2009 I went to the Concert on the Green at Concordia University Irvine performed by the wind orchestra and conductor, Jeff Held. There were two parts of the concert with an intermission, and both parts were similar yet different. The instruments used were wind orchestra instruments, but also vocals. This reminded me of Music: In History and matching the instruments with their sound, because many of the same instruments were used. My favorite piece was The Lion King because it reminded me of my childhood and I think a lot of the audience connected to that piece and reminded me of what we had to write about for Music: As Feeling. This concert also tied together what we learned about in Music: Assimilation about Bach and Mozart. Also, I found that many of the songs dynamics used both soft and loud parts to emphasize. I really enjoyed the concert and it was a great way to spend my Sunday.

The first part of the concert had the pieces, The Star-Spangled Banner, American Salute, Adagio for Winds, Leudamus Te, Arioso, Canticle: All Creatures of Our God and King, and Overture to “Candide.” Most of these pieces are not as modern as the second half pieces. Mozart and Bach both had pieces in this section so it was very classical and a great tribute to their time. The second half of the concert had the pieces, Klezmar Classics, Block M, The Lion King, I Dreamed a Dream, Old Ironsides, and The Ultimate Patriotic Sing-Along. Many of these pieces were more modern than the first half. However, the patriotic spirit of many of the songs tied the whole concert together really well.

The main types of instruments used in the wind orchestra are woodwinds, percussion and brass instruments. This concert also used vocal by Natalie Hovespian. The woodwinds consisted of flutes, clarinets, oboes and perhaps bassoons. I could definitely hear the flutes during many of the pieces, one of them being Overture to “Candide.” The percussion consisted of drums and cymbals, and I could hear the drums during many of the marches and patriotic songs. I liked the sound of a wind orchestra better in comparison to the blues concert I went to.

There were a lot of kids at the concert and the atmosphere was made for it to be open for everyone. My favorite piece was probably one of the songs the kids liked the most, The Lion King. This really reminded me of what we learned while doing the Music: As Feeling unit because when writing that blog I discussed how when listening to music it can bring you back to a certain time. Listening to The Lion King brought me back to being a kid and watching the movie and it was a really fun song to put in a concert.

Another part of the concert that connected back to what we have learned was the pieces by Bach and Mozart. I know I spent a lot of time doing the unit Music: Assimilation by doing mymusiclab.com and the chapters on Bach and Mozart. With that unit you only get to listen to one piece by them so it was great to hear some other pieces and really connected to what I had learned. Also, during that unit we had to go through the elements of music. One of the biggest things I remembered and heard during the concert was dynamics. Many of the songs used softness and loudness to emphasize parts of the song. Block M Concert March was one of the songs that used dynamics.

After seeing and hearing the wind orchestra perform at The Concert on the Green at Concordia University Irvine, I really have a better appreciation for classical music. I also have tied it to many of the things we have learned this summer about music. I liked how even though the concert was in two parts there was a strong patriotic vibe that went through the entire concert. Also, I could really identify many of the instruments that performed. The Lion King was my favorite piece performed and it reminded me of the unit Music: As Feeling. Also, the Bach and Mozart pieces, and the use of dynamics reminded me of the Music: Assimilation unit. I really enjoyed this concert and definitely would want to see another wind orchestra performance at Concordia while I’m going to school here.

Conclusion: Triumph of Music

The new moving ages of cinema and television with music is an amazing technological innovation. The stars that are on TV and radio have become huge with status, popularity, and wealth and play an important role in social and political change. The relationship between music and TV is beneficial but not equal. "Music can exist without the moving image, but the moving image can not exist without music," Blanning says in The Triumph of Music. And this is just one part of the advances music has brought us.

Music has been transformed in the modern world and has helped transform it. What we have seen is the status, purpose, places and spaces, technology, and liberation of music and musicians.

Liberation

The Triumph of Music describes liberation as freedom as a nation, people, or sex and the relationship it has to music.

English and British nationalism was portrayed in the music-drama King Arthur and King Alfred. Composed by Henry Purcell, here’s a clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le4fhX50X94

One of Paris’ political songs during the Revolution was Ladre by Becourt, violinist at the Theatre du Vaudeville. The lyrics translated mean to get rid of nobles and priests all together. Here’s a clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35UnkTdPhO0

But an even more famous revolutionary song, and now national anthem is Merseillaise heard here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K1q9Ntcr5g

In Russia, the opera Boris Godunov represented the fall of the tsar. Here’s a clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVSOnvNYU-8

Race was a major struggle in music and to prove her point Marian Anderson in 1939 when she was refused permission to sing in Washington D.C.’s Constitution Hall performed at the Lincoln Memorial. Here’s a speech and clip from that day http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkPI0VKM4Fk

Music was influential during the time of Martin Luther King Jr as well, and right before his famous “I have a dream” speech Mahalia Jackson sang. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glLESOK582Y

Sexual liberation was sung by Elvis Presley, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Led Zeppelin. Here’s a clip of Led Zeppelin playing in 1973 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9i2fqxSjTI

Technology

One new technology was created because there was a need for an instrument that would be more expressive and combine the power of the harpsichord with the range of the clavichord. Barolomeo Cristofori created the fortepiano, which eventually became the keyboard we see today. Here’s a picture http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/images/h2/h2_89.4.1219.jpg.

Another new technology was the ability to produce instruments so that the middle class could afford and play them. This was also true of literature, and Elizabeth Gaskell wrote about instruments and the 1800’s. Here’s an article about her http://www.online-literature.com/elizabeth_gaskell/

Salvation Army bands brought religious music onto the streets of Great Britain. Here’s a picture. http://www.northdevongazette.co.uk/northdevongazette/flatfiles/features/2006/ilfvictorian/band.gif

The biggest technological advances in music came in the end of the nineteenth century with recording, radio, and eventually TV. The first jazz musician to demonstrate the importance of recording was Louis Armstrong, with his Hot Five and Hot Seven recordings. Here’s a clip of Hot Five - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksmGt2U-xTE

The next big thing was TV and NBC transmitted Toscanini’s famous concerts with the New York Philharmonic in 1948. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nt7pPKXDhPc

Purpose

The purpose of music has changed throughout time. From assertion to power, money, pleasure or for dancing, there are several purposes music had in the past.

Louis XIV and the assertion of power lead to Louis XIV wanting the best of everything including music and dancing. Here’s a picture of him https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEL1JdyMBWQkisSIztHwdN_JRvA4QLPG-wDzHjFt2ymSqO2CbPXdoUBAcH8PVSnMPX9Bk3_U9hLLJY9S99L56Ptjv2gj9RQppGvl2tHFGObOCO1M1dxU2v-idpvqike0wRxShMt3g-JZ0M/s320/300px-Louis_XIV_of_France.jpg

One purpose of music was the worship of God. Bach’s St Matthew Passion was a performance for Good Friday in Leipzig. Here’s a clip. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_LLFfFXaUA

Another performance that’s purpose was for the worship of God was Messiah by Handel performed in 1742 seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnHksDFHTQI

Another purpose was the new ideals from the movement of Romanticism. Beethoven led this with the new ideas of music having a complete absence from God. This is shown in Beethoven’s third symphony Eroica, symphony no. 3 in E-flat Major. Here’s a clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFltqVS8d9I.

Jazz and romanticism was a spontaneous, improvisatory, and individual type of music started after World War II. A great example of this is John Coltrane playing A Love Supreme composed in 1964. The purpose of this song was self-expression and talked about addiction. Here’s a clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92T4DQqQApE

Status

In the beginning of music, musicians were like servants or slaves. Later, with Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven there becomes a liberation.

One of the most memorable musical moments of modern Europe was a performance of The Creation in the main hall of the University of Venice for Haydn in 1808 for his 76^th birthday. Here is a clip of The Creation performed by the London Symphony Orchestra. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAxXDt9dOrE

What Mozart and Haydn have in common is their massive contribution to raising both the status of music, by the quality of their compositions, status of the musician, and demonstration of what could be achieved in the rapidly changing social and cultural conditions of the late 18^th century. Mozart’s international reputation was at its highest right after he showed the first performance of La Clamenza di Tito in Prague and The Magic Flute in Vienna in September 1791, both high quality opera serias.

Here’s a clip of The Magic Flute by the Met Orchestra.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFdB8Zz8VOo&feature=PlayList&p=E616D683968748BF&index=1

Musicians were also looked at as heroes. One example is violinist Niccolo Paganini. Read more about this virtuoso here. http://www.paganini.com/nicolo/nicindex.htm

The next phase of musicians status is an apotheosis, almost putting them as royalty or god-like beings. One example of this is the knighting of musicians. The United Kingdom did this in an extremely formal honor, even though politicians tried to stop it.

Introduction: Triumph of Music

The Triumph of Music by Tim Blanning discusses the rise of composers, musicians and their art. It talks about status, purpose, places and spaces, technology and liberation of these musicians. This is what Blanning calls, “music’s march to cultural supremacy.” We see an example of all of these qualities during the Jubilee Concert in 2002 for the Queen.

There was the elevated status of musicians- compiled were the most famous and rich creative artists. The place and space was significant in the way that it was at Buckingham Palace, where the sound was made possible by technology. And the messages were all about liberation- for women, young, ethnic minorities, gays, etc. The purpose was a royal celebration and great festival and here's a website with pictures of the event - http://media.photobucket.com/image/jubilee%202002%20concert/RoyalProtocol/155263C7-1.jpg.

Blues Concert

Theo and the Zydeco Patrol

On June 27, 2009 I went to the Long Beach Bayou and Mardi Gras festival. The band I watched was called Theo and the Zydeco Patrol, which consists of Theo Bellow who plays guitar and sings, and four other members. The instruments they played reminded me of what we learned about blues but they also had a more southern zydeco twist. The members of the band took turns playing solos, which reminded me of learning about Louis Armstrong’s West End Blues. The spirit of the festival reminded me about what we learned about jazz and blues and the American spirit. It also resembled improvisation a lot. Theo and the Zydeco Patrol really embodied blues and improvisation, which is what we just learned about.

The instruments that Theo and the Zydeco Patrol used represented blues. There were two guitar players and two players playing different types of drums and an accordian player. The guitar and the way that Theo sang really represented blues and reminded me of hearing Robert Jackson in our e-book. However, the accordian player was an interesting sound and really represented southern zydeco and gave it more of a funky sound. The music was more blues than jazz because there wasn’t a brass instrument. However, at one point they did use a trumpet to play As The Saints Go Marching In and switched it in instead of a guitar.

The form of the songs was like Louis Armstrong’s West End Blues. Each player would do a solo but they all sounded similar and other players would play their instruments as background throughout. Some of the songs were pretty long because of all the solos and it made for interesting music to listen to. Most of the songs were faster than one we had listened to as well.

The mood and atmosphere at the festival was very fun. Everyone was dancing and having a good time and it reminded me of what we read about American spirit and jazz. Jazz music brought about a mixture of optimism and realism and this music definitely did that. The article we read talked about how jazz music was made to dance to and it was definitely hard not to dance when the music made you feel good about yourself and had a happy beat. Since it was a festival there was southern food and drinks and really captured the feeling of New Orleans.

I also liked how Theo and the Zydeco Patrol used a lot of improvisation, which was what our last unit was all about. You could see the band members playing off each other and during each solo they had a chance to use improvisation and it made the experience a lot of fun. The improvisation had a lot to do with blues and that was definitely a key point the band was trying to make.

When going to see Theo and the Zydeco Patrol I really didn’t know what to expect. It was a great way to hear blues music with a fusion of zydeco that was interesting and because we were at a music festival the atmosphere was fun and there was a lot of dancing. The instruments used were similar to blues but also different because of the zydeco twist in the music. It also reminded me of Louis Armstrong’s West End Blues because of how each instrument took turns playing solos. It reminded me of jazz as well because it used optimism and a happy beat to create a great and fun atmosphere. The improvisation that the band used really related to what we had been learning in class too.

Music: Improvisation

Improvisation and Jazz

Reading about improvisation had a closer impact and related more to my life than some of the other units we’ve looked at. I liked watching Victor Borge and Anton Kontra play an encore together of a song that Victor had never played before, only heard. This reminds me a lot of concerts or music festivals that I go to today and sometimes performers of two different genres will play together and learn each other’s music and have to use improvisation and it makes for a really great show. An example would be Snoop Dogg (hip-hop/rap) and Slightly Stoopid (mixture of acoustic rock, blues, and reggae) doing a tour together this summer and having to complement one another when playing.

I also liked learning about jazz and Louie Armstrong. The video we watched where it tried to show notes for what Louie Armstrong was playing was incredibly amazing because he played so fast and different that it’s hard to write music for other people to imitate him. I also like the comparison we read between the development of jazz music and our country politically because at the same time there were so many American developments in music and politics. Jazz definitely is an expression of American spirit and from traveling to New Orleans years ago I remember it having a lasting impression on me.