Dieterich Buxtehude might seem at first glance an interesting minor figure, the “man who influenced Bach.” But consider: If he was a decisive inspiration to Bach, that means that Buxtehude can lay claim to being the immediate progenitor of the mainstream classical music tradition we all enjoy. Prelude Our experience of classical music has become [...]
Felix Mendelssohn, for all his amazing versatility, is now remembered by a tiny handful of his works, themselves not always representative. But there is now no excuse for neglecting so many of the masterworks of a composer who was central to the art of his epoch. Mendelssohn: The Caged Spirit: A New Approach to the [...]
Franz Schubert’s music is the music of Paradise lost. It is the songful lament of the wanderer who has been banished, yet who must find the difficult way back through suffering and death. It is music of the journey in exile. In terms of his achievement there is only one other composer to whom Franz [...]
Mozart was not like us. The question as to why Mozart died so young is always superseded by: How could he have existed at all? How could you ask more of a miracle? In 1991, the bicentennial of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s death was the occasion for massive festivals and grand recording projects, as well as [...]
Tchaikovsky’s operas are remarkable for their passion, characters, and their pure, elevated humanity His music has the quality of touching something deep in one’s heart, revealing profound aspects of the human experience in a lofty and beautiful way that transcends time and barriers. Russian operas are not quite as well known as the operas of [...]
"The Gloucestershire Wassail" is a traditional English carol associated with the eve of Epiphany, when revelers drank wassail punch, a hot-mulled sherry- or brandy-based cider, sweetened with sugar and seasoned with other spices, and including yeast, apples, and toast. According to British Food History, "wassailing predates the Battle of Hastings and is thought to have [...]
The film "Maestro" is certainly well-made and well-acted, with Bradley Cooper (who also directed) carrying off a spot-on impersonation of Leonard Bernstein. But at its core is an emptiness that no mere artifice can fill. Writers for the movies, I have found, don’t seem to know how to deal with the arts as a dramatic [...]
"Good King Wenceslas" is a Christmas carol that tells a story of a Bohemian king going on a journey and braving harsh winter weather to give alms to a poor peasant on the Feast of Stephen (December 26, the Second Day of Christmas). During the journey, his page is about to give up the struggle [...]
Hector Berlioz was a professed atheist, but could anything as tender and touching as "L’Enfance du Christ" have been written by a man who did not believe? And what of Berlioz’s closing line to the work: “Oh my soul, what remains for you to do but shatter your pride before so great a mystery?" The [...]
“O Holy Night” is a carol with a purity, beauty and a timeless message I dearly love. What I’ve always thought of as a humble yet glorious, affecting Christmas carol, turns out to have a vaguely spicy story behind it. Confession: I stopped writing this essay on “O Holy Night,” soured by something I couldn’t [...]
Why, one wonders, would readers of The Imaginative Conservative be interested in hearing of my enjoyment of music videos designed for very young children? The answer is that the Wiggles offer children (of all ages) entertainment that is both imaginative and conservative. I have a confession to make. For almost twenty years I’ve been a [...]
On December 22, 1808, Ludwig van Beethoven—by then an established composer and a renowned piano virtuoso—conducted a concert of his own works, featuring himself also as pianist, at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna. The program included the premiers of Beethoven's Fifth and Sixth symphonies, his Fourth Piano Concerto, and a concluding piece for [...]
What would the Christmas season be without Sleigh Ride, the beloved orchestral chestnut by Leroy Anderson? It’s one of those festive selections endlessly piped into our ears on radio, television, and in every public marketplace, to the point of becoming a sort of seasonal wallpaper—something taken for granted. But if Sleigh Ride is a tune [...]
We think of Beethoven as the stormy rebel, the musical Zeus hurling his thunderbolts. But there exists also Beethoven's Apollonian side. His music can indeed be so elegant, so meltingly tender or nostalgic. So much of what Beethoven composed projects a pastoral peace and contentment, evoking the walks in the country he so enjoyed. Musical [...]