Tonight: The King of Swing
Evening Music | May 6, 2010
Benny Goodman may have become the King of Swing, but he made his debut playing Haydn. His commitment to “classical” music never flaggedwe’re airing two works to prove it.
Benny is joined by pianist Leon Pommers and cellist Fritz Maag in a stellar version of the Brahms Clarinet Trio in A Minor. Goodman was fond of discussing similarities in style between Bix Beiderbecke and Johannes Brahms. Food (or sound) for thought. And Goodman is the soloist in Stravinsky’s “Ebony Concerto,” a work that fits him like a glove, even though it was commissioned by and written for Woody Hermann. Stravinsky is the conductor, and the band is the Columbia Jazz Combo. Did I forget to mention that it’s Goodman’s birthday (1909)?
Put on your thinking caps (with a nightcap in hand), because more music for thought appears in our final hour, which might be dubbed Philosophy 101. Julian Lloyd Webber stars in Gavin Bryars’s Cello Concerto, “Farewell to Philosophy”; Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts the Stockholm Chamber Ensemble in Haydn’s Symphony No. 22, or the“Philosopher”; and Terry Riley plays the piano as he offers us his own “Philosopher’s Hand.”
Benny is joined by pianist Leon Pommers and cellist Fritz Maag in a stellar version of the Brahms Clarinet Trio in A Minor. Goodman was fond of discussing similarities in style between Bix Beiderbecke and Johannes Brahms. Food (or sound) for thought. And Goodman is the soloist in Stravinsky’s “Ebony Concerto,” a work that fits him like a glove, even though it was commissioned by and written for Woody Hermann. Stravinsky is the conductor, and the band is the Columbia Jazz Combo. Did I forget to mention that it’s Goodman’s birthday (1909)?
Put on your thinking caps (with a nightcap in hand), because more music for thought appears in our final hour, which might be dubbed Philosophy 101. Julian Lloyd Webber stars in Gavin Bryars’s Cello Concerto, “Farewell to Philosophy”; Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts the Stockholm Chamber Ensemble in Haydn’s Symphony No. 22, or the“Philosopher”; and Terry Riley plays the piano as he offers us his own “Philosopher’s Hand.”
