Thursday, April 18, 2013

Hidden Voices: William Grant Still's 'Afro-American Symphony' and Duke Ellington's 'Harlem' performed by BBC Concert Orchestra, available online 6 more days


Michael S. Wright alerts us to a 90-minute program broadcast on April 17, 2013, which can still be heard online for the coming six days.  Michael writes:

"There was an important broadcast on BBC Radio 3"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01rw1vd


The Rest is Noise Episode 3 of 4
Availability:
6 days left to listen
Duration:
1 hour, 30 minutes
First broadcast:
Wednesday 17 April 2013
The Rest is Noise. With Louise Fryer. A week with the BBC Concert Orchestra from the year-long festival on London's South Bank. Today, "Hidden Voices" - African-American inspired music from the first part of the twentieth century

Henry F. Gilbert drew on folk music in America in his own music and his most enduring work begins the programme today. The work draws on Creole themes, and was reinvented as a dance piece which was successfully performed in Frankfurt at a contemporary music festival in the 1920's.

William Grant Still was an African American composer, who grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas in the 1900s and ended up arranging band music after the first World War. He studied for a while with Edgar Varese, but continued to compose and arrange film music, taking him to Los Angeles in the 1930s.

The great Duke Ellington was a band leader at the Cotton Club and others in New York in the roaring 20's and later on in the 1950's revisited his spiritual home of Harlem in New York for his "Harlem Suite".

Keith Lockhart conducts the BBC Concert Orchestra, and they're joined by the Nu Civilisation Orchestra for a Duke Ellington celebration - including hits from the Cotton Club days - in the second half of the concert.

Henry Gilbert: The Dance in Place Congo

2.20pm

William Grant Still: Symphony No. 1 "Afro-American"


2.45pm

Duke Ellington: A tone parallel to Harlem (Harlem Suite); medley of Cotton Club numbers



Nu Civilisation Orchestra
BBC Concert Orchestra
Keith Lockhart, conductor. 

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