Today's Birthdays

Caroline Miolan‑Carvalho (1827-1895)
Ernest John Moeran (1894-1950)
Silvestre Revueltas (1899-1940)
Nathan Milstein (1904-1992)
Jule Styne (1925-1994)
Jaap Schröder (1925-2020)
Odetta (1930-2008)
Calvin Hampton (1938-1984)
Stephen Cleobury (1948)
Donna Summer (1948-2012)
Jennifer Higdon (1962)

and

Henri Matisse (1869-1954)
Nicholas Sparks (1965)
Junot Díaz (1968)

Today's Birthdays

William Croft (1678-1727)
André Messager (1853-1929)
Joseph Bohuslav Foerster (1859-1951)
Alfred Einstein (1880-1952)
Dmitri Kabalevsky (1904-1987)
Paul Bowles (1910-1999)
Sir David Willcocks (1919-2015)
Bo Diddley (1928-2008)
Bruno Canino (1935)
June Anderson (1950)
Stephen Jaffe (1954)
Antonio Pappano (1959)

and

Theodor Fontane (1819-1898)
Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)
Sara Lidman (1923-2004)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1879 was the premiere of Gilbert & Sullivan's operetta "The Pirates of Penzance," in Paignton at the Royal Bijou (partial preview to insure British copyright). The first full performance of the new work occurred at the Fifth Avenue Theater in New York City the following day, with Sullivan conducting and Gilbert in attendance. The New York premiere was arranged to register American copyright of the new work and pre-empt unauthorized "pirate" productions in the U.S.

Today's Birthdays

Tomás Bretón (1850-1923)
Pablo Casals (1876-1973)
Lionel Tertis (1876-1975)
Yves Nat (1890-1956)
Peggy Glanville-Hicks (1912-1990)
Billy Tipton (1914-1989)

and

William Gaddis (1922-1998)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1903 took place the first concert by the Seattle Symphony at Christensen's Hall in Seattle under the baton of violinist Harry F. West. The program includes music of Massenet, Bruch, Schubert and Rossini.

Today's Birthdays

Christian Cannabich (1731-1798)
Julius Rietz (1812-1877)
Benjamin Johnson Lang (1837-1909)
Francesco Tamagno (1850-1905)
Roger Sessions (1896-1985)
Earl "Fatha" Hines (1905-1983)
Johnny Otis (1921-2012)
Nigel Kennedy (1956)
Michel Petrucciani (1962-1999)

and

Charles Portis (1933-2020)

Today's Birthdays

Sir John Goss (1800-1880)
Tito Schipa (1888-1965)
Marlene Dietrich (1904-1992)
Oscar Levant (1906-1972)

and

Johannes Kepler (1571-1630)
Charles Olson (1910-1970)
Wilfrid Sheed (1930-2011)
Chris Abani (1966)
Sarah Vowell (1969)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1841, Franz Liszt performs at the Singakademie in Berlin. Women swooned and the general audience reacts with such uncontrolled enthusiasm that Heinrich Heine coins the term "Lisztomania" to describe their fanatical devotion to the performer, which soon swept through most of Europe.

Today's Birthdays

Maurice Gendron (1920-1990)
Thea King (1925-2007)
Earle Brown (1926-2002)
Phil Specter (1940-2021)
Wayland Rogers (1941-2020)
Harry Christophers (1953)
Andre-Michel Schub (1953)
Gabriella Smith (1991)

and

Thomas Gray (1716-1771)
Henry Miller (1891-1980)
Jean Toomer (1894-1867)
Juan Felipe Herrera (1948)
David Sedaris (1958)

Today's Birthdays

Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625)
Jean‑Joseph de Mondonville (1711-1772)
Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint‑George (1745-1799)
Cosima Wagner (1837-1930)
Lina Cavalieri (1874-1944)
Giuseppe de Luca (1876-1950)
Gladys Swarthout (1900-1969)
Cab Calloway (1907-1994)
Noël Lee (1924-2013)
Noel Redding (1945-2003)
Jon Kimura Parker (1959)
Ian Bostridge (1964)

and

Dorothy Wordsworth (1771-1855)
Clara Barton (1821-1912)
Rod Serling (1924-1975)

Merry Christmas

 

Today's Birthdays

Peter Cornelius (1824-1874)
Nikolai Roslavets (1881-1944)
Lucrezia Bori (1887-1960)
Charles Wakefield Cadman (1881-1946)
Sir Vivian Dunn (1908-1995)
Teresa Stich-Randall (1927-2007)
Mauricio Kagel (1931-2008)
Arnold Östman (1939-2023)
Libby Larsen (1950)
Hans-Jürgen von Bose (1953)
Vasyl Slipak (1974-2016)

and

Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)
Anthony Fauci (1940)
Dana Gioia (1950)

and from The Writer's Almanac

Today is Christmas Eve. One of the best modern Christmas Eve stories is a true one, and it happened in 1914, in the trenches of World War I. The “war to end all wars” was raging, but German and British soldiers had been engaging in unofficial ceasefires since mid-December. The British High Command was alarmed, and warned officers that fraternization across enemy lines might result in a decreased desire to fight. On the German side, Christmas trees were trucked in and candles lit, and on that Christmas Eve in 1914, strains of Stille Nacht — “Silent Night” — reached the ears of British soldiers. They joined in, and both sides raised candles and lanterns up above their parapets. When the song was done, a German soldier called out, “Tomorrow is Christmas; if you don’t fight, we won’t.”

The next day dawned without the sound of gunfire. The Germans sent over some beer, and the Brits sent plum pudding. Enemies met in no man’s land, exchanging handshakes and small gifts. Someone kicked in a soccer ball, and a chaotic match ensued. Details about this legendary football match vary, and no one knows for sure exactly where it took place, but everyone agrees that the Germans won by a score of three to two.

At 8:30 a.m. on December 26, after one last Christmas greeting, hostilities resumed. But the story is still told, in a thousand different versions from up and down the Western Front, more than a century later.

On Christmas Eve in 1906, the first radio program was broadcast. Canadian-born Professor Reginald Aubrey Fessenden sent his signals from the 420-foot radio tower of the National Electric Signaling Company, at Brant Rock on the Massachusetts seacoast. Fessenden opened the program by playing “O Holy Night” on the violin. Later he recited verses from the Gospel of St. Luke, then broadcast a gramophone version of Handel’s “Largo.” His signal was received up to five miles away.

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1920, the last operatic appearance ever of the Italian tenor Enrico Caruso took place in an evening performance of Halevy's "La Juive" (The Jewess) at the old Metropolitan Opera in New York City. Caruso would die in Naples (where he made his operatic debut on March 15, 1895) at the age of 48 on August 2, 1921.

Today's Birthdays

Joseph Boismortier (1689-1755)
Ross Lee Finney (1906-1997)
Claudio Scimone (1934-2018)
Ross Edwards (1943)
Edita Gruberová (1946-2021)
Elise Kermani (1960)
Han-Na Chang (1982)

and

Harriet Monroe (1860-1936)
Norman Maclean (1902–1990)
Robert Bly (1926-2021)
Carol Ann Duffy (1955)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1989, Leonard Bernstein led the first of two public performances of Beethoven's Ninth at the Philharmonie in West Berlin, with an international orchestra assembled to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The second performance occurred on December 25 at the Schauspielhaus in East Berlin

Today's Birthdays

Carl Friedrich Abel (1723-1787)
Giovanni Bottesini (1821-1889)
Teresa Carreño (1853-1917)
Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924)
Franz Schmidt (1874-1939)
Edgard Varèse(1883-1965)
Joseph Deems Taylor (1885-1966)
Alan Bush (1900-1995)
Andre Kostelanetz (1901-1980)
David Leisner (1953)
Jean Rigby (1954)
Zhou Tian (1981)

and

Jean Racine (1639-1699)
Kenneth Rexroth (1905-1982)
Donald Harrington (1935-2009)

Today's Birthdays

Zdeněk Fibich (1850-1900)
André Turp (1925-1991)
Frank Zappa (1940-1993)
Roger Lasher Nortman (1941)
Michael Tilson Thomas (1944)
András Schiff (1953)
Kim Cascone (1955)
Thomas Randle (1958)
Jonathan Cole (1970)

and

Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881)
Maud Gonne (1866-1953)
Edward Hoagland (1932)

Bach Cantata Choir sings Bach's Christmas Oratorio - Parts 1, 2, 5, 6

I'll be singing in this concert, which will be performed with orchestra.

Today's Birthdays

Henry Hadley (1871-1937)
Vagn Holmboe (1909-1996)
Gordon Getty (1933)
John Harbison (1938)
Roger Woodward (1942)
Mitsuko Uchida (1948)
Hobart Earler (1960)

and

Elizabeth Benedict (1954)
Sandra Cisneros (1954)
Nalo Hopkinson (1960)

Review: Vancouver Symphony ushers in the holidays with Columbia Dance, David Shifrin, and Farkhad Khudyev

Paul Quackenbush Photography

A festive spirit filled the air Sunday afternoon (December 15) at Skyview Concert Hall, which was packed to the gills for the Vancouver Symphony’s annual Holiday Concert. The orchestra treated concertgoers to an eclectic program of ballet music with dancing provided by Columbia Dance, music for clarinet and orchestra that featured David Shifrin, plus a mix of orchestral gems and seasonal favorites. Guest conductor Farkhad Khudyev led the music with panache. The sold-out concert buzzed with an energetic vibe could be felt before any note was played, and it acquired a heightened level after All Classical Radio CEO and President Suzanne Nance stepped on to the stage as the evening’s emcee. That’s because she announced that Rene Flemming would be appearing with the orchestra at the Vancouver Arts and Music Festival in the summer. Yes, America’s most popular diva will sing this summer with the hometown band!

After that bombshell announcement, Nance skillfully directed the audience attention to the program, which included a Suite from Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake.” Students from Columbia Dance deftly pirouetted and executed an array of lovely movements across the extension at the front of the stage. Although limited by the area they could use, the dancers (ages 12-18) captivated the audience with style and grace. All of the dancers exhibited excellent technique, and the prima dancer, in the role of Odette, displayed supreme elegance – especially when she moved backwards while on the tips of her toes.

Director Becky Moore deserved kudos for getting sets of dancers (up to eight at a time) on and off the stage area without any mishaps. She also arranged several tableaus that beautifully set the end of a movement. The orchestra, under Khudyev, supported the dancers with great sensitivity.

The concert spotlighted Shifrin in three colorful pieces that showed why he is considered one of America’s greatest clarinetists. “Circus,” a new piece written by Khudyev’s older brother, Eldar Hudiyev, received it Northwest premiere with Shifrin transitioning from a gentle, ethereal melody to a boisterous, Klezmer-like romp that ended on a wild high note.

Next came “Viktor’s Tale,” which John Williams wrote for the 2004 movie “The Terminal.” In that film, Tom Hanks portrayed an Eastern European man who becomes stuck in an airline terminal, because of a military coup in his homeland. Shifrin dug into the quirky and slightly humorous twists and turns of the melody with verve, which elicited a sense of the predicament that Hanks’ character endured.

For the final number in Shifrin’s set, “Blues” from “An American in Paris” by Italian composer Michele Mangani, concertgoers erupted into applause after recognizing the big opening glissando imitated the first bars from “Rhapsody in Blue.” With a bluesy swagger, Shifrin then expressed several themes that the trumpet has in “American in Paris,” and ended the piece on a stratospheric high note that brought down the house.

Suzanne Nance kicked off the second half of the concert with a heartwarming rendition of “Adeste Fideles” (“O Come All Ye Faithful”) in an arrangement for soprano and orchestra by her husband Desmond Earley.

“Dances in the Canebrakes” by Florence Price (and orchestrated by William Grant Still) paid tribute to our nation’s African-American experience with gentle and pleasant themes. The “Light Cavalry Overture” by Franz von Suppé launched the concert with a famous, crowd-pleasing calls from the trumpets.

In a nod to the season, the orchestra played Leroy Anderson’s “A Christmas Festival,” which cycled through eight Christmas carols plus “Jingle Bells” and concluded by delightfully mashing together “Adeste Fideles” with “Joy to the World.” Another Anderson concoction, the ever popular “Sleigh Ride” received a spirited performance from the local band with Khudyev adding some humorous gestures from the podium.

The concert concluded with two fun bon mots from Vienna. The first was Johann Strauss Jr’s “Tristch-Tratsch Polka,” which allowed orchestra members to shout a “Whoo Hoo.” The second was Johann Strauss Sr’s “Radetzky March,” in which the audience enthusiastically clapped along with the music – as guided by Khudyev.

Khudyev has terrific musical instincts and communicated well with the orchestra and the audience. Sometimes he showed a silly playfulness that was just perfect for a particular passage. It would be great to see him return to the podium some day in the future.

Today's Birthdays

Louis‑Nicolas Clérambault (1676-1749) George Frederick Bristow (1825-1898) Fritz Reiner (1885-1963)
Paul Dessau (1894-1979)
Edith Piaf (1915-1963)
Dalton Baldwin (1931-2019)
Phil Ochs (1940-1976)
William Christie (1944)
Marianne Faithfull (1946)
Christopher Robson (1953)
Olaf Bär (1957)
Steven Esserlis (1958)
Rebecca Saunders (1967)

and

Italo Svevo (1861-1928)
Constance Garnett (1861-1946)

and from The Writer's Almanac:

It’s the birthday of French chanteuse Édith Piaf (1915). Piaf was born Édith Giovanna Gassion in Belleville, on the outskirts of Paris. Her mother was a café singer and a drug addict, and her father was a street performer who specialized in acrobatics and contortionism. Neither of them particularly cared for Piaf, so she mostly grew up with her grandmother, who ran a brothel. Piaf was looked after by prostitutes and later claimed that she was blind from the ages of three to seven because of keratitis, or malnutrition, though this was never proved.

Her father reclaimed her when she was nine and Piaf began singing with him on street corners until he abandoned her again. She lived in shoddy hotel rooms in the red-light district of Paris and sang in a seedy café called Lulu’s, making friends with pimps, hookers, lowlifes, and gamblers, until she was discovered by an older man named Louis Leplée.

Leplée ran a nightclub off the Champs-Élysées. He renamed Piaf La Môme Piaf, “The Little Sparrow,” dressed her entirely in black, and set her loose on the stage. Piaf was a hit, and recorded two albums in one year, becoming one of the most popular performers in France during World War II.

Édith Piaf died on the French Riviera at the age of 47. More than 40,000 people came to her funeral procession. Soviet astronomer Lyudmila Karachkina named a small planet after Piaf; it’s called 3772 Piaf. Her songs have been covered by Madonna, Grace Jones, and even Donna Summer.

Édith Piaf’s last words were, “Every damn thing you do in this life, you have to pay for.”

Today's Birthdays

Charles Wesley (1707-1788)
Carl Maria von Weber (1786-1826)
Edward MacDowell (1860-1908)
Fletcher Henderson (1897-1952)
Rita Streich (1920-1987)
William Boughton (1948)
David Liptak (1949)
Christopher Theofanidis (1967)

and

Saki - H. H. Munro (1870-1916)
Paul Klee (1879-1940)
Christopher Fry (1907-2005)
Abe Burrows (1910-1985)

Today's Birthdays

Domenico Cimarosa (1749-1801)
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Arthur Fiedler (1894-1979)
Ray Noble (1903-1975)
Art Neville (1937-2019)

and

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892)
Ford Madox Ford (1873-1939)
William Safire (1929-2009)
John Kennedy Toole (1937-1969)

and from The Writer's Almanac:

It's the day that The Nutcracker ballet was performed for the first time in St. Petersburg, Russia (1892). Czar Alexander III, in the audience, loved the ballet, but the critics hated it. Tchaikovsky wrote that the opera that came before The Nutcracker "was evidently very well liked, the ballet not. ... The papers, as always, reviled me cruelly." Tchaikovsky died of less than a year later, before The Nutcracker became an international success.

Today's Birthdays

François Adrien Boieldieu (1775-1834)
Augusta Holmès (1847-1903)
Zoltán Kodály (1882-1967)
Turk Murphy (1915-1987)
Steve Allen (1921-2000)
Dame Thea King (1925-2007)
Alice Parker (1925-2023)
Kenneth Gilbert (1931-2020)
Rodion Shchedrin (1932)
Philip Langridge (1939-2010)
Trevor Pinnock (1946)
Isabelle van Keulen (1966)

and

Jane Austin (1775-1817)
George Santayana (1863-1952)
Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944)
Sir Noel Coward (1899-1973)
Noël Coward (1899-1973)
V. S. Pritchett (1900-1997)

Today's Birthdays

Michel‑Richard Delalande (1657-1726)
Lotte Schöne (1891-1981)
Stan Kenton (1911-1979)
Ida Haendel (1924-2020)
Eddie Palmieri (1936)
Nigel Robson (1948)
Jan Latham-Koenig (1953)

and

Ludwig Lazarus Zamenhof (1859-1917)
Maxwell Anderson (1888-1959)
Freeman Dyson (1923-2020)
Friedensreich Hundertwasser (1928-2000)
Edna O'Brien (1930-2024)

Today's Birthdays

Maria Agata Szymanowska (1789-1831)
Joseph Jongen (1873-1953)
Georges Thill (1897-1984)
Spike Jones (1911-1965)
Rosalyn Tureck (1914-2003)
Dame Ruth Railton (1915-2001)
Ron Nelson (1929-2023)
Christopher Parkening (1947)
Thomas Albert (1948)
John Rawnsley (1949)

and

Shirley Jackson (1919-1965)
Amy Hempel (1951)

Today's Birthdays

Anna Milder-Hauptman (1785-1838)
Alexis de Castillon (1838-1873)
Josef Lhévinne (1874-1944)
Eleanor Robson Belmont (1879-1979)
Samuel Dushkin (1891-1976)
Victor Babin (1908-1972)
Alvin Curran (1938)

and

Mary Todd Lincoln (1818-1882)
Kenneth Patchen (1911-1972)
James Wright (1927-1980)
Lester Bangs (1948-1982)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1836, at a musical soiree at Chopin's apartments in Paris, the female writer "George" Sand, determined to make a good impression with her host, arrives wearing white pantaloons and a scarlet sash (the colors of the Polish flag). Paris Opéra tenor Adolphe Nourit sings some Schubert songs, accompanied by Franz Liszt. Liszt and Chopin play Moschele's Sonata in Eb for piano four-hands.

John Vergin in Winter's Voice

Winter's Voice is an annual treat by John Vergin, one of Portland's favorite bass-baritones. This one-man show will take place this Friday, December 13th at 7:30 pm in Eliot Hall Chapel on the campus of Reed College. Admission is $5 - 10.

Today's Birthdays

Andrey Schulz‑Evler (1852-1905)
Kurt Atterberg (1887-1974)
Frank Sinatra (1915-1998)
Philip Ledger (1937-2012)
Margaret Tan (1945)
Donald Maxwell (1948)
Jaap van Zweden (1960)
Julie Ann Giroux (1961)
David Horne (1970)
Evren Genis (1978)

and

Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880)
Edvard Munch (1863-1944)
John Osborne (1929-1994)

Today's Birthdays

Hector Berlioz (1803-1869)
Joseph Jongen (1873-1953)
Mieczyslaw Karlowicz (1876-1909)
Leo Ornstein (1893-2002)
Elliott Carter (1908-2012)
David Ashley White (1944)
Neil Mackie (1946)

and

Grace Paley (1922-2007)
Naguib Mahfouz (1911-2006)
Grace Paley (1922-2007)
Jim Harrison (1937-2016)
Thomas McGuane (1939)

and from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1918, Russian-born conductor Nikolai Sokoloff leads the first concert of the Cleveland Orchestra at Gray's Armory, presented as a benefit for St. Ann's Church. His program included Victor Herbert's "American Fantasy," Bizet's "Carmen" Suite, two movements of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4, Liadov's "Enchanted Lake," and Liszt's "Les Préludes".

Today's Birthdays

César Franck (1822-1890)
Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)
Morton Gould (1913-1996)
Sesto Bruscantini (1919-2003)
Nicholas Kynaston (1941)
Julianne Baird (1952)
Kathryn Stott (1958)
Sarah Chang (1980)

and

Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
Melvil Dewey (1851-1931)
Adolf Loos (1870-1933)

Preview of Vancouver Symphony's Holiday Concert

Columbia Dance - Swan Lake

It’s that cold and rainy time of the year, when we are seeking some warmth and the glow of optimism to cheer us up. Fortunately, the Vancouver Symphony’s annual Holiday Concert is the perfect antidote for anyone who may be under the weather. The upcoming concerts (November 14 and 15) at Skyview Concert Hall offer an excellent musical chestnuts and contemporary pieces that you can cozy up to.

Suite from “Swan Lake” with Columbia Dance

The VSO will collaborate with the Columbia Dance to present a suite from Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake,” one of the greatest ballets ever written. This is a return engagement for Columbia Dance, which presented excerpts from "Swan Lake” in 2018 and from “The Nutcracker” in 2019.

“To accommodate the dancers, a stage extension will be built at the front of the stage, and it will extend about eight feet into the seating area,” said Becky Moore, Director of Columbia Dance, during a phone call. “Combined with the seven feet that we have on the regular stage, we will have 15 feet of actual stage to work with.”

“We are building the stage next Tuesday from 10 pm to 2 am,” added Moore. “That’s when time allows in the schedule. Then we will lay down the Marley Dance floor, and we will work on spacing at Thursday and Friday night dress rehearsals. The dancers will perform ‘The Nutcracker’ the following weekend (Nov. 20-22) at Skyview also.”

Moore has been leading Columbia Dance for the past five years and has an extensive professional dance portfolio with many companies, including The Cincinnati Ballet, Pittsburgh Ballet, Ballet West, The Washington Ballet, and Marin Ballet. She has choreographed the excerpts from “Swan Lake.”

“We have 36 dancers - ages 11 to 18 - performing with the orchestra,” said Moore. “But they will not be on stage at the same time. It’s about 8 on stage at any given moment – with 16 during some entrances and exits. It’s pretty tight, but we have rehearsed it well. The performance will involve all of our Company dancers, which is our most advanced group – 28 of them. And then our Level 5 dancers – 8 of them.”

Because they will dance “The Nutcracker” the following weekend, Moore had to give the VSO concert a lot of thought before committing to it.

“At first when I was approached about the VSO performance, I thought ‘No!’ remarked Moore. “We still have three dancers with us from the 2019 experience with the VSO, and they recalled how the music just took over their whole bodies. It was just so powerful to have that wave of live sound right there instead of a recording. So we decided to be crazy and different and go for it! The opportunity to give these kids a real live orchestra is just so rare – that makes it all the more compelling and worthwhile. They will never forget it.”

Guest Conductor Farkhad Khudyev

Making his debut on the podium will be Farkhad Khudyev, who is the Music Director of the University of Texas Symphony Orchestra and the Assistant Professor of Music in Orchestral Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as the Music Director of the Orchestral Institute at the Hidden Valley Institute of the Arts in Carmel, California. He recently made his conducting debut with the Eugene Symphony, where he is one of the finalists vying to become its next music director.

Born in Turkmenistan to a family of non-musicians, Khudyev has a Masters in Orchestral Conducting from Yale University.

“My father was an economist and mother was a cardiologist,” said Khudvey via Zoom. My younger brother, Emil Khudyev, is associate principal clarinetist and has his Master’s degree from Yale where he studied with clarinetist David Shifrin. My older brother, Eldar Hudiyev, is a professional violinist and composer in Bellevue, Washington. He wrote “Circus,” which the Vancouver Symphony will play in the Holiday Concert. That will be its Pacific Northwest premiere.”

Khudyev’s family hosted Peace Corp volunteers from the U.S. He and Emil became the first music students from Turkmenistan to receive scholarships to attend Interlochen. Farkhad was there for three years as a violinist before matriculating to Oberlin Conservatory for his Bachelors and then to Yale for his Masters.

“The Holiday Concert program with the Vancouver Symphony is a bit eclectic but flows beautifully well together,” noted Khudyev. “I have conducted all of the pieces before. We will open with Suppé’s ‘Light Cavalry Overture,’ which I have done with the Seattle Symphony in a Family Concert series. It has a balance between the lyrical and fanfare. I’ve conducted Tchaikovsky’s ballet, and I love to collaborate with youth. Tchaikovsky wrote what we call eternal music. I suggested the Florence Price’s ‘Dances in the Canebrakes.’ It is just a phenomenal piece that she wrote towards the end of her life. It was orchestrated by William Grant Still. I have conducted it with my orchestra in Texas and with the Boston Symphony.”

Khudyev is looking forward to the three pieces with Shifrin as soloist.

“John Williams’ ‘Viktor's Tale’ from the movie ‘The Terminal is a wonderful number,” said Khudyev. “We will also do Michele Mangani‘s ‘Blues from American in Paris.’ It starts like ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ then goes into themes from American in Paris. Eldar’s ‘Circus’ is a metaphor for life. It’s a short piece that travels long distances. At the premiere in Austin I told the audience to buckle your ear bells because you will experience quite a bit in a short period. From divine places you appear in a bar with a piano – crude and raw music. We will follow that with some traditional favorites, Leroy Anderson’s ‘Christmas Festival’ and ‘Sleigh Ride’ and a couple of favorites from Johann Strauss Jr and Johann Strauss Sr. “

Guest Clarinetist David Shifrin

Legendary clarinetist Shifrin last appeared with the VSO in 2017, playing pieces by Carl Maria von Weber and Giachino Rossini. He is well-known for his long tenure as Artistic Director of Chamber Music Northwest, but his acclaim extends internationally through his extensive concertizing and discography, which includes multiple Grammy nominations.

On tap to perform the pieces by Williams, Hudiyev, and Mangani, Shifrin noted during a phone call that this will be his first time to perform these pieces.

“It keeps me going to play new things,” said Shifrin. “I have seen the movie, ‘The Terminal’ and I knew the clarinetist, Emily Bernstein, who played the score for the movie. I played in the studios in L. A. for a several years. ‘Circus’ is a real romp. It’s a new piece that I have not heard until Farkhad sent the score to me. His younger brother was my clarinet student, and now I’m doing the music of his older brother. At Yale, I coached Emil and Farkhad in the Brahms ‘Clarinet Quintet.’ Emil was the clarinetist and Farkhad played first violin.

“In 2019, we had a big clarinet celebration at Chamber Music Northwest,” added Shifrin. “Michele Mangani arranged a blues version of Gershwin's ‘An American in Paris’ but this will be my experience with the orchestral version. It has a couple of excerpts from ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ and then a whole Blues exposition on ‘American in Paris.’”

I had to ask him how many clarinets he owns.

“I don’t know,” chuckled Shifrin. “I’ll have to take an inventory.”

“I’m playing on a clarinet that was made in Vancouver. B. C.,” he added, “A Backun clarinet.”

“What kind of reeds do you use?” I asked.

“Over the last several years, I have been using synthetic reeds made by Guy Légère,” answered Shifrin. “It is made of a special polymer that vibrates just line cane. You don’t have to scrape them. That has given me a lot of time back. I don’t have to be a carpenter.”

PS: Sunday’s performance of the Holiday Concert is Sold Out, and there are only a few tickets remaining for the concert on Saturday.

Today's Birthdays

Emile Waldteufel (1837-1915)
Joaquin Turina (1882-1949)
Conchita Supervia (1895-1936)
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (1915-2006)
Dennis Eberhard (1943-2005)
Donny Osmond (1957)
Joshua Bell (1967)

and

John Milton (1608-1674)
Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908)
Léonie Adams (1899-1988)
Ödön von Horváth (1901-1938)

From the Writer's Almanac:

Milton coined more than 600 words, including the adjectives dreary, flowery, jubilant, satanic, saintly, terrific, ethereal, sublime, impassive, unprincipled, dismissive, and feverish; as well as the nouns fragrance, adventurer, anarchy, and many more.

Today's Birthdays

Claude Balbastre (1724-1799)
Frantisek Xaver Dussek (1731-1799)
Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
Manuel Ponce (1882-1948)
Bohuslav Martinů (1890-1959)
Gérard Souzay (1918-2004)
Moisei Vainberg (1919-1996)
James Galway (1939)

and

Horace (65-8 B.C.)
Diego Rivera (1886-1957)
James Thurber (1894-1961)
James Tate (1948-2015)
Mary Gordon (1949
Bill Bryson (1951)

Today's Birthdays

Bernardo Pasquini (1637-1710)
Hermann Goetz (1840-1876)
Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945)
Ernst Toch (1887-1964)
Rudolf Friml (1879-1972)
Richard Franko Goldman (1910-1980)
Daniel Jones (1912-1993)
Helen Watts (1927-2009)
Harry Chapin (1942-1981)
Daniel Chorzempa (1944-2023)
Tom Waits (1949)
Kathleen Kuhlmann (1950)
Krystian Zimerman (1956)

and

Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680)
Willa Cather (1873-1947)
Joyce Cary (1888-1957)
Noam Chomsky (1928)
Susan Isaacs (1943)

Profile of multi-talented Nicole Buetti in Oregon ArtsWatch

 Nicole Buetti is a force of nature and a force for the arts - for kids and adults. My profile of this dynamic and prolific musician-artist-composer - you name it - has been published in Oregon ArtsWatch here.

Today's Birthdays

Orazio Vecchi (1550-1605)
Johann Christoph Bach (1642-1703)
Ira Gershwin (1896-1983)
Dave Brubeck (1920-2012)
Nikolaus Harnoncourt (1929-2016)
Henryk Górecki (1933-2010)
Tomas Svoboda (1939-2022)
John Nelson (1941)
Daniel Adni (1951)
Bright Sheng (1955)
Matthew Taylor (1964)

and

Baldassare Castiglione (1478-1529)
The Encyclopedia Brittanica (1768)
Alfred Eisenstaedt (1898-1995)

Today's Birthdays

Francesco Geminiani (1687-1762)
Vitezslav Novák (1870-1949)
"Little" Richard Wayne Penniman (1935-2020)
José Carreras (1946)
Krystian Zimerman (1956)
Osvaldo Golijov (1960)

and

Christina (Georgina) Rossetti (1830-1894)
Joan Didion (1934-2021)
Calvin Trillin (1935)
John Berendt (1939)
Lydia Millet (1968)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1704, George Frideric Handel (age 19) refuses to turn over the harpsichord to Johann Mattheson (age 23) during a performance of Mattheson's opera "Cleopatra," leading to a sword duel between the two. It is said that during the swordplay, Handel was saved by a button on his coat that deflected Mattheson's mortally-directed blade. The two reconciled on December 30 that year, dining together and attending a rehearsal of Handel's opera "Almira," becoming, as Mattheson put it: "better friends than ever."

Today's Birthdays

André Campra (1660-1744)
Michel Pignolet de Montéclair (1667-1737)
Sir Hamilton Harty (1879-1949)
Alex North (1910-1991)
Yvonne Minton (1938)
Lillian Watson (1947)
Andrew Penny (1952)

and

Thomas Carlyle (1795-1891)
Samuel Butler (1835-1902)
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926)
Cornell Woolrich (1903-1968)

Article about All Classical Radio move to downtown Portland in Oregonlive

My story about All Classical Radio's new digs at the KOIN Tower has been published in Oregonlive here. It will appear in the Sunday edition of The Oregonian.

Today's Birthdays

Nicolo Amati (1596-1684)
André Campra (1660-1744)
Antonio Soler (1729-1783)
Émile Waldteufel (1837-1915)
Anton Webern (1883-1945)
Halsey Stevens (1908-1989)
Ivan Sollertinsky (1902-1944)
Machito - Fransico Grillo (1909-1984)
Nino Rota (1911-1979)
Irving Fine (1914-1962)
Charles Craig (1919-1997)
Paul Turok (1929-2012)
José Serebrier (1938)
Matt Haimovitz (1970)

and

Joseph Conrad (1857-1924)
Anna Freud (1895-1982)
Zlata Filipović (1980)

Today's Birthdays

Harry T. Burleigh (1866-1949)
Rudolf Friml (1879-1972)
Harriet Cohen (1895-1967)
Sir John Barbirolli (1899-1970)
Robert Moevs (1920-2007)
Maria Callas (1923-1977)
Jörg Demus (1928-2019)
Galina Grigorjeva (1962)

and

Georges-Pierre Seurat (1859-1891)
T. Coraghessan Boyle (1948)
George Saunders (1958)
Ann Patchertt (1963)

And from the Composers Datebook: On this day in 1717, J.S. Bach is allowed to leave the Duke’s Court at Weimar. He had been imprisoned since Nov. 6th by his former employer Duke Wilhelm Ernst of Weimar for accepting a new post at Prince Leopold’s court at Cöthen without first asking permission.

Today's Birthdays

François‑Xavier Richter (1709-1789)
Ernest (Louis-Etienne-Ernest) Reyer (1832-1909)
Agathe Grøndahl (1847-1907)
Lou Rawls (1933-2006)
Gordon Crosse (1937-2021
Bette Midler (1945)
Rudolf Buchbinder (1946)
Leontina Vaduva (1960)