4/23 Lectures on Conductors and Aliens

http://www.etsy.com/people/needlelite

Vanderbilt University in Nashville has an incredible Youtube channel where you can literally spend days - maybe weeks, watching their educational videos, lectures and concerts.  It's pretty incredible that this kind of programming is free on the internet.  Several universities do this nowadays and you can find filmed classroom lectures on everything from electronic music synthesis to copyright law to brain surgery (I think).

Here's "What Does a Conductor Actually Do?" (1 hr. 20 min.)
Giancarlo Guerrero leads a penetrating and intimate exploration of the role and responsibilities of the symphonic conductor. Through the use of personal stories, DVDs, recordings and demonstration, class participants learn firsthand the actual components of the conductor's leadership and job requirements. The world's great conductors will be compared and contrasted, illuminating the central and sometimes surprising role the conductor plays in the musical interpretation, production, sound, personnel and importantly the enjoyment of the audience.
Beethoven  - Symphony 7 (excerpts)
Sir Georg Solti, Vienna Phil
Fritz Reiner, Chicago Symphony
Carlos Kleiber, Concertgebouw Amsterdam
Tchaikovsky (excerpts)
Leonard Bernstein, NY Phil

How to Listen to Classical Music: What Does A Conductor Actually Do?

Here's an 1 hr 15 min. lecture/demonstration called "Symphony 101"
Giancarlo Guerrero, music director and conductor of the Nashville Symphony, leads an engaging and invigorating discussion about the elements and structure of the music of the symphony orchestra. What is a symphony? Maestro Guerrero will dissect the symphonic form exploring scherzo, minuet, theme and variation, and more. The great composers of symphonies and their works are also explored through their different approaches to the form and their unique and recognizable voices.

How to Listen to Classical Music: Symphony 101

Check out Vanderbilt's channel for more lectures and concerts including:
OCTUBAFEST at the Blair School of Music (lots of tubas on stage)
and
"Life in the Universe" (Jodie Foster character in the movie Contact is largely based on this real-life researcher)...

12/13 Beethoven in Outer Space

(Rarest Beethoven record ever.)

In 1977, two Voyager space probes were launched into the greater universe, and with each of them was a "Golden Record", basically a message to aliens attempting to prove that we're intelligent (and worthy of gifts).  It includes everything from chemical formulas to Ancient Sumerian greetings to a message from Jimmy Carter.  It also includes 90 minutes of music including "Johnny B Goode", mariachi music, Pygmy girls' initiation songs and of course, Beethoven. In fact the final track on this "Earth's Greatest Hits" is from Beethoven's String Quartet Opus 130, the "Cavatina" movement. This is the piece that Beethoven said caused tears to well up in his eyes just thinking about it. For the next 40,000 years (or so) this record will be Beethoven's "das lied von der erde" (that's of course a reference to Gustav Mahler's "Song of the Earth").

I've tried analyzing it a couple times and I was originally going to post some annotations but - this is one time where analysis seems to be missing the point. I'll just summarize by saying that I think it's basically in A,A1,B,A2 form and that the sections kind of meld together, so it's very difficult to divide the measures up into "sections". The B section is the "up" part and picks up some energy before reverting back to cosmic profundity...

String Quartet 13 in Bb, Op.130 (1826) Movement V: Cavatina: Adagio molto espressivo
The Guarneri Quartet


Music on Voyager's Golden Record - TRACKLIST.

If you want to hear the actual music on this Golden Oldie go HERE and click on the spacecraft, then the small Gold record, then the big Gold Record, then the circle-thingy on the upper left (I'm assuming that's a design for a space turntable).

Go HERE to see an interactive Flash presentation about Voyager's Golden Record.
Voyager main page with loads of interesting info.
Video Collage by bloconovo:

Was Beethoven an alien?  ;)