Digital signature

I watched the New York Philharmonic Orchestra perform Symphony No.5 of Dimitri Shostakovich, which took place at Bunka Kainan, Tokyo, Japan in 1979. This concert was conducted by Leonard Bernstein. The concert lasted approximately 50 minutes and included varieties of instruments. Instruments to name are a large group of violins, clarinets, cellos, French horns, a harp, flutes, basses including a bassoon and oboe. I tend to hear various melodies used elsewhere either from Star Wars and or Pink…

A unique feature of playing a piano piece is that it, in a sense, transports an orchestra into a single performer’s own two hands; Mozart was able to do just that as a major classical composer. While Mozart’s music across the board demonstrated a mastery of all sorts of musical types, his piano sonatas capture distinct character paired with enunciated form in such a way that is very specific to his style. Mozart’s Piano Sonata No. 9 in D major is one of 18 piano sonatas in total, all of which…

time. “Kathy’s Waltz” explores polyrhythm and “Take Five,” arguably the band’s “titular” work today, too pushes the boundaries of common time with its 5/4 beat. Throughout the album, works are contrasted within each other by style changes and time signature variation; yet despite their unfamiliar form, the tunes still manage to provide a solid,…

Beethoven’s Leonore No. 3 overture can be evaluated the complete version of the Leonore overture like the magnificent symphonic work. This third version of overture also overture was composed in the sonata form like Leonore No. 1 overture, and Leonore No. 2. Further, its musical materials and structure also are developed from Leonore No. 1 overture. In other words, he kept using the excellencies of the previous overtures, and Complemented the Deficiencies of the previous overtures. Basically,…

When listening to any piece by Beethoven, you receive the whole range of emotions, and the Fifth Symphony is no different. Just the first four notes, a simple da-da-da-dum, is enough to send shivers up your back. Packed with all the furious confidence of Beethoven, it suggests scarlet eruptions, heavenly processions and all the powers human drama. These four notes started the memorable first movement. This movement is like a Stephen King novel because it is so saturated with intensity and…

violins; creating discomfort to the ear and thus creating tension. The tension is increased yet more by the use of tremolo in the double basses. Mahler marks the score with “viel Bogen”, meaning “much bow” or “many bow changes” , to intensify the sound, and “Wieder Zuruckhaltend”, meaning “to hold back tempo”, to prolong each note to increase the drama of the music. (http://www.orchestralibrary.com/reftables- /mahler2gloss.html#V) The combined effects create a profound emotional response among…

On the night of Saturday, November 19, I attended the North Carolina Theatre production of Monty Python’s Spamalot. This was part of a five-night run at Raleigh Memorial Auditorium, part of the Duke Energy Center complex. It was a cold, brisk night, and the warm glow from Memorial Auditorium beckoned to me to enter. The auditorium inside in the biggest concert space I have been to not called an arena. Walking in at the second floor, the auditorium spilled out in front of me, welcoming, with…

The composition opens in Db major with a tonic chord. Here Debussy has already broken two rules of conventional voice leading; Debussy begins without the tonic note, introducing it later, where the mediant of the chord (F natural) is doubled. This gesture could also be interpreted as opening with chord iii (still with doubled mediant) moving to chord I on the third beat of the bar; however I think this is less likely to be Debussy’s intention because of the use of a Db chord in bar 9 when the…

Tin Pan Alley Tin Pan Alley is the name that is given to the group of musical artists and producers of New York during the 19th and 20th century. The name was, at first, given to a specific location in New York. Tin Pan Alley was located between West 28th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenue in Manhattan. Tin Pan Alley is said to have gotten its name from the collective sound of the pianos all playing different tunes at the same time. This was said to sound like tin pans being banged…

In his lieder inspired by Klaus Groth’s “Es hing der Reif”, Brahms highlights both the dreamy and nightmarish aspects of fixating on love by floating in-between the relative keys of A minor and C major, introducing foreign “problematic” harmonies and chord members, and implying a strong sense of irony when concluding lines and stanzas. By never truly establishing a key until the very last lyrical statement, Brahms keeps the piece suspended in a dreamy uncertainty. This is evident even as early…