{"id":8031,"date":"2012-11-20T18:14:30","date_gmt":"2012-11-21T02:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/?p=8031"},"modified":"2013-02-07T21:16:18","modified_gmt":"2013-02-08T05:16:18","slug":"strauss-mozart-posthorns-and-end-of-life-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2012\/11\/20\/strauss-mozart-posthorns-and-end-of-life-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"strauss, mozart, posthorns, and end of life issues"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_8039\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8039\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/strauss.jpg\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-8039 \" title=\"richard strauss photo\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/strauss-300x227.jpg?resize=300%2C227\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"227\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-8039\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Richard Strauss<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>I&#8217;m working on the program notes for the Oregon Symphony&#8217;s January 26-28, 2013 concerts, which will be a series you won&#8217;t want to miss. The first half is given to Mozart&#8217;s magnificent Serenade No. 9 in D major, K. 320 &#8220;The Posthorn&#8221;. Now, with a nickname like that, you&#8217;d expect there to be a virtual posthornpalooza going on. Not exactly. One of the trios of one of the minuets has some prominent passages for the postally-inclined horn and that&#8217;s it. Don&#8217;t fret, however, the piece is charming and beautiful, and even borders on the sublime on occasion. The second half of the concert contains two of my most favorite pieces in the entire repertoire, and they&#8217;re both by Richard Strauss. The first is his early tone poem <em>Death and Transfiguration<\/em>, Op. 25. It was a seminal work in my journey along the path towards becoming a professional musician, and so it has a huge sentimental attachment for me. Not only that, but I think it&#8217;s one of his strongest compositions just from a musical standpoint, and also one of his most vividly told musical narratives. Plus John Williams stole the transfiguration theme for use in his score to <em>Superman<\/em>. The last work on the program is Strauss&#8217; <em>Four Last Songs<\/em>. The last pieces he ever completed, they are autumnal settings of poems depicting the close of life with great dignity, affection, and love. Something manages to get in my eye every time I listen to them &#8211; imagine the impact of hearing them in person!<\/p>\n<p>Here are my picks for my favorite recordings of the works on the program &#8211; enjoy!<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B00008WQB7&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=dailyobservat-20\">Strauss: Four Last Songs, etc. &#8211; Scottish National Orchestra\/Felicity Lott\/Neeme J\u00e4rvi<\/a>\u00a0[amazon.com]<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B000001GQF&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=dailyobservat-20\">Strauss: Death and Transfiguration; Metamorphosen &#8211; Berlin Philharmonic\/Herbert von Karajan<\/a>\u00a0[amazon.com]<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/id403679331\">George Szell Plays and Conducts Mozart<\/a>\u00a0[iTunes]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m working on the program notes for the Oregon Symphony&#8217;s January 26-28, 2013 concerts, which will be a series you won&#8217;t want to miss. The first half is given to Mozart&#8217;s magnificent Serenade No. 9 in D major, K. 320 &#8220;The Posthorn&#8221;. Now, with a nickname like that, you&#8217;d expect there to be a virtual [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":303,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[168,2],"tags":[310,1179,3075,3198,3197,3202,3201,2690,3200,3203,1268,3199],"class_list":["post-8031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recordings-music","category-the-orchestra-world","tag-berlin-philharmonic","tag-cleveland-orchestra","tag-death-and-transfiguration","tag-felicity-lott","tag-four-last-songs","tag-george-szell","tag-herbert-von-karajan","tag-mozart","tag-neeme-jarvi","tag-posthorn-serenade","tag-richard-strauss","tag-scottish-national-orchestra"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa8kC-25x","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8219,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2013\/01\/27\/strange-things-are-afoot-at-the-circle-k\/","url_meta":{"origin":8031,"position":0},"title":"strange things are afoot at the circle k","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 27, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Bogus. Heinous. Most non-triumphant. Ah, Ted, don't be dead, dude. - Bill S. Preston, Esq. Last night was the first of our classical series concerts for this weekend. It's a great program, one that everyone in the orchestra is pretty stoked about. Rehearsals had gone well, everyone seemed to be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;appreciation&quot;","block_context":{"text":"appreciation","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/appreciations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/0QQl3KGqWZw\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8175,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2013\/01\/23\/recordings-for-this-weeks-concert\/","url_meta":{"origin":8031,"position":1},"title":"recordings for this week&#8217;s concert","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 23, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"While I'm not a reviewer of recordings, I do have some recordings that I do especially like. This week's program of works by Mozart and Richard Strauss is one of my favorite of this season, and so I want to share some of my favorite recordings of the week's program\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;recordings&quot;","block_context":{"text":"recordings","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/recordings-music\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"strauss-lott","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/strauss-lott.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8153,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2013\/01\/21\/notes-for-the-end\/","url_meta":{"origin":8031,"position":2},"title":"notes for the end","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 21, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"This week we tackle two of my favorite pieces for orchestra ever written. Both are by Richard Strauss. They are his tone poem Death and Transfiguration (Tod und Verkl\u00e4rung), and his Four Last Songs. I wrote the program notes for the performances, but they had to be cut a bit\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;appreciation&quot;","block_context":{"text":"appreciation","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/appreciations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"jeffrey work, trumpet","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/05\/jeffreyworkphoto.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":13134,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2014\/01\/01\/2013-playlist\/","url_meta":{"origin":8031,"position":3},"title":"2013 playlist","author":"Charles Noble","date":"January 1, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"This is as exhaustive as I can make it, but I've certainly missed some things by accident, and omitted others on purpose. It's been that kind of year. Here's to more great music in 2014! * = first time performed by me Chamber Music Bart\u00f3k Quartet No. 1* Britten Quartet\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;chamber music&quot;","block_context":{"text":"chamber music","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/chamber-music\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":927,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2008\/04\/16\/a-great-bench\/","url_meta":{"origin":8031,"position":4},"title":"a great bench","author":"Charles Noble","date":"April 16, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"In the sporting world, if you've got depth on your team, then you've got a \"great bench\". Supporting players that can come in at a moment's notice and make a crucial difference when one of your first string players is unable to play. Here at the Oregon Symphony it's been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;conducting&quot;","block_context":{"text":"conducting","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/conducting\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Gregory Vajda - photo credit: Aaron Hewitt","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/03\/vajda-by-aaron-hewitt.thumbnail.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7052,"url":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/2011\/11\/05\/another-great-concert\/","url_meta":{"origin":8031,"position":5},"title":"another great concert","author":"Charles Noble","date":"November 5, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Saturday and Monday nights will see another great set of concerts in this already stellar season. The big surprise for this week? The Britten Piano Concerto. Never heard of it? Well, neither had I, before this season's repertoire was announced. We had our rehearsals with pianist Stephen Osborne over the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;appreciation&quot;","block_context":{"text":"appreciation","link":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/category\/music\/appreciations\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/01\/britten_benjamin_s.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/303"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8031"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8031\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nobleviola.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}