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| Delighted that you've decided to join us and now let's see if Peter Schickele is there Peter | |
| We're counting on you | |
| You were gonna say that here's the theme | |
| Hello there I'm Peter sickly and this is Schickele Mix a program dedicated to the proposition that all musics are created equal or as Duke Ellington put it if it sounds good it is good and it's also good to Acknowledge that our bills are paid by the Corporation for public broadcasting and by this fine radio station right here on your digital dial where I hole up to hone these wholesome packets of perspicacity to perfection and | |
| Whence the finished work of art is diligently distributed by PRI public radio international It's a beautiful lazy summer afternoon, and you're lying on a reclining chair in your backyard half asleep half awake | |
| Gradually you become aware of an ominous sound | |
| It disappears around the house but you know you're in trouble because it has to be one of only two things a swarm of killer bees or An accordionist launching into Lady of Spain no time to think about which would be worse you bolt for the door | |
| But it's coming around the other side of the house | |
| You made it you're safe at least for the moment then you suddenly remember that you left a window open upstairs And to your horror you realize that it's already in the house. It's coming down the stairs this time | |
| There's no place to hide | |
| Wake up wake up. Come on. Come on wake up. It's okay. It's only a dream | |
| You're having a bad dream, but everything's gonna be all right | |
| It's okay. It's only a dream. You're having a bad dream, but everything's all right. You're listening to shickly mix just relax | |
| Everything's fine | |
| Listen if it makes you feel any better. You're not the first person to have that nightmare But I hope you won't hold it against the accordion. It's not the instruments fault that too many people play Lady of Spain By the way having just had one did you ever wonder where the word nightmare comes from? | |
| It is not as you might have guessed some kind of vampire horse No mare is a Middle English word akin I happen to know to the old high German Mara meaning incubus It's an evil supernatural being that causes bad dreams | |
| It's also related to the Serbo-Croatian word for | |
| Okay, okay | |
| Okay, I guess I can't argue with the ump on that call | |
| Heating the exhortations of the irrelevancy alarm | |
| Let's return to today's topic | |
| The accordion was invented in the first half of the 19th century and by the beginning of the 20th century | |
| It had like killer bees spread all over the world But it has always been and continues to be | |
| Primarily what the music dictionary calls an instrument of the people as if audiences at classical concerts | |
| Weren't people you know what I'm saying? Well, we all know what it means. You know, it's interesting about reverse snobbism | |
| I know a clothing store whose merchandise | |
| Includes overalls and work shirts and stuff like that and their motto is real clothes for real people | |
| And so of course I shop there. Hey, I don't want to risk becoming imaginary The store is miles from my home | |
| But I drive there regularly and the accordion is used in all sorts of non-classical music and listened to by all sorts of very real people On another edition of this show. We hear examples of the German polka band tradition the Tex-Mex tradition of Tejano music | |
| The Parisian tradition the tango tradition of Argentina and the Cajun tradition of Louisiana | |
| And there are many others | |
| But as a matter of fact, there is some classical music written for accordion and today we're going to check some of it out Don't worry. We won't be hearing enough of it to turn you into a non-person | |
| Like the players of other instruments with small repertoires | |
| Classical accordionists often resort to transcriptions, but we're going to be concentrating on original music | |
| Having said that I have to mention that the opening movement of our first suite was originally written for harmonium But playing a harmonium piece on the accordion hardly counts as a transcription Since in terms of sound production the two instruments are practically identical | |
| They're both free reed organs | |
| The main difference between them is that on the harmonium you work the bellows with your feet and on the accordion you do it with | |
| Your left arm Okay, the international suite for unaccompanied accordion has three movements and lasts about six and a half minutes | |
| I'll see you then | |
| [No speech for 381s.] | |
| The three movements of the international suite for unaccompanied accordion were by max rager leaf kaiser and | |
| Aaronj kernes | |
| Rager wrote the romance in a minor in 1904 | |
| It was performed here by helmet yacobs Leaf kaiser is a danish composer and the little piece we heard marked quasi waltz Comes from a work called confetti | |
| The accordionist was geard drogsvold | |
| My apologies if my pronunciation of norwegian isn't up to snuff | |
| There seems to be a lot of interest in the classical accordion in scandinavia Hey, they go for months without sunshine | |
| A sweet little interlude | |
| Then our finale was the phantom polka by aaron j kernes, which is based on a series of visual images | |
| the composer says | |
| For a reason I can't explain soon after beginning this polka. I thought of a movie abbott and costello in the haunted house The specific images brought to mind were those of a translucent ghost appearing on a stairway | |
| And the same essentially tame yet scary apparition in a large ballroom dancing with hundreds of fellow phantoms | |
| This vision appeared in 30s or 40s black and white on a fuzzy 60s tv The polka is formed as a little story and as in many of my compositions. It is eclectic | |
| Aye that it is | |
| It was played by the man who commissioned it the american accordionist guy klusovic | |
| Music my apologies if my pronunciation of american isn't up to snuff | |
| The liner notes say that he grew up in a slavic community in western pennsylvania | |
| and developed Sorry folks Hello | |
| Yeah, but uh, but I tell you I rarely have guest artists and when I do it's planned well in advance You know today's show is is all mapped out | |
| Hey, I really can't talk right now. Okay. Uh, why don't you give me your name and number and i'll call you after the show? | |
| Okay. Okay. Yeah, go ahead. Lou s-q-u-e-e-z-e-a | |
| n-a | |
| Squeeziana, your name is lou squeezy. Anna. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Lou squeezy. Anna Okay, don't tell me you play the accordion and you live in new orleans right an agent for accordionist same difference | |
| What's the number? | |
| Got it. Okay. I'm on the air here. I cannot talk now. I'm going to have to hang up. Bye I hate to do that. But agents are like door-to-door salesmen. I'm old enough to remember them. They were hard to get rid of | |
| Hello, i'm the fuller brush man. Do you have a minute? | |
| My name is peter shickley and I moonlight as the host of shickley mix from pri public radio international The carol flowers society recognizes those listeners who have made a commitment to wnyc's future by including | |
| The station in their estate plans or by making a life income gift if you've done so, please let us know We want to thank you to learn how to include wnyc in your estate plans call dhedra at two one two six six nine eight nine | |
| Eight two you have the power to make a difference | |
| You're listening to shickley mix on 93.9 wnyc | |
| 93.9 wnyc | |
| We're talking about the accordion an instrument of the people and its relationship to classical music | |
| You know the kind of music associated with effete snobs like myself I call today's show beer drinker at a cocktail party And we're about to hear some accordion music that is about as far from the beer barrel polka as it's possible to get | |
| We're dealing now with what the composer performer whose concept it is calls the expanded accordion This is meditative music that takes the accordion where no man has ever gone before | |
| Which figures because it's by a woman | |
| This is a section from a larger work and i'll be back in about five minutes | |
| [No speech for 303s.] | |
| That was this great fool's stage the fourth section of crone music Which the composer pauline oliveros wrote for a production of shakespeare's lyre | |
| It's a beautiful engaging river of sound. I would have liked to have seen the production | |
| Here's a description of the expanded accordion | |
| Oliveros uses four digital delay processors during performance | |
| Each output from the right and left hand is sent separately to a processor | |
| Processor which she controls to accomplish layering pitch bending or modulation | |
| Pitch bending is controlled with foot pedals The results are sent to two other processors for reverberations | |
| Which simulate a variety of aural experiences from landscapes and indoor spaces? | |
| The second pair of processors and the mixing is controlled by a second person | |
| panaiotis | |
| Okay, it's tidbit time at the Schickele Mix accordion academy double-barreled tidbit today Okay, I know I said we'd be concentrating on original classical music for accordion | |
| But what we're about to hear is an arrangement now | |
| I've got a reason for making this deviation from stated policy | |
| But before we get to that, let's hear the original that's going to be arranged. Here's the way the composer wrote it | |
| [No speech for 190s.] | |
| Tango for piano by igor stravinsky played by his son selima stravinsky The composer had concertized in argentina in the 1930s | |
| So he had heard tangos from the horse's mouth as it were | |
| Now, of course, one of the instruments most strongly associated with tango is the accordion or its close relative the bandoneon | |
| So what happens if you play that tango on the accordion? | |
| Well personally | |
| I think you can make a good argument for saying that it sounds at least as good as | |
| And maybe even better than the original piano version. Now. I'm not completely serious about that | |
| One of the nice things about certain choices in this world is that you don't have to make them | |
| Both versions are there to be heard, but I must say the accordion version sounds pretty steamy | |
| [No speech for 262s.] | |
| Stravinsky's tango played on the accordion by stefan husong | |
| Who I think made the arrangement the liner notes are not completely clear on that But stravinsky actually made an arrangement himself of the tango for a bunch of instruments And he approved of a couple of other arrangements, but none of them uses the accordion | |
| Now i'm not saying that just because the accordion is so strongly associated with tango music | |
| That you ought to use an accordion if you write a tango | |
| In fact composers often make a point of distancing themselves when they borrow material or styles | |
| And certainly stravinsky was a consummate virtuoso at distancing himself | |
| That is no matter what he took as a model. He always sounded like himself | |
| Even his piece for woody herman's jazz band sounds russian I met stravinsky once he was | |
| I met stravinsky once he was a | |
| Person hello look | |
| Look, mr. Squisiana. I said I couldn't yeah, look i'm sure that all the accordionists you handle are good and she may be | |
| Well, you see that's a problem right there. You say she's played in all the best nightclubs | |
| Well, this is a program about classical music for accordion. So, you know, mr. Squisiana. It's true It's really not going to work out. I mean lady of spain or hernando's hideaway | |
| Now, I don't want you to think that i'm a snob or anything, but pieces like that simply are not going to fit in | |
| I mean your client really wouldn't feel comfortable at the intellectual level i'm operating at here | |
| So so look i'm going to hang up and i'll call you after the show. Please don't call back | |
| Boy, I guess that's why he's an agent | |
| Anyway, what was I talking about? Oh, yeah meeting stravinsky in 1959 I was part of a special one-week seminar at princeton | |
| And stravinsky came and answered questions and we all got to meet him | |
| I was 24 years old and terribly enamored of his music. I mean, I still love it | |
| But in those days well a piece I wrote a couple of years before that seminar | |
| I can remember working on it with the score of stravinsky's symphony and three movements open in front of me That's how much I was emulating his orchestration | |
| Anyway, when I actually got to shake his hand naturally, I didn't know what to say All I could do was mumble something like i'm very pleased to meet you | |
| I wish I had had the courage to express what was in my heart | |
| I should have said | |
| I'm, very pleased to meet you and I hope you don't worry about people forgetting your music when you're dead and gone | |
| Because long after you've kicked the bucket, mr. Stravinsky, i'll be playing your works on the radio program I'm going to have someday My name is peter shickley and the show will be called shickley mix from pri public radio international You're listening to shickley mix on wnyc | |
| Today's show is called beer drinker at a cocktail party We're talking about the accordion in the world of classical music | |
| About how the proletarian image of the accordion is not the whole story | |
| And I have to say that researching this program was a real ear opener for me | |
| I hadn't realized what an excellent chamber music instrument the accordion is It blends very well and interestingly with other wind and string instruments | |
| We're going to hear two suites of chamber music including accordion. They both have three movements | |
| The first suite is the more introspective of the two | |
| The composer of the opening number points out something that hadn't occurred to me | |
| And that's that part of the reason the instruments blend so well is that they're all reed instruments clarinets bassoon Saxophone and accordion in the middle work. We hear the accordion with a string instrument and a piano | |
| And the last piece is a song set to a truly heartbreaking text It's a poem called the garden a little garden fragrant and full of roses The path is narrow and a little boy walks along it a little boy a sweet boy Like that growing blossom when the blossom comes to bloom the little boy will be no more | |
| We'll call this chamber suite number one il penseroso. I'll be back in about seven minutes | |
| [No speech for 289s.] | |
| Hmm | |
| [No speech for 120s.] | |
| Chamber suite number one il penseroso | |
| To begin with we heard the first section of a work called parterre by mary ellen childs | |
| performed by relish the ensemble for contemporary music | |
| Parterre refers to an ornamental patterned garden good title for the piece | |
| The other two composers are new to me. The next piece was the interlude from ted | |
| Zarlengo's suite for accordion cello and piano played by robert devine and richard slavich with the composer on piano | |
| And the final song was by andy pape P-a-p-e once again, i'm not sure of the pronunciation. He was born in california, but seems to live in denmark | |
| Just a beautiful setting of a wrenching poem from a collection of texts | |
| Written by children and adolescents in the nazi extermination camp at teresienstadt | |
| The soprano was lisa lotta nielsen singing in that childlike voice The violinist was soren kass kleysen and the accordionist Gerd drogsvold whom we heard earlier in the opening suite on the program | |
| The accordion provided such an effective bass in that song strong, but not intrusive | |
| Those three pieces have definitely given me some things to think about And you know, that's one of the highest compliments a composer can give it usually concerns orchestration Several years ago after a world premiere. I heard another composer tell the composer of the new work | |
| There are definitely some things in there. I plan to steal | |
| Our chamber suite number two is subtitled l'allegro | |
| You know allegro has come to mean fast in music | |
| But the italian word actually means lively or spirited again three movements and they last about seven and a half minutes | |
| [No speech for 428s.] | |
| Chamber suite number two l'allegro we began with an argentine tango from the 1940s or 50s that to me feels much more like a piece of chamber music than like music for social dancing | |
| It's called a fuego lento and it's by the pianist composer. Horacio. Salgan | |
| The middle piece was christian marclay's ping-pong polka for accordion and turntables | |
| The title refers according to the composer to the old stereo aesthetic the ping-pong effect As well as the exchange between the live and the pre-recorded material Guy klusevec composed and performed the accordion part christian marclay himself was on the turntables | |
| The last piece comes from the middle of the 19th century it was the eighth of a set of pieces called leisure moments by giulio regandi a Composer for and virtuoso on the guitar and the concertina which is a smaller cousin of the accordion and that's what we heard | |
| Quintessential parlor music from victorian england played here by douglas rogers. The pianist was julie lustman | |
| Uh | |
| Well, ladies and gentlemen i've been finessed here | |
| Remember louisouisiana the agent who called earlier trying to get me to put an accordionist he represents on the show | |
| Well, she's here | |
| She's not only here. She brought three other musicians with her | |
| I don't know what it is about the accordion every time I do a program on accordions Somebody shows up at the studio wanting to play Anyway, so what am I going to do? I've told her she can go ahead and do one number but she knows that there's not | |
| Going to be any chit chat and she has promised to play a classical selection. Okay, miss castle. It's all yours | |
| [No speech for 95s.] | |
| Uh | |
| Uh, yes well, uh, that was miss joanne castle and a chamber ensemble | |
| Performing an excerpt from rimsky-korsakov's opera the czar sultan | |
| That instrumental interlude is called flyetsky bumblebee. Anna vichka and uh | |
| I feel duty bound to mention that unlike most of the other music on today's program. That is an arrangement | |
| Okay now miss castle if you and your Colleagues would kindly just wait a moment before packing up. I'll i'll get some music on here so I can kill the microphones | |
| We're going to go out with some more music by. Mr. Giulio ragondi | |
| Serenade in a for concertina and piano | |
| [No speech for 12s.] | |
| And that's Schickele Mix for this week Our program is made possible with funds provided by the corporation for public broadcasting and by this radio station and its members | |
| Thank you members | |
| And not only that our program is distributed by pri public radio international | |
| We'll tell you in a moment how you can get an official playlist of all the music on today's program with album numbers and everything | |
| Just refer to the program number. This is program number 158 158 and this is peter sickly saying goodbye and reminding you that it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that certain | |
| You're looking good. See you next week | |
| If you'd like a copy of that playlist I mentioned send a stamped self-addressed envelope to Schickele Mix that's | |
| S-c-h-i-c-k-e-l-e Schickele Mix care of public radio international | |
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