Musica della sera

Musica della sera is a classical music radio show
hosted alternate weeks by Meera Collier and Nicholas Mitchell
It airs Thursdays on KUSP Santa Cruz, 88.9 FM, 7:00-9:30pm (Pacific Time)

or stream most recent show ↗

Complete Playlist Index (2003-present)

Last night’s show featured all the music I found when I couldn’t find what I was looking for. Made for a pretty fun show, don’t you think?

Read the rest of this entry »

Mozart at Seventeen

by Claire Keyes

I’d done it again: locked out of my car
that evening after the concert.
No friendly red salute as I flicked the unlock icon.

No keys and my stupid car remained indifferent
while I made the dreaded phone call
to my husband with the news

and could he come to the rescue.
The only bright thing that night was the symphony
Mozart composed at seventeen,

the year his father brought him to Vienna
to seek a position in the court of Empress Maria Theresa.
Only Salieri had won the keys to the court

and there was nothing for Amadeus.
So what does he do?
He attends the symphonies of Haydn,

glorious and inventive,
and over a period of weeks produces a music
filled with restless, angular melodies,

the oboe and flute freed into colorful bursts
that force the violins to yield. Only in the andante
does he settle into more introverted passions.

He was a teenager after all, destined
to trump Salieri, some say even Haydn.
Though he doesn’t know this at the time.

Maybe suspects it, so that three centuries later
as I was walking towards my car one evening
after a concert, fishing for my keys,

Mozart seemed to whisper: In clarity lies the serene.

Poet Claire Keyes

“Mozart at Seventeen” by Claire Keyes from What Diamonds Can Do. © Cherry Grove Collections, 2015.  

─NM

Musica della sera

Tune in to 88.9 FM

7:00-9:30 PM (Pacific Time)

or

stream on demand for a week after it airs

Fans of Wendy Carlos may enjoy hearing the music she wrote for Stanley Kubrick’s “A Clockwork Orange.” Unless I’m mistaken, these recordings are not commercially available in a digital format.

Stanley Kubrick did not use ”Timesteps” for his film. The two pieces that follow are the opening titles based on Purcell’s “Funeral Music for Queen Mary”, with sprinklings of the ominous “Dies Irae” theme, and then the Clockwork Orange theme (Beethoviana), emulating Ludwig Van’s particular style of inserting lilting filigree between notes of a theme.

The W. Carlos’ music for “A Clockwork Orange” begins at about the 115:20 time marker (streaming for this program will expire early Friday morning, 8/28. If the time counter isn’t visible from the blog page, try the secondary option: the KUSP Music Show Player.).

Hosted by Nicholas Mitchell

─N.M.

Comments and requests welcome, follow us on Twitter: , , and (new).  Call during the show at: (local) or toll-free
.  

We’re also on Facebook: , , and .

Opinion expressed there and here is our own and does not reflect that of the station. A note about playlists and Listener Feedback.

─N.M.

Tonight’s program features selections from some of my favorite recordings released by Alia Vox. From their website:

Since its creation in 1998, ALIA VOX has developed its role as the exclusive producer and publisher of all new recordings by Hesprion XXI, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, Le Concert des Nations, Montserrat Figueras & Jordi Savall.

Enjoy!
–Meera

Read the rest of this entry »

Musica della sera

Tune in to 88.9 FM

7:00-9:30 PM (Pacific Time)

or

stream on demand for a week after it airs

Hosted by Nicholas Mitchell

─N.M.

Comments and requests welcome, follow us on Twitter: , , and (new).  Call during the show at: (local) or toll-free
.  

We’re also on Facebook: , , and .

Opinion expressed there and here is our own and does not reflect that of the station. A note about playlists and Listener Feedback.

by Nina TotenBerg

( it and see the wonderful photographs)

─N.M.

 
How on earth do we process the death of a child? How will anything be better, ever? How will we laugh again? How is it possible that the sun still rises and people have birthdays and dogs still bark and the clothes need to be washed and food prepared and parades still happen?

We have lost a child. Indeed, we have lost two children. The brokenness of one led to the death of another. Waves upon waves — not ripples, but waves — of brokenness spreads like wildfire after a drought. We all look to answer why, we yearn to understand, we try to take our own selves out of the equation to make the loss make sense. We add variables. Try to identify constants. We rationalize the irrational and try to balance the equation that doesn’t result in such an imbalanced loss. What could we have done differently. Who is to blame. We heap the intensity of our emotion onto anyone we can point to, saying he did it. She did it. It’s his fault. They didn’t do it right. If only this hadn’t happened. If only I had been there. If only anyone could have seen. If only anyone knew. If only somehow. If only.

Blame doesn’t help. No matter how we try, there is no sense, no logic; there is no fault, there is no reason. Nothing works to ease the raw wound that we all now carry.

When faced with emotions that are so raw, so livid and infected, I have to turn to art. There are not enough words, not enough tears, not enough logic in the universe to make sense of something like this, so the only thing to do is let it wash over and through. Just as the heat of the last week has made dogs pant in the shade and more grass to shrivel and go into dormancy, I have to let the emotion drain me dry. Listen to music, read poetry, draw, paint, cook, garden. “All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten my hand”, but perfumes are cloying anyway, and emotion needs to color each expression.

Art has been dry, bitter, and prickly this week. I expect next week will be dark and empty, all in a minor key. After that, who knows. Stars will continue to make pinpricks in the velvet dark, scattering themselves across the Maddy-shaped hole in the universe.

And from this, maybe calm returns. Laughter will eventually come naturally, and the colors will reassert themselves in a field of wildflowers. We will remember.

–Meera

The poetry from tonight’s show are linked below in the playlist for tonight’s program, except for two by Ken Collier, which I read at the end of the program. The texts are below.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tune in at 88.9 FM

7:00-9:30 PM (Pacific Time)

or

stream on demand for a week after it airs