Sunday 16 February 2025
from Canonic Sonata for Two Flutes No.1
Here is the third and last movement of Georg Philipp Telemann's Canonic Sonata No. 1. It's a lively 2/4-time Allegro in G major, and like all the movements in the “Canonic” collection it is written as a canon, so both players can play the same part, just one measure apart.
Saturday 15 February 2025
by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy
This is probably the best known of Mendelssohn's 100 or so songs.
Mendelssohn wrote the piece a couple of months after moving to Leipzig to become director of the Gewandhaus Orchestra and Singakademie. He had just spent a frustrating two years in Düsseldorf trying to conduct somewhat amateur musicians and performing for unappreciative audiences. He found that everything in cosmopolitan, cultured Leipzig was to his liking; his contentment is reflected in this song.
With this song Mendelssohn set to music a German romantic poem by Heinrich Heine. The text tells of melody's power to transport lovers to the most beautiful night garden, with bright and fragrant flowers, gazelles, a murmuring stream, and a palm tree, under which they can dream.
Friday 14 February 2025
Traditional Irish jig
The earliest known appearance of this jig is in Francis O'Neill's collection Music of Ireland, published in Chicago in 1903. O'Neill's source for this tune was his colleague, Police Sergeant James Kerwin.
No words of mine could do justice to Sergeant Kerwin—the genial, hospitable “Jim” Kerwin, not as a fluter and a lover of the music of his ancestors, but as a host at his magnificent private residence on Wabash Avenue. On his invitation and that of his equally hospitable and charming wife, a select company, attracted and united by a common hobby, met monthly on Sunday afternoons at his house for years.
Thursday 13 February 2025
from “20 Easy and Melodic Studies”
This étude in B minor is taken from the first book of Twenty Easy Melodic Progressive Studies by Italian flutist and composer Ernesto Köhler. It mainly focuses on articulation, and at the beginning you will find the indication molto staccato, demanding for a very sharp staccato.
Wednesday 12 February 2025
by Amilcare Ponchielli, arranged for Flute duet
The “Dance of the Hours” is a ballet from the opera La Gioconda by Italian composer Amilcare Ponchielli. First performed in 1876, La Gioconda was a major success for Ponchielli, as well as the most successful new Italian opera between Verdi's Aida (1871) and Otello (1887).
The “Dance of the Hours” is considered one of the most popular ballet pieces in history. The ballet was parodied in Walt Disney's 1940 classic Fantasia. The segment consists of the whole ballet, but performed comically by animals rather than humans. The dancers of the morning are represented by Madame Upanova and her ostriches. The dancers of the daytime are represented by Hyacinth Hippo and her servants. The dancers of the evening are represented by Elephanchine and her bubble-blowing elephant troupe. The dancers of the night are represented by Ben Ali Gator and his troop of alligators.
Another famous parody of the “Dance of the Hours” is Allan Sherman's 1963 song “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh”, describing a miserable time at summer camp. It uses the main theme of the ballet as its melody.
Tuesday 11 February 2025
Traditional Prussian March by Frederick the Great
Did you know that King Frederick II of Prussia was a gifted musician who played the transverse flute? He composed 100 sonatas for the flute as well as four symphonies. His court musicians included C.P.E. Bach, Johann Joachim Quantz, and Franz Benda. It was a meeting with Johann Sebastian Bach in 1747 in Potsdam that led to Bach writing The Musical Offering.
And it was the “Old Fritz”, as the king was nicknamed, who wrote the “Hohenfriedberger”, one of the best known German military marches. It is named for the victory of the Prussians over the allied Austrians and Saxons in 1745 during the Second Silesian War in the Battle of Hohenfriedberg, near Striegau.
You may remember this march being used at the beginning of the film Stalingrad, or in Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon depicting the Prussian army during the Seven Years War.
Monday 10 February 2025
Traditional Irish jig
This jig appears to be unique to Chicago Police Captain Francis O'Neill's collections Music of Ireland (1903) and The Dance Music of Ireland (1907).
Coomanore is the name of an actual place in Ireland. It is now split between the townlands of Coomanore North and Coomanore South, both located in County Cork.