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Before the word processor

Started by Alan Howe, Monday 21 June 2021, 12:25

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Alan Howe


TerraEpon

Of course Leroy Anderson is neither unsung nor really within the forum's 'remit'.

He is one of my favorite composers granted,...

Alan Howe

No, but he's too often 'unseen', i.e. visually unsung.

Oh, and the piece is definitely within our remit! Why wouldn't it be? Because it was written in 1950?

Justin

Anything that is featured in a Jerry Lewis film is certainly within our remit.  ;D

Gareth Vaughan


kolaboy

His piece "Forgotten Dreams" was a favorite of my pre-school days. Still is, actually.

MartinH

Anderson within the remit? Yippee!

I love his music and it isn't as well known as it was once and should be, save for the ubiquitous Sleigh Ride. My story: three years I was invited to conduct a pops concert with the understanding I could choose the music. So I programmed some favorite unsungs (Chadwick, Gottschalk, MacDowell) some light Americana (marches, etc) and then a Leroy Anderson Suite: Belle of the Ball, Sandpaper Ballet, Forgotten Dreams, Typewriter and close with Bugler's Holiday. The positive response and comments from the audience were heartening, but what really struck my was how few orchestra members had ever played any of those works. No one had played the Sandpaper Ballet or Forgotten Dreams. Band members had played Bugler's Holiday. Players were certainly receptive and I think the sense of nostalgia the works bring with them made a difference. There were the grumblers, that this music was corny, hokey, old-fashioned, cheesy and not worth the effort. Can't please everyone. The hit of the evening was Night in the Tropics.

Anyway - the Typewriter. Those things are hard to come by, especially the one specified in the score with the settings to get the bells and such in exactly the right spot. So we updated: the Word Processor. The typewriter sounds were managed by a desk bell and drum sticks on a wood block: an alternative Anderson wrote. We wheeled out a computer terminal and got a good laugh. At the end when the typewriter goes crazy, suddenly a bloom of white smoke and a bang came out the terminal - a stage tech had removed the old computer guts and replaced it with stage props to make smoke and a bang. Worked great!

TerraEpon

Quote from: Alan Howe on Monday 21 June 2021, 15:51
No, but he's too often 'unseen', i.e. visually unsung.

Oh, and the piece is definitely within our remit! Why wouldn't it be? Because it was written in 1950?

Well if you say it it, then it is.

His Piano Concerto is one of my all time favorite pieces and one of the only pieces I try to buy every recording of (five I know of, including an arrangement for Piano, Theater Organ, and Percussion).

Alan Howe

QuoteWell if you say it it, then it is.

Nothing to do with me - it's in UC's remit:
Some composers did not actively compose until well after the traditional period and yet wrote, and still write, in a recognisably romantic idiom: examples being Marx, Korngold, Atterberg, Furtwängler, many composers of film music and, until his death in 2013, Schmidt-Kowalski.

'Typerwriter' clearly qualifies.