Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness

It’s a daily joy to offer you the best recordings from the WXXI library from 6 to 10am, with arts news from Rochester’s rich cultural calendar, updates from NPR, the Mystery Piece at 6:40am, the Composers' Datebook at 7:20am, and the Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor at 8:20am. Here’s a look at what’s coming up in the next few weeks:

      Monday, October 29

We’ll start a stormy week with silky strings by Rossini, dreamy harp music by Bax, James P. Johnson’s signature tune for the 1920s, and a visit to Franz Schubert’s Devil’s Pleasure Castle. 

Tuesday, October 30

Trick or treat?  Watch out -- it’s a trick!  We’ll get a visit from the Noonday Witch in a tone poem Dvorak based on an eerie Czech folk tale. 

Wednesday, October 31

Let’s break open the candy early with fanciful stories and spooky bits for Halloween, plus the lighthearted Fairy Tales, a trio from the Indian summer of Robert Schumann’s life.  Arnold Schoenberg arrives for Trick or Treat on the Composer’s Datebook.

Thursday, November 1

We throw our arms open wide to welcome American Music Month with works by Aaron Copland, Charlotte Blake, and William Schumann.

Friday, November 2

Lions, and tigers, and bears! Oh, my!  We launch into Friday together with songs by Harold Arlen, Gilbert and Sullivan, and Anna Russell.  You’ll hear more American music, including George Gershwin’s New York Rhapsody.  

(CHANGED DATE) Let’s get caught up in the excitement – or humor, or pathos –or WHATEVER is happening when Philip Carli’s playing the piano.  He specializes in silent film accompaniment, and in her debut as the host of 1370 Connection Arts Friday  Mona Seghatoleslami sits down at the piano with Philip to ask him about the art of enhancing silent film.

Monday, November 5

Monday means more coffee (please) and more American music and pieces by Joan Tower and William Bolcom, plus Harold Arlen’s wistful classic, “Over the Rainbow.”

Tuesday, November 6

We'll continue our celebration of American Music Month with Cary Ratcliff’s Cello Sonata from a recording featuring the Rochester composer the piano and the amazing RPO cellist Ingrid Bock.

Wednesday, November 7

You’ll get a sneak preview of Live from Hochstein and a lunchtime concert with the Irrera Brothers, with an exclusive performance from their recent appearance on WXXI’s Backstage Pass.  Plus, American music by Eric Whitacre, Samuel Barber, Michael Daugherty, and Ron Nelson’s “Aspen Jubilee” (he’s an Eastman grad, by the way.)

Thursday, November 8

I can hardly wait to open recordings by American masters Bobby McFerrin, Dawn Upshaw, and Anne Akiko Meyers. Plus, WXXI’s Julia Figueras will chat with Jeff Tyzik about his new work commemorating the Memorial Art Gallery's centennial, Images:  Musical Impressions of an Art Museum.      

Friday, November 9

We hear from the legendary Dame Joan Sutherland (in advance of a special weekend broadcast, Dame Joan Sutherland, La Stupenda airing Saturday, November 10th at 3:10 p.m.) I’m also looking forward to introducing you to author Marianne Langner Zeitlin, whose new novel, Motherless Child, tells the story of a woman who assumes a false identity to accept a job working for a classical music impresario she believes ruined her family’s happiness.  Zeitlin, the wife of acclaimed violinist Zvi Zeitlin, dedicated the book to her husband before he died this past spring, and she says now it’s become a kind of memorial to him. (CHANGED DATE: see my review in a previous post.)

Plus . . .

One of the world's leading flute virtuosos, flutist Marina Piccinini, will appear in Rochester this weekend, and you’ll hear why members of the Rochester Flute Association are so excited to hear her play in Hatch Recital Hall.   "I always go back to what brought me into music, and that’s great singing," says Marina.

Plus (okay, the days are just packed) . . .

Friday night, November 9^th

Again this year, I’m thrilled to be hosting the 12th Annual Rochester Early Music Festival at 7:30pm at Saint Anne Church (1600 Mount Hope Avenue) in Rochester, presented by Musica Spei. New to the Early Music Festival this year are performances by the Amadeus Chorale, Christopher Wilke and T. Woolard Harris, organ.  The Amadeus Chorale, a chorus of children and youth from grades 2 through 12, will perform works by Michael Praetorius, East, Telemann and Lassus. Wilke, (recently praised in the Democrat and Chronicle) will introduce the audience to works by Carre, Guerau, and de Murcia on baroque guitar. Harris, the organist for St. Anne Church, will perform works by Buxtehude.

Come and hear a narrated composition about naval combat, played by Bonnie Choi, harpsichord, as well as music of the English Cavaliers: sublime and unusual instrumental music by William Lawes, Cavalier to the King, and other 17th century English composers, performed by Pegasus Early Music. 

Bonnie Choi is really amazing, as is Deborah Fox, with her colleagues in Pegasus Early Music. We'll enjoy Christel Thielmann, viola da gamba, leading the Eastman Collegium Baroque Orchestra and Viol Consort; Baroquen Bones, an ensemble of brass instruments (which, frankly, are a little weird-looking); several members of Publick Musick, and Musica Spei. 

It’s a PRISM-style concert, a format in which you will be surrounded by performers and the music flows from piece to piece with minimal interruption. After the concert, I hope you’ll join me and Musica Spei for a free reception where we can mingle with the performers.  Last year, some of them wore scary masks!