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2009 Arabian Nights
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This concert performance is dedicated to the memory of the late Alan Harvey, former Dean of Fine Arts , Vice President, and Executive Director of the Performing Arts Alliance (PAA) at Foothill College. PAA is one of our valued sponsors. Read about Alan on Facebook.
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“Marvelous concert - wonderful program” Jeanne McCann
“It was a treat playing with the orchestra” Jim Aikin
“enjoyed it immensely - fabulous music - it was a real delight” Nancy
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“They said they enjoyed our concert as much, if not more than the S.F. concert..” Hilda Hodges
“Our guest, an avid symphony patron, loved it as well.” Betty Ulrich
“a really beautiful concert” Shirley Huang
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“Marvelous concert - wonderful program - all performers including yourself were great. There was so much sensitivity in every selection. Thank you for a superb evening and my guests join me.”
Jeanne
“Hi, Michael--Thanks for the gig! It was a treat playing with the orchestra -- they're a great group, and your conducting was consistently top-notch. I hope I'll have a chance to play with you again in the future.”
--Jim Aikin
“Hi - We were there - Enjoyed it immensely - fabulous music - loved the opera singer - absolutely terrific voice - very glad we went - but I hadn't had much sleep the night before - so we decided not to come over to your house after as we were driving home, I was pretty tired as well as shy - sorry to disappoint - I should have said something -
Thanks again - we'll have to come to the concerts more often - it was a real delight –”
Nancy
“Thanks, Michael!! I loved playing that concert! My friends and family and students thought it was superb.”
Brian Bensing
“Dear Michael,
Congratulations for the wonderful last Concert!!! Everything was perfect! I will appreciate your future mails for the next concerts. Thanks a lot!”
Everything was wonderful....You and the musicians did a extraordinary performance! I will enjoy the concert recording...and I will wait the next event with pleasure... Elsa Vazquez
“Dear Michael, It was my pleasure to play with SVS. It was a really beautiful concert and I enjoyed a lot. Thank you for letting me join you. I hope we could have another opportunity to play together.”
Shirley Huang
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“Michael,
I want to thank you for a wonderful concert last night. It gives me great pleasure to be playing in the 2nd violin section. I am most proud of our orchestra and you, our conductor. I see and hear your enthusiasm and feel your commitment to us and the joy of making good music. My friends that came last night had gone to the S.F. Symphony concert only a few weeks ago in which they played Scheherazade. They said they enjoyed our concert as much, if not more than the S.F. concert. They were referring not only to "S" but the whole concert. They were appreciative of your choice of music, delighting in all of the pieces.
My husband and I missed you last night at the lovely party at your house. As you know, Susie prepared a delicious turkey and rice dish etc. which was a real treat. Thank you for opening your house to the musicians.
See you on the 16th! With appreciation,”
Hilda
“Michael:
It was a great concert Saturday night. Our guest, an avid symphony patron, loved it as well. Thank you for all you do. Jerry & Betty Ulrich, PCLG”
Betty Ulrich
Dear Michael,
As I have said before, I don't know how you top yourself with each concert performed, but you have succeeded again. It's easy for me to say they are all number 1, because as you know, I am not a trained musician, so I wouldn't hear any boo-boos, but I do know that I have thoroughly enjoyed each and every concert the Silicon Valley has performed. Your talent, mixed with those in the orchestra, your music selection, the ambiance, the energy of each performance is something no one should miss! The whole picture you draw is just like an artist painting in oils, but you paint the music in beautiful colors for listening enjoyment.
Loretta Faulkner
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Fanfare for the Common Man
by Aaron Copland
Written 1942
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In his autobiography, Copland wrote: "Eugene Goossens, conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, had written to me at the end of August about an idea he wanted to put into action for the 1942-43 concert season. During World War I he had asked British composers for a fanfare to begin each orchestral concert. It had been so successful that he thought to repeat the procedure in World War II with American composers". A total of eighteen fanfares were written at Goossens' behest, but Copland's is the only one which remains in the standard repertoire.
Copland titled the piece Fanfare for the Common Man. Goossen wrote "Its title is as original as its music, and I think it is so telling that it deserves a special occasion for its performance. If it is agreeable to you, we will premiere it 12 March 1943 at income tax time". Copland's reply was "I [am] all for honoring the common man at income tax time". The fanfare was also used as the main theme of the fourth movement of Copland's Third Symphony.
Copland's fanfare was reincarnated in 1977 by British rock band Emerson, Lake & Palmer on the album Works Volume I. It became one of the band's biggest hits when an edited version was released as a single that year. Keith Emerson had long been an admirer of Copland's Americana style, previously using Copland's Hoedown on the band's Trilogy album in 1972.
An excerpt of Fanfare for the Common Man also opens the Rolling Stones album Love You Live (1977), as it was used to open the 1976 concert tour supporting the Black and Blue album.
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Aaron Copland
1900 - 1990
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The American rock band Styx has also used the Copland piece. Their 1972 self-titled debut album opens with a suite called Movement for the Common Man. The third section of the suite, titled Fanfare for the Common Man, is loosely based on the Copland original.
Additionally, the rock band Asia (which shares the drummer Carl Palmer from Emerson, Lake & Palmer) often plays a variation of Fanfare during their live shows. Different versions have appeared on various live Asia albums over the years as well.
The Woody Herman Orchestra was known for closing their performances with a jazz rendition of Fanfare for the Common Man.
Bob Dylan has also opened his shows with Fanfare for the Common Man.
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O mio babbino caro
from Gianni Schicchi
by Giacomo Puccini
Written 1918
Caro nome
from Rigoletto
by Giuseppe Verdi
Written 1851
Khori Dastoor, Soprano Soloist
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O mio babbino caro (Oh my dear papa) is an aria from the opera Gianni Schicchi (1918) by Giacomo Puccini (music) and Giovacchino Forzano (Libretto). It is sung by Lauretta after tensions between Schicchi and his prospective in-laws have reached a breaking point that threatens to separate her from Rinuccio, the boy she loves. It provides a contrasting interlude expressing lyrical simplicity and single-hearted love in the atmosphere of hypocrisy, jealousy, double-dealing and feuding in medieval Florence of Puccini's only comedy, and it provides the only set-piece in the through-composed conversational musical give-and-take.
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Italian
O mio babbino caro
Mi piace è bello, bello
Vo' andare in Porta Rossa
a comperar l'anello!
Sì, sì, ci voglio andare!
e se l'amassi indarno,
andrei sul Ponte Vecchio,
ma per buttarmi in Arno!
Mi struggo e mi tormento!
O Dio, vorrei morir!
Babbo, pietà, pietà!
Babbo, pietà, pietà!
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Translation in English
O my dear papa
I like him, he is handsome, handsome
I want to go to Porta Rossa
to buy the ring!
Yes, yes, I want to go there!
And if my love were in vain,
I would go to the Ponte Vecchio
and throw myself in the Arno!
I am aching, I am tortured!
Oh God, I'd like to die!
Father, have pity, have pity!
Father, have pity, have pity!
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Caro nome is an aria in Rigoletto. Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo. It was first performed at La Fenice in Venice on March 11, 1851. It is considered by many to be the first of the operatic masterpieces of Verdi's middle-to-late career.
The hunch-backed court jester Rigoletto is deeply bitter about his own deformity, which gives an edge to the continual barbs he hurls at party guests of his licentious boss, the Duke of Mantua. The only source of joy in Rigoletto’s life is his innocent daughter Gilda. When the jester finally goes too far, he provokes a curse from his victim, with Gilda paying the final price. In Caro Nome, Gilda's act one aria, Gilda expresses her budding affections for a new love, sealing her fate.
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Giuseppe Verdi
1813 - 1901
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Italian
Caro nome che il mio cor
festi primo palpitar,
le delizie dell'amor
mi dêi sempre rammentar!
Col pensiero il mio desir
a te ognora volerà,
e pur l' ultimo sospir,
caro nome, tuo sarà.
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Translation in English
Sweet name, you who made my heart
throb for the first time,
you must always remind me
the pleasures of love!
My desire will fly to you
on the wings of thought
and my last breath
will be yours, my beloved.
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Adagio for Strings
by Samuel Barber
Composed in 1936
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Barber's "Adagio for Strings" originated as the second movement in his String Quartet No. 1, Op. 11, composed in 1936. In the original it follows a violently contrasting first movement, and is succeeded by a brief reprise of this music.
In January 1938 Barber sent the piece to Arturo Toscanini. The conductor returned the score without comment, and Barber was annoyed and avoided the conductor. Subsequently Toscanini sent word through a friend that he was planning to perform the piece and had returned it simply because he had already memorized it.[1] It was reported that Toscanini did not look at the music again until the day before the premiere. The work was given its first performance in a radio broadcast by Arturo Toscanini with the NBC Symphony Orchestra on November 5, 1938 in New York.
The composer also transcribed the piece in 1967 for eight-part choir, as a setting of the Agnus Dei ("Lamb of God").
The recording of the 1938 world premiere, with Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Orchestra, was selected in 2005 for permanent preservation in the National Recording Registry at the United States Library of Congress.
In 2004, Barber's masterpiece was voted the "saddest classical" work ever by listeners of the BBC's Today program, ahead of "Dido's Lament" from Dido and Æneas by Henry Purcell, the "Adagietto" from Gustav Mahler's 5th symphony, Metamorphosen by Richard Strauss and Gloomy Sunday as sung by Billie Holiday.
The piece was played at the funerals of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Prince Rainier of Monaco. It was also performed in 2001 at a ceremony at the World Trade Center to commemorate the victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks. Adagio for Strings was also part of the program of the Last Night of the Proms that year, in contrast to the event's usual atmosphere.
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Samuel Barber
1910 - 1981
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Arturo Toscanini
1867 - 1957
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Glitter and Be Gay
from Candide
by Leonard Bernstein
Written 1956
Khori Dastoor, Soprano Soloist
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Glitter and Be Gay is an aria from the operetta Candide, sung by the character of Cunegonde. It was written by Leonard Bernstein and Richard Wilbur. The tune of the up-tempo section ("Ha ha, ha ha ha ha") is well-known from its prominence in the show's overture, as well as from its use for years as the theme music of Dick Cavett's talk show.
This aria poses considerable difficulties. Technically, it is among the most fiendishly challenging coloratura soprano arias. If sung as written throughout (alternative phrases are provided at several points in the score), there are three high E-flats (above high C), two staccato and one sustained; there are also numerous uses of high C and D-flat. Some of the florid passages are very intricate, calling for marksmanship of the highest order.
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Leonard Bernstein
1918 - 1990
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Scheherazade, Op. 35
Symphonic Suite
by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Completed August 7, 1888
Julian Brown, Violin Soloist
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Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
1844- 1908
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Julian Brown
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Scheherazade is a legendary Persian queen and the storyteller of One Thousand and One Nights.
The frame tale goes that every day King Shahryar would marry a new virgin, and every day he would send yesterday's wife to be beheaded. This was done in anger, having found out that his first wife was betraying him. He had killed three thousand such women by the time he was introduced to Scheherazade, the vizier's daughter.
In Sir Richard F. Burton's translation of The Nights, Shahrazad was described in this way: "[Shahrazad] had perused the books, annals and legends of preceding Kings, and the stories, examples and instances of by gone men and things; indeed it was said that she had collected a thousand books of histories relating to antique races and departed rulers. She had perused the works of the poets and knew them by heart; she had studied philosophy and the sciences, arts and accomplishments; and she was pleasant and polite, wise and witty, well read and well bred."
Against her father's protestations, Scheherazade volunteered to spend one night with the King. Once in the King's chambers, Scheherazade asked if she might bid one last farewell to her beloved sister, Dinazade, who had secretly been prepared to ask Scheherazade to tell a story during the long night. The King lay awake and listened with awe to Scheherazade's first story and asked for another, but Scheherazade said there was not time as dawn was breaking, and regretfully so, as the next story was even more exciting.
And so the King kept Scheherazade alive as he eagerly anticipated each new story, until, one thousand and one adventurous nights, and three sons later, the King had not only been entertained but wisely educated in morality and kindness by Scheherazade who became his Queen.
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