Philzuid

Philzuid welcomes summer with the warm-blooded sounds of Samuel Barber and Aaron Copland. Special guest is top mezzo Julia Bullock. Orchestral music warmed by the sun’s rays that instantly brings summer to mind. American masters Samuel Barber and Aaron Copland combine symphonic sound drama with soothing harmonies. A feeling of happiness overwhelms the listener when the delightful Appalachian Spring ballet suite is played. Aaron Copland pulls out all the sensitive stops for a work by the groundbreaking choreographer Martha Graham. Her 1944 ballet describes a dancing wedding party taking place in a nineteenth-century religious Shaker community. Copland’s ecstatic music touches all souls, then and now. The work was his big breakthrough and even earned him the Pulitzer Prize for Music.

That positive energy is maintained by colleague Samuel Barber. The relaxed Barber switched effortlessly from style to style, with a penchant for neo-Romantic melancholy. Martha Graham also managed to rope Barber into writing a ballet score. In their Medea, the audience is swept away in a dance spectacle about jealousy and revenge. The passionate music follows the inner turmoil of the tormented mythical figure Medea. In the ballet-related orchestral work Medea’s Dance of Vengeance, a furious dance full of resentment and revenge slowly unfolds.

Barber also believed in the power of old America. In the picturesque Knoxville, Summer of 1915 for soprano and orchestra, long, languid summer evenings and endless childhood dreams reign supreme. Just after World War II, Barber evoked memories of a naive and simple America that now seems further away than ever. The guest performance by mezzo-soprano and Grammy winner Julia Bullock is eagerly awaited. The committed star vocalist is extremely familiar with the American repertoire. She has performed Barber’s Knoxville with the LA Philharmonic and London Philharmonia.

The crowning glory of the summer will be Stravinsky’s Symphony in Three Movements, a dazzling masterpiece with which the famous Russian made his debut in his new homeland, the USA. Stravinsky perfected his sparkling vision of the great classical tradition with a symphony bursting with pure solar energy.

Program

Barber – Medea’s Dance of Vengeance, Opus 23a
Stravinsky – Symphony in Three Movements
Barber – Knoxville Summer of 1915
Copland – Appalachian Spring Suite