This week's Vivace: An unusual pot-pourri

This week's Vivace will contain a really unusual pot-pourri.  In the first hour, we'll begin gently with a Sonata for Flute and Piano by Danish composer, Friedrich Kuhlau, followed by the last in our occasional series of the five symphonies of Sir Hubert Parry.

At 7 o'clock, we'll feature the symphony that inspired Samuel Smith to write the lyrics to "My Country 'Tis of Thee" in 1831: the Great National Symphony by Muzio Clementi. 

We'll celebrate the birthday of French composer, Marie Auguste Durand, and just before 8 o'clock, we have a very rare recording of the final work of Claude Debussy, a short piano piece he wrote to thank his coal supplier for keeping his house warm during his final illness, a work that was lost until discovered in a trunk in Paris in 2001.

At 8 o'clock, we'll celebrate the birthday of Czech composer Julius Fucik.

Then, we'll have a short tribute to the great conductor, Lorin Maazel, who passed away earlier this week, featuring two of his own compositions.  And finally, we'll hear one of Mozart's early piano concertos, No 9, which he wrote when he was 19.

Lorin Maazel                              Mozart at 19

As ever, I hope you'll join me for what promises to be a busy and, I hope, interesting edition of Vivace, Friday morning, 6-9 am, here on WTJU-Charlottesville.

Clementi: Gradus Ad Parnassum Vol. 4 - Delightful

Clementi: Gradus ad Parnassum, Vol. 4
Exercises Nos. 66-100
Alessandro Marangoni, piano
Naxos

Pianist Alessandro Marangoni completes his survey of Muzio Clementi's Gradus ad Parnassum with this release. Composed over several years, this three-volume collection of keyboard exercises has become one of the standard teaching tools for pianists. But these works aren't just a series of dull and difficult finger exercises.

True, within each of the short pieces in this collection a pattern of notes will occur over and over, sometimes obsessively. But Clementi underpins those patterns with interesting  and supple harmonies that provides forward motion and musical organization.

Most of the 34 exercises in this volume were grouped by Clementi into suites. Each suite, taken as a whole, aesthetically makes sense. Each suite has collection of contrasting movements. A mid-tempo piece is followed by an up-tempo one. A simple, lyrical movement is followed by a complex fugue, and so on. Although the individual pieces are enjoyable enough to listen to, the suites place the movements in context and provide deeper musical meaning to the whole.

The contrapuntal pieces were the ones I found most interesting -- Clementi had a facility for writing canons and fugues. The fugues don't sound like Bach warmed over. Just as with the counterpoint of Mozart and Haydn, these movements have a strong melodic flavor to them. These pieces work as music and not just intellectual (or fingering) exercises.

Marangoni plays with alacrity and a light touch, making these difficult exercises sound effortless. And more importantly, he makes them sound musical.