Word: cantatas
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Candles at the Altar. Arrigo Boito, excitable and fiercely mustachioed, was the son of an Italian painter of miniatures who abandoned his family soon after Ar-rigo's birth. His mother, a Polish countess, set him studying to become a musician. At 19, his cantata Le Sorelle d'Italia won him a traveling scholarship. On his way home from Paris he traveled through Poland and Germany and picked up some heretical ideas that soon got him in hot water at home. Sample: he wrote a poem calling for a composer who could restore the glory of Italian music...
...goes on a Bach bender. Best of the lot: Preludes and Fugues (Carl Weinrich, organist; 6 sides) includes the fine A Minor and A Major. The Concerto in C Major for Two Harpsichords and Strings (Manuel and Williamson Harpsichord Ensemble; 5 sides) comes out muggily; the light-hearted Coffee Cantata (chamber group and soloists; 7 sides) gets a somewhat heavy-footed performance. Recordings: fair...
Hanns's composer friends* decided to hold another all-Eisler concert in Manhattan, and engaged Town Hall for Feb. 28. Hanns promised to bring forth a new work for the occasion. It was to be called The Alien Cantata. Hanns described it modestly as "a very lyrical piece about myself...
...Bach: Cantata No. 140 (RCA Victor Chorale and Orchestra with soloists, Robert Shaw conducting; Victor, 8 sides). Young Robert Shaw gives Bach's powerful Sleepers, Wake! careful and loving treatment. Recording: fair...
...Williams and Milhaud, the result is quite different. Like a great translation which becomes a work of art by its own merits, a good transcription becomes a piece of music which can be enjoyed as a new work. Purists might still complain, but with far less justification. Two Bach cantata choruses were also enlarged, but not so successfully. Despite the quality of performance, the effect was marred by the excess of performers, especially in the second where a series of flute echoes were drowned out by the preceding blasts...