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Charles Ives: Holidays Symphony

Coming of age at the dawn of the twentieth century, Charles Ives saw the halcyon days of his youth fading fast. Not willing to let them go, he invented a striking new musical language to enshrine the feelings and ideals of a simpler time. But many, shocked by passages like the “fireworks” in ‘Fourth of July,’ found his new-fangled methods at odds with the memories he was trying to preserve. Did Ives go too far? Or did he succeed in turning his memories into music?

AIR-DATE
October 2009

COMMENTS
0

TAGS
American, band, Composers, experiments, Ives, march, noise, techniques, tunes

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Aaron Copland: Appalachian Spring

Explore the sights, sounds and influences that brought Copland to write music that gave Americans a sense of their own identity and created a truly American sound. With excerpts from the original 13-instrument version of Appalachian Spring.

AIR-DATE
November 2006

COMMENTS
12

TAGS
American, patriotism, dance, Copland, folk tunes

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Copland and the American Sound

Aaron Copland blended his Brooklyn Jewish roots with jazz, folk music, and hymns to gamble on a new American sound, yet how such an unlikely outsider captured the spirit of Billy the Kid is a tale worth its own string section. From Fanfare for the Common Man to Appalachian Spring, Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony pare Copland down to reveal the sound we now recognize as purely American.

AIR-DATE
Thursday, November 16, 2006 at 10pm

COMMENTS
2

TAGS
20th Century, American, Copland, dance, folk tunes, patriotism

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Copland: Could it Be Modern?

A scrapbook timeline exploring the themes and roots of modernism in Copland’s early music.

AIR-DATE
November 2006

COMMENTS
0

TAGS
American, history, Copland, modernism

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Copland: In Search of the American Sound

See and hear a chronicle of Copland’s life—from his roots in Brooklyn, to the travels abroad, to the influences that shaped his music.

AIR-DATE
November 2006

COMMENTS
0

TAGS
American, history, Copland

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Charles Ives: Holidays Symphony

Ranging from tender sentiment to savage chaos, the music of early 20th-century composer Charles Ives explores an essentially American riddle: how can we survive the relentless assault of our own success? Join Michael Tilson Thomas as he, the San Francisco Symphony, and Charles Ives belt it out over truth, beauty, and the American Way.

AIR-DATE
Thursday, October 22, 2009 at 10pm

COMMENTS
4

TAGS
20th Century, American, Ives