Fifteen years after the death of Aaron Copland, Tom Service reassesses the music of one of America's best loved composers. He talks to friends and colleagues including conductor Michael Tilson Thomas, writer and historian Vivian Perlis and the journalist Paul Moor, a former lover. And ahead of Radio 3's British Music Week, Tom discusses the position of British contemporary music in the 21st century.
In this programme
Aaron Copland
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American composer Aaron Copland captured the sound of America in pieces like Appalachian Spring and Fanfare for the Common Man. However, his best-known and most popular music only represents part of his compositional output. In his early works, like the Piano Variations, and late pieces, like Connotations for Orchestra, the sound is dissonant and spiky.
Copland became an icon of American 20 th Century music, but was actually an outsider. He was of Russian-Jewish descent, a homosexual, and had left-wing political sympathies. His formative years were spent away from the U.S. studying with Nadia Boulanger in Paris , so how did his music come to epitomize America ?
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15 years after his death, a new book: Aaron Copland and His World, explores Copland's influences and inspiration. Tom talks to Carol Oja, one of the editors, to find out what has come to light in this collection of writings about Copland and his music. The Copland biographer Peter Dickinson reviews the book with Tom.
Copland's personality is also revealed through an interview from the archive and contributions from his former lover, Paul Moor, the conductor and collaborator, Michael Tilson Thomas, and his friend and biographer, Vivian Perlis.
Carol J. Oja & Judith Tick (Ed.): Aaron Copland and His World . Pub. Princeton University Press, £14.95 (paperback) / £35.95 (hardback).
British music
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This week, BBC Radio 3's British Music Focus celebrates the work of British composers, culminating in a broadcast of this year's British Composer Awards ceremony. But, what is the state of contemporary classical music in this country? Young composers have a hard task competing with the commercial sector and the worlds of pop and rock music. Even previous generations of British composers like Harrison Birtwistle and Peter Maxwell Davies and more recently James MacMillan and Mark-Anthony Turnage have set a challenging precedent. So, how do the current generation of composers move forward? Tom is joined by the composers and teachers Christopher Fox and Robert Saxton and the Head of the Contemporary Music Department at Schott Music Publishers in London, Sally Groves, to discuss the future of British music.
BBC Radio 3's British Music Focus on Performance on 3 , 1 st -12 th December 2005 .
The British Composer Awards take place at the Barbican on 9 th December 2005 and are broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on Monday 12 th December.
Hogarth's musical imagery ![The Enraged Musician By Hogarth]()
Visit the Music Matters Hogarth Gallery
The London of William Hogarth in the early 18th Century was very different from the vibrant metropolis of today. It was a place of seething, stinking life which Hogarth recorded in his famous series of prints, including The Rake's Progress - a story later turned into an opera by Stravinsky in the 1950s. In amongst the scenes of political corruption and sensual debauchery, Hogarth depicts musicians to illustrate his satirical themes. From the grotesque players of street bands to the refined Italianate professionals, the imagery contributes to the complex meaning of Hogarth's prints. Jeremy Barlow explores the relationship between Hogarth's art and music in his new book and talks to Tom about the prints at Hogarth's House in Chiswick, West London , alongside the Chairman of the William Hogarth Trust, Val Bott.
Jeremy Barlow: The Enraged Musician - Hogarth's Musical Imagery. Pub. Ashgate, £65 (hardback).
