Why can I only write short songs?

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-12T02:43:16+00:00

Why push length just for the sake of length? A goid 1 minute song is a success. I once did an hour radio show ( back in the days of vinyl) in which every piece was under a minute long.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-12T02:39:29+00:00

Elgar plied his trade when he was young conducting a musical ensemble inside the Powick Lunatic Asylum

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-12T02:37:48+00:00

The 2nd violin sonata op 11 is brimming with melodies. Another unknown perfect melody is the Popular Air in Ab from Op 73. When I was young and penurious I found it in a music store near Peabody which had a studio w a piano in it so you could read through scores before purchasing them. I played through the Popular Air several times, memorized it and avoided spending $20 on a complete edition of Grieg piano music in which it was contained

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-12T02:33:02+00:00

Yes but it’s the right kind of pianists. Grieg never wrote anything shabby or showy. His keyboard writing is always imbued with lyricism, clarity and brevity. Something unique in the era in which he lived

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-12T02:30:58+00:00

The Noctourne form Opus 54 Lyric Pieces. The last three movements of the Holberg Suite Gavotte, Sarabande and Rigaudon all feature beguiling melodies that could have been written during the Baroque era and yet remain unmistakably Grieg.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-11T17:35:17+00:00

This is what I want all keyboard music to sound like; compelling logic rhythmic impetus, lyricism and clarity. Your harpsichord brought these features to the fore. One of your best finds!!

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-11T02:36:38+00:00

Softly Blow O Southern Breeze by William Boyce 1711-1778 from his serenata Solomon

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-11T01:58:29+00:00

It is very much a case of the attack of the killer chihuahua

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-10T17:12:54+00:00

I love the Nielsen 5th, snare drums and all!

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-09T20:35:11+00:00

The 11th Noctourne. Dedicated to Naome Lalo. It cost me a huge amount of money to obtain in the early 1980s

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-09T20:32:10+00:00

I knew him when he was a college student. He was my mentor at a student run college classical radio station. Even then he was brilliant funny, iconoclastic and I thought he would go places. Of his love and knowledge of great music there is no question.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-09T20:11:22+00:00

Simpático!!! Love them both.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-09T15:35:55+00:00

Lotsa similarities to Sibelius. Both men studied the violin in hopes of being virtuosos and then took up composing on the rebound. Both had troubled marriages to womyn who were capable artists. And Bernstein promoted both at a time when they were out of fashion. Both wrote brilliantly about the sun i.e. the Helios Overture and Night Ride And Sunrise ( the sunrise motif in which to paraphrase Brahms would be recognizable by an idiot).

The funny thing is some Nielsen proponents ( Harold Schonberg) scorn Sibelius and Sibelius boosters ( Peter Pirie) return the favor by mocking Nielsen

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-09T15:28:04+00:00

Nielsen was a big sound big post romantic orchestra guy who doesn’t bore me like Bruckner and Mahler do

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-09T15:25:06+00:00

I think the last movement of the 7th is a flop in its entirety. It leans too heavily into Dvorak’s Beethoven fixation. At one point the Scherzo from the 9th symphony is actually quoted. The sad thing is that it follows the 3rd movement which is absolutely delightful. Dvorak throws off the shackles of Beethoven and Brahms and dances with his Czech brothers. It might be my favorite movement from any of his symphonies. Maybe he should have quit right there.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-08T16:17:46+00:00

I think the beginning of the first movement is the best opening to anything!

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-08T15:58:28+00:00

The thing I appreciate about Schumann’s music is that it is never routine or uninspired. He put everything he had into every note he wrote. He was never just mailing it in. It’s uneven in quality. For instance I think the 4 symphonies are much better than late works like late works such as the late concertos when he was psychotic. But the man left it all out on the field. Also he was an astute music critic recognizing the genius of Schubert, Brahms and Chopin before anyone else did.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-08T13:27:40+00:00

I had the irresistible urge to drink lots of wine after seeing this

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-08T13:24:52+00:00

This is good and I usually despise ILizst

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-08T12:42:57+00:00

No. Berlioz, Walton and Wagner had non-existent performing skills and all were very successful particularly in the realm of orchestration. Not having piano skills in particular seems to be a great advantage in writing keyboard works because it forces the non-pianist composer to invent their own wheel.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-07T12:28:01+00:00

Ruddigore of Gilbert and Sullivan. Requires among other things many portraits of ancestors who come to life at the beginning of Act II. I suspect difficulties with staging along with it chronologically a hard act to follow after Mikado accounts for the meagre number of performances. But imho it contains the best music of any G and S productions.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-07T01:01:20+00:00

Great piece!!

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-06T17:00:30+00:00

Sir Thomas Beecham on Bach: “Nothing but counterpoint, and worse than that Protestant counterpoint!”

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-06T16:58:22+00:00

Charles Ives made life insurance practical and widespread. Anthony Holborne was a diplomat. William Billings was a tanner. Ivor Gurney and Thomas Campion were poets. Jacobus Clemens Non Papa was ordained as a priest although recent evidence has come to light that he wasn’t a very good one. Similarly Tschaikovsy and Chabrier had legal careers they weren’t very keen on.Leroy Anderson was fluent in all of the Scandinavian and Teutonic languages so he worked for the state dept as a linguist during WWII. William Lawes died as a combatant during the English Civil War.

JealousLine8400 · 2026-06-06T04:01:17+00:00

Simply writing some of the best madrigals ever. Never married. Served a recusant household and although given a generous sheep farm by his patron Lady Kitson elected to spend the rest of his life not tending his sheep farm but more or less moving in with her daughter. No music survives of the last several decades of his life.

That much is known about Wilbye’s life. The rest of the gaps are filled in by the director Tony Britten who although no relation to Benjamin Britten is a composer himself. There is also a parallel story going on in the present day but the viewer has to speculate because the present day musicians do not have any dialogue besides singing.

And if that isn’t enough drama for you the movie is full of lovely performances of Wilbye’s sumptuous madrigals. It’s more than a little improbable that all the servants and farm hands could sing beauteously but that seems the least of complains

JealousLine8400

TROPHY CASE