June 2nd, 2006
Charles Tomlinson Griffes
If you don’t know his music, allow me to introduce you to Charles Tomlinson Griffes (1884 - 1920). I won’t clog up this blog with his bio, if you would like to know more about this fellow, Naxos has a handsome summary. He studied with Englebert Humperdinck (the original one) because at that time an American composer was not considered legitimate unless he studied in Europe. (America still has this unfortunate false idea about conductors.) He has a huge catalog of songs. You’ll hear his German period, a French period, and at the end, there was a marvelous fusion: people called him an American impressionist. He was an excellent pianist, and I don’t think you will be disappointed procuring a CD of his piano music. Griffes was also gay. (He liked policemen. Read “Gay New York” excerpt on CTG). His most famous works are “The White Peacock” and “The Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan” which exist as piano pieces as well as in orchestral versions. My favorite piano pieces are the “Three Fantasy Pieces” and Three Tone Pictures, op.5 (1910-15).
Oh, did I mention that I was a big Griffes fan?
August 6th, 2006 at 8:04 am
[...] 1. Red Black Window. Composer/professor Roger Bourland’s tastes (and lifestyle) are somewhat different than mine but anyone with a “GRIFFES” license plate deserves to be read. 2. PostClassic. Kyle Gann knows too much about American classical music, classical music, “downtown music”, portable disk drives as music archives etc. I think he’s also a native Texan but he maintains our intellectual interest, nonetheless. 3. The Standing Room. Not as much about parking lately but still interesting and fun. 4. Renewable Music. His music landmarks list is diverse and well-articulated as is his blog in general. 5. Theatre of Found Sounds. Another sophisticated take on musical truth. 6. Coolfer. Record industry news and links. I wish my industry had such an exceptional blog. Hmm. 7. Kinderkuchen for the FBI. I share almost none of her operatic interests but I’ll defend to the death her right to blog about it. Ok, maybe not to the death, but still… 8. NewMusicBox. 9. Playbill Arts. 10. Sequenza21 news. [...]