Music Inspired by Shakespeare

Started by calyptorhynchus, April 15, 2016, 01:54:15 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Print
Go Down Pages1 2
User actions

calyptorhynchus

April 15, 2016, 01:54:15 AM
Saturday week, 23 April, is the 400th anniversary of the death of Shakespeare.

What pieces of music inspired by Shakespeare do you like?

Off the top of my head I can think of Mendelssohn's Overture and Incidental Music to A Midsummer Night's Dream; Finzi's Incidental Music to Love's Labours Lost and his Shakespearean song-cycle Let us Garlands Bring and Sibelius's Incidental Music to the Tempest.

(Beethoven's Coriolan Overture is written to a different treatment of the story by a contemporary German dramatist).
'Many men are melancholy by hearing music, but it is a pleasing melancholy that it causeth.' Robert Burton

'...is it not strange that sheepes guts should hale soules out of mens bodies?' Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing

Scion7

#1
April 15, 2016, 02:13:12 AM
They'll probably move this to General Classical Music Discussion since it is not a thread on a specific composer.  But 'The Tempest' and 'Romeo and Juliet' and 'Hamlet' have all been subjects for more than one composer - Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, and more.
Saint-Saëns, who predicted to Charles Lecocq in 1901: 'That fellow Ravel seems to me to be destined for a serious future.'

vandermolen

#2
April 15, 2016, 03:25:15 AM Last Edit: April 15, 2016, 04:10:00 AM by vandermolen
Alwyn's 'The Magic Island' after 'The Tempest'

Sibelius 'The Tempest' - I especially like the complete score on BIS as it includes a lovely noble theme for Prospero which is not included on either of the suites from the score.

David Diamond 'Romeo and Juliet' I like the Prokofiev ballet too and Tchaikovsky's tone poem.

Tchaikovsky 'Hamlet'.

Honegger 'The Tempest Prelude'

If film scores are allowed I'd include Miklos Rozsa's 'Juius Caesar' and Walton's 'Henry V' and 'As you Like It' and Michael Nyman's score for 'Prospero's Books'.

Vaughan Williams's score 'Three Portraits from the England of Elizabeth' features a movement 'Poet' which is a musical depiction of Shakespeare.

"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Scion7

#3
April 15, 2016, 03:31:38 AM
Saint-Saëns, who predicted to Charles Lecocq in 1901: 'That fellow Ravel seems to me to be destined for a serious future.'

vandermolen

#4
April 15, 2016, 03:49:00 AM
Quote from: Scion7 on April 15, 2016, 03:31:38 AM
This might be of interest:   http://www.gramophone.co.uk/features/focus/shakespeare-and-music

Interesting article. A while back Gramophone magazine did a survey of music inspired by The Tempest but left out 'The Magic Island' by William Alwyn which is actually my favourite work inspired by The Tempest. I wrote to them about it and they printed my letter which was nice.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

pjme

#5
April 15, 2016, 04:01:29 AM
There's a huge variety - from Berlioz ' Roméo et Juliette to Hans Werner Henze ( eight symphony ) and beyond...

Miloslav Kabelac's Hamlet improvisation

https://youtu.be/1a0lmH3lW8c

Frank Martin's The tempest

https://youtu.be/kDUHg3y3gBQ

Florent Schmitt



Gösta Nystroem



Etc.

Peter

vandermolen

#6
April 15, 2016, 04:05:11 AM
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

pjme

#7
April 15, 2016, 04:27:10 AM Last Edit: April 15, 2016, 05:27:37 AM by pjme
Very recent : Hans Abrahamsen : Let me tell you.

http://www.barbarahannigan.com/press/abrahamsen-let-me-tell-you/

Santiago Quinto's Hamlet symphony

https://youtu.be/vwEBR6sUuFU


Fun: Smetana March for the Shakespeare Festival!

https://youtu.be/5fkX7jMCalI

Stunning: Joan Sutherland as Ophélie in Ambroise Thomas' opera..

https://youtu.be/XhZAeZmZIPo


Aribert Reimann: Lear - heavy!

https://youtu.be/sZ5srOEgJFQ




(poco) Sforzando

#8
April 15, 2016, 05:11:14 AM
Quote from: vandermolen on April 15, 2016, 03:49:00 AM
Interesting article. A while back Gramophone magazine did a survey of music inspired by The Tempest but left out 'The Magic Island' by William Alwyn which is actually my favourite work inspired by The Tempest. I wrote to them about it and they printed my letter which was nice.

Did they include Egon Wellesz's Prospero's Spells?
"I don't know what sforzando means, though it clearly means something."

vandermolen

#10
April 15, 2016, 06:18:03 AM Last Edit: April 15, 2016, 06:26:41 AM by vandermolen
Quote from: (poco) Sforzando on April 15, 2016, 05:11:14 AM
Did they include Egon Wellesz's Prospero's Spells?
No, I don't think so. Never heard of it and it sounds most interesting. I like his Symphony 2 'The English' very much.
Thanks v much for the YouTube link pjme. It sounds great - have just ordered the CD.  ::)
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Sergeant Rock

#11
April 15, 2016, 06:48:25 AM
Dvorak Othello Overture

https://www.youtube.com/v/rjuvCLdxdm0


Sarge
the phone rings and somebody says,
"hey, they made a movie about
Mahler, you ought to go see it.
he was as f*cked-up as you are."
                               --Charles Bukowski, "Mahler"

pjme

#12
April 15, 2016, 09:53:49 AM
Quote from: vandermolen on April 15, 2016, 06:18:03 AM
No, I don't think so. Never heard of it and it sounds most interesting. I like his Symphony 2 'The English' very much.
Thanks v much for the YouTube link pjme. It sounds great - have just ordered the CD.  ::)

I was glad to re-discover it at this very moment. I did buy the cd some years ago. "Prospero's Beschwörungen" is just splendid.

There is an incredible amount of -often- excellent music inspired by Shakespeare. !

Take Julius Caesar:

Hans Rott in 1877: https://youtu.be/46oBNMFnXd8

Robert Kurka in 1955: https://youtu.be/N750UtuCi50

Mario Castenuovo Tedesco in 1934: https://youtu.be/dob5ZwkMIqQ

Rudolf Tobias in 1896: https://youtu.be/VgiQ9EIqbUk





Jo498

#13
April 15, 2016, 12:24:49 PM
One of the most famous German comic operas is "Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor" (The merry wives of Windsor) by Otto Nicolai. Like other (comic) operas from the mid-19th century it is not quite as popular as it used to be until about 40 years ago, but at least the ouverture remains well known (it was included in one of Kleiber's New Year's concerts).

It's not clear if Beethoven's op.31/2 has really anything to do with Shakespeare's tempest. There is no obvious connection and Schindler might have made it up...
Tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos, dans une chambre.
- Blaise Pascal

calyptorhynchus

#14
April 15, 2016, 01:51:33 PM
Thanks for all these suggestions, of course Shakespearean operas are many, with Verdi's Otello, Macbeth and Falstaff being notable. I like Vaughan William's Sir John in Love and Holst's At the Boar's Head. Walton's scores for Richard III, Hamlet and Henry V...

I've always been a bit cool on Elgar's Falstaff, never really seems to get going until halfway through.
'Many men are melancholy by hearing music, but it is a pleasing melancholy that it causeth.' Robert Burton

'...is it not strange that sheepes guts should hale soules out of mens bodies?' Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing

Chronochromie

#15
April 15, 2016, 02:40:36 PM
Berlioz's Roméo et Juliette

Verdi's Otello  and Falstaff

Sciarrino's Macbeth

Probably others that I can't recall right now.

kishnevi

#16
April 15, 2016, 05:30:48 PM
Wikipedia says the source was Chaucer's narrative poem, but the Shakespearean version must have had an impact on this opera, which it so happens I am listening to now


Other works which can be included (some mentioned before)
Purcell's Fairy Queen (Midsummer Night's Dream)
Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream
Wagner's Liebesverbot (Measure for Measure)
Riemann's King Lear
Berlioz's Beatrice et Benedict
Barber's Antony and Cleopatra

Shakespeare's poem on the Rape of Lucretia might be an influence on Britten's opera.

Then there is the mashup of Tempest and Midsummer Night's Dream which provided the excuse  for the Metropolitan Opera's pastiche, The Enchanted Island.

Jo498

#17
April 16, 2016, 12:12:59 AM
There is Music for The Tempest attributed to Purcell but maybe from someone else (not sure about state of research).
Tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos, dans une chambre.
- Blaise Pascal

listener

#18
April 16, 2016, 12:37:49 AM
Quote from: Jo498 on April 16, 2016, 12:12:59 AM
There is Music for The Tempest attributed to Purcell but maybe from someone else (not sure about state of research).
Paul CHIHARA, recorded on Reference RR10-CD  - a full-length ballet I saw in San Francisco in 1980, I think.   And in the opera section GOETZ The Taming of the Shrew (Der Widerspänstigen Zähmung)
"Keep your hand on the throttle and your eye on the rail as you walk through life's pathway."

Maestro267

#19
April 16, 2016, 10:39:04 AM
Besides many of the usual suspects (Tchaikovsky x3, Prokofiev, Berlioz et al.), I'd like to nominate Shostakovich's 1964 film score Hamlet.
Print
Go Up Pages1 2
User actions