American composers 20th century almanac Robert Palmer: Memorial Music
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American composers 20th century Almanac a series of original compositions by
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young American composers commissioned and recorded by the University of Michigan broadcasting
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service under a grant in aid from the National Educational Television and Radio Center in
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cooperation with the National Association of educational broadcasters. These
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compositions were written to highlight important American holidays or seasonal
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observances. Today we're going to hear the first performance of a
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solemn observance from Memorial music 1058 by Robert
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Palmer. It will be played by the honors orchestra of the National Music Camp at Interlochen
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Michigan Orian Dolly conducting. But first here is Robert Palmer the
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composer with a few words about his composition
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memorial music.
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I was happy to learn that in the commissions for works appropriate to the
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series of national holidays that I should have been assigned Memorial Day
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the nature of the series indicates the kind of mature and imaginative thinking
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characteristic of the National Association of educational broadcasters.
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It is also the sort of commission composers today have all too seldom
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which is to write music in their own terms to fill a very specific functional
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need. I would like to discuss two aspects of my approach
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to the problems of this commission. First the holiday itself and its
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meaning for me and them some thoughts on my approach to the creation
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of the work itself. During my earliest
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days Memorial Day meant for me what was at that time an extensive
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trip with my family from Syracuse New York through the Cherry Valley and
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the Catskills to the beautiful country of the Hudson Valley where an annual
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reunion was held at a Dutch Reform Church in the valley below the
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Xango mountains. Here in one of the oldest churches in the area
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I buried my maternal ancestors. After the decoration of the
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graves in the morning we all assembled in the afternoon for a festive gathering at the
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farm of my great uncle at Montgomery New York. The
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holiday gods had at first a family significance which combined with the
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beauties of the scenery left an indelible impression. Long after these annual
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trips were no longer taken the same pattern of the more
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solemn morning and festive afternoon activities were characteristic of
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memorial days spent at home in later years. In the
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morning with the services and the decoration of the graves of war dead. Then
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in the early afternoon hours the various patriotic and civic groups would stage
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the Memorial Day parade down the Main Street and its thousands of counterparts
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across the land.
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The holiday was originated So my research tells me by the custom
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of Southern women throwing flowers on the graves of Southern as well as northern
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dead immediately after the Civil War. This fact
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which I had not known before I became even more poignant to me when I
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realized also that May 30th is not universally celebrated in these United
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States. The nature of the holiday has
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since lost most of its original narrower meaning and represents a tribute to
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those who have lost their lives in all the increasingly terrible wars of the last hundred
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years. I would like my memorial music
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to be thought of as perhaps thoughts of an American on Memorial Day.
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If I am representing anything it is my own thoughts on the significance of
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war in the past. And this includes the American past as well as the larger
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past from which we come. It also must include thoughts on the
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incredible change that war has undergone in our time. When the
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borderline between war and peace is increasingly hard to define.
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In deciding on a form for the work I very soon came to the idea of
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using the morning and afternoon relationship the emotional and
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dramatic basis was from the first derive from the more solemn and religious observances
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of the morning and the festive character of the traditional American parade.
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I have therefore divided the work into two parts. Calling the first part solemn
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observance and the second part. Traditional festivities
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the dichotomies of passive active solemn boisterous inward
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outward suggested a slow more serious and reflective movement
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for part one.
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In the first movement as well as in the second I have used closed
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form in the limited sense that the opening material of each
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movement is briefly stated at the end of that movement
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in the central portions of both movements. There was a free unfolding of the
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material which proceeds from expressive rather than from formal considerations.
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These two movements are probably the freest from the formal standpoint of any I have written.
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It is not possible for me to quote as did the late Charles Ives
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from American patriotic songs or hymns I was whose works on
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national subjects are as fine as any we have was able to use this material
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naturally and with great originality. I did feel that something of the
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nature of the solemn observance should begin to Caite it. It took care of
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itself when my initial idea for part one seemed to have a human like character.
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This idea and a few shorter fragments became the basis for the movement.
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I feel that I am in some sense a national composer in some works my focus has
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been and other than specifically American directions particularly in my art more abstract instrumental
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works. There is a series of more American works mostly
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associated with texts. A setting of Asia Lindsey's Abraham Lincoln
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walked at midnight for chorus an orchestra and an elegy for Thomas
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Wolfe called K-19 both from the mid forties belong to this
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group. More recently a chamber Cantata of Knight and
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the sea commissioned by the from Foundation contains a
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setting of Walt Whitman's out of the cradle endlessly rocking.
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I feel that memorial music like The Thomas Wolfe Elegy without text
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belongs to the group of my works with a somewhat more specifically national expression
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that was composer Robert Palmer's discussing his memorial music
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1958.
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We now hear a solemn observance from this work performed by the honors orchestra of the National
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Music Camp. Or am Dolly conducting it.
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The Boss.
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The owner.
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The
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Boss.
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The owner.
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The anything.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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You.
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Do.
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News.
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The
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boy.
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Her.
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Womb.
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That was a solemn observance from Memorial music 958 by Robert
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Palmer. This is been one in a series of original compositions by American
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composers American composers 20th century Almanac has been commissioned and
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recorded by the University of Michigan Broadcasting Service and regret in aid from
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the National Educational Television and Radio Center in cooperation with the National Association of
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educational broadcasters a consultant for the series has been Ross leaf any composer
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in residence at the University of Michigan. This is the N.A. E.B. Radio
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Network.
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