![]() ![]() īecause he composed the music without the benefit of knowing what the title was going to be, Copland was often amused when people told him he captured the beauty of the Appalachians in his music, a fact he alluded to in an interview with NPR's Fred Calland. The word spring denotes a source of water in the Crane poem however, the ballet is a journey to meet springtime. Steep, inaccessible smile that eastward bendsĪnd northward reaches in that violet wedge O Appalachian Spring! I gained the ledge Shortly before the premiere, Graham suggested Appalachian Spring, a phrase from a Hart Crane poem, "The Dance", from a collection of poems in his book, The Bridge. Originally, Copland did not have a title for the work, referring to it simply as "Ballet for Martha" – a title as simple and direct as the Shaker tune, Simple Gifts, quoted in the music. The latter was credited as more important in popularizing the composer. The original ballet and the orchestral suite were well received. The 1954 version was recorded by Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony for RCA Victor in May 1999. The 1944 version was recorded in 1973 by Copland himself directing the Columbia Chamber Orchestra, and by Hugh Wolff and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra for Teldec in 1991. Thus, there are four versions of Appalachian Spring: 1944, 13-player complete 1945, orchestral suite 1954, orchestral complete and 1972, 13-player suite. In 1972, Boosey & Hawkes published a version of the suite using the scoring of the original ballet. In 1954, Eugene Ormandy asked Copland to expand the orchestration for the full score of the ballet. The Orchestral Suite from 1945 was first recorded by Serge Koussevitzky with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. It is a condensed version of the ballet, retaining all essential features but omitting those sections in which the interest is primarily choreographic. The present arrangement for symphony orchestra was made by the composer in the Spring of 1945. The original scoring called for a chamber ensemble of thirteen instruments. From the preface in the original Boosey & Hawkes publication of the suite: Copland cut about 10 minutes from the original 13-instrument score to make the suite. In 1945, Copland was commissioned by conductor Artur Rodziński to rearrange the ballet as an orchestral suite, preserving most of the music. Copland did the bulk of the work in 1943–44, and the work was premiered at the Library of Congress on October 30, 1944, with Graham dancing the lead role. In 1942, Martha Graham and Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge commissioned Copland to write a ballet with "an American theme". One of the last of his creative accomplishments was the completion of his two-volume autobiography, an essential document in understanding the growth of American music in the twentieth century.Problems playing this file? See media help. By the mid-'70s, Copland had for all intents and purposes ceased composing. In 1958, he began conducting orchestras around the world, performing works by 80 other composers as well as his own over the next 20 years. This is nowhere more in evidence than in Copland's ballets of this period, and it finally earned him mass acclaim. By the mid-1930s, taking the direct engagement of and communication with audiences as one of his central tenets, Copland's compositions developed an "American" style marked by folk influences, a new melodic and harmonic simplicity, and an appealing directness free from intellectual pretension. He tried to avoid taking a university position, instead writing for journals and newspapers, organizing concerts, and taking on administrative duties for composers' organizations, trying to promote American music. The most representative work of this period–the Piano Variations (1930)–remains one of the composer's seminal efforts. Boulanger's performance of Copland's 1924 Organ Symphony with Koussevitzky was the beginning of a friendship between the conductor and composer that led to Copland teaching at the Berkshire Music Center (now Tanglewood) from 1940 until 1965.Īfter his return to America, Copland drifted toward an incisive, austere style that captured something of the sobriety of Depression-torn America. He went on to study in Paris with Ricardo Vií±es and Nadia Boulanger and spent the next three years in Europe. In 1921, he went to Fontainebleau, France, taking conducting and composition classes at the American Conservatory. Instead of attending college, Copland studied theory and composition with Rubin Goldmark and piano with Victor Wittgenstein and Clarence Adler, and attended as many concerts, operas, and ballets as possible. He did not take formal piano lessons until he was 13. Copland was the youngest of five children born to Harris and Sarah Copland, Lithuanian Jewish immigrants who owned a department store in Brooklyn. ![]()
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