By Daniel Hathaway
HAPPENING TODAY:
At noon, Oziah Wales plays Julius Reubke’s Sonata on the 94th Psalm at the Church of the Covenant.
Not happening: The Severance Music Center concert by the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra originally scheduled for this evening has been postponed.
Check our Concert Listings for forthcoming events.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
On September 26, 1800, New England composer William Billings died in Boston, French conductor Charles Munch was born in Strasbourg in 1891, and American composer and trombonist William Dawson was born in Anniston, Alabama in 1890.
Billings departed the scene too early to have left recordings, but Ross W. Duffin and Quire Cleveland brought his infectious motet I Am the Rose of Sharon to life in a concert at Historic St. Peter’s Church in April, 2014. The piece sets words from the Biblical Song of Songs (“Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples…”) Watch here. Pictured below: Billings’ hymn tune Chester from 1781.
Here’s a clip of a performance of “The Shepherds’ Farewell to the Holy Family” from Berlioz’ L’Enfance du Christ with Charles Munch conducting the Boston Symphony, Harvard Glee Club, and Radcliffe Choral Society in December of 1966, a luminous performance of a work that should be heard more frequently (the entire oratorio is available on DVD — see the notes).
William L. Dawson (pictured above) brought the Tuskegee Institute Choir to such a level that the ensemble was invited to sing six daily performances at New York City’s Radio City Music Hall in 1932. His arrangements of spirituals are classics, and his Negro Folk Symphony was premiered by Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1934. Click here to watch a performance by The Orchestra Now (TŌN), conducted by Leon Botstein in a live streamed concert from the Fisher Center at Bard College on September 11, 2021.
