A Christmas Music Countdown - A Christmas Festival
Christmas can’t begin soon enough for me, musically speaking. Actually, the holiday season began back in October, when the bands began practicing the music for the Christmas concerts. My tradition in terms of recorded music is to begin with my favorite concert piece, “A Christmas Festival.” It’s on a CD called “Encore Christmas with the Boston Pops,” directed by Arthur Fiedler and John Williams, of Star Wars and Indiana Jones fame.
"Christmas Festival” starts the Christmas season out with a bang, which puts it among my very favorites. My count-down isn’t so much about what song is number one, but why it’s an important piece of holiday music on a particular day.
Every musician knows “Christmas Festival” from their days as high school musicians. It’s the high school band “chestnut;” you can depend upon it, if you’re a high school musician, you will perform this number with your band at least once before you graduate.
And with good reason: it’s a wonderful medley of Christmas songs: Joy to the World, Jingle Bells, Silent Night, played masterfully and gently by the Boston Pops on this CD. As a chime player, it’s my favorite chime piece to play. This CD also has what is possibly the most stirring instrumental arrangement of “White Christmas” I’ve ever heard – but we’ll talk about that later (get your hankies ready, though).
Back to Christmas Festival. It’s a long number (particularly for the musicians!) but as it begins with a bang, it ends with a rousing finish that just makes you want to jump up and cheer (unless you’re playing the tuba, in which case standing is in advisable), even if you’ve been playing it every year for 40 or 50 years. The original composition, written in 1950, was 9 minutes long. Two years later, Anderson put out a shorter version, 5:45 long.
Leroy Anderson was a popular composer who certainly knew what audiences wanted to hear and he gave it to them. He’s best known now for “Sleigh Ride” and the ubiquitous “Sleigh Ride” but he also wrote “Blue Tango” (his first hit), “Belle of the Ball,” and “The Typewriter.” The last explains why kids don’t know some of his other tunes.
He was born in Cambridge, Mass., on June 29, 1908. His parents were Swedish immigrants. His father was postal clerk who played the mandolin. His mother was organist at the Swedish Church in Cambridge. Leroy studied piano and music at the New England Conservatory of Music and later graduated from Harvard University, where he earned his bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD degrees. He spoke 9 languages.
So you’d think this guy, after earning all those degrees in music, wanted to be a professional composer or something, right? Nope; he wanted to be a language teacher (his doctorate was in Languages), but changed his mind at the last minute to give music “one last try,” although he did serve as a translator and interpreter during World War II in the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps. He was promoted to Captain and while assigned to the Pentagon as Chief of the Scandinavian Department of Intelligence, he wrote “The Syncopated Clock” and conducted the Boston Pops Orchestra when the song premiered. He finally left the service to devote himself full-time to composing. Thanks to his upbringing and his education, he was close friends with Arthur Fiedler, who helped popularize Anderson’s compositions.
Leroy Anderson died in 1975. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1976 and Harvard University named its Harvard University Band headquarters the Anderson Band Center in 1995 in his honor. * Source: Wikipedia
Be sure to put “Christmas Festival” – in whatever CD version you choose, though “Encore Christmas” is wonderful – on your Black Friday list. Maybe Anderson is now a dead white, Scandinavian-American composer, but he sure knew how to start the Christmas holidays off!
"Christmas Festival” starts the Christmas season out with a bang, which puts it among my very favorites. My count-down isn’t so much about what song is number one, but why it’s an important piece of holiday music on a particular day.
Every musician knows “Christmas Festival” from their days as high school musicians. It’s the high school band “chestnut;” you can depend upon it, if you’re a high school musician, you will perform this number with your band at least once before you graduate.
And with good reason: it’s a wonderful medley of Christmas songs: Joy to the World, Jingle Bells, Silent Night, played masterfully and gently by the Boston Pops on this CD. As a chime player, it’s my favorite chime piece to play. This CD also has what is possibly the most stirring instrumental arrangement of “White Christmas” I’ve ever heard – but we’ll talk about that later (get your hankies ready, though).
Back to Christmas Festival. It’s a long number (particularly for the musicians!) but as it begins with a bang, it ends with a rousing finish that just makes you want to jump up and cheer (unless you’re playing the tuba, in which case standing is in advisable), even if you’ve been playing it every year for 40 or 50 years. The original composition, written in 1950, was 9 minutes long. Two years later, Anderson put out a shorter version, 5:45 long.
Leroy Anderson was a popular composer who certainly knew what audiences wanted to hear and he gave it to them. He’s best known now for “Sleigh Ride” and the ubiquitous “Sleigh Ride” but he also wrote “Blue Tango” (his first hit), “Belle of the Ball,” and “The Typewriter.” The last explains why kids don’t know some of his other tunes.
He was born in Cambridge, Mass., on June 29, 1908. His parents were Swedish immigrants. His father was postal clerk who played the mandolin. His mother was organist at the Swedish Church in Cambridge. Leroy studied piano and music at the New England Conservatory of Music and later graduated from Harvard University, where he earned his bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD degrees. He spoke 9 languages.
So you’d think this guy, after earning all those degrees in music, wanted to be a professional composer or something, right? Nope; he wanted to be a language teacher (his doctorate was in Languages), but changed his mind at the last minute to give music “one last try,” although he did serve as a translator and interpreter during World War II in the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps. He was promoted to Captain and while assigned to the Pentagon as Chief of the Scandinavian Department of Intelligence, he wrote “The Syncopated Clock” and conducted the Boston Pops Orchestra when the song premiered. He finally left the service to devote himself full-time to composing. Thanks to his upbringing and his education, he was close friends with Arthur Fiedler, who helped popularize Anderson’s compositions.
Leroy Anderson died in 1975. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1976 and Harvard University named its Harvard University Band headquarters the Anderson Band Center in 1995 in his honor. * Source: Wikipedia
Be sure to put “Christmas Festival” – in whatever CD version you choose, though “Encore Christmas” is wonderful – on your Black Friday list. Maybe Anderson is now a dead white, Scandinavian-American composer, but he sure knew how to start the Christmas holidays off!
posted by Belle | 4:56 PM
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