Classical Works Spotlight #329--Copland And A Quiet City

[erik]

A failed play by Irwin Shaw nevertheless provides another boon to the prestige of America's greatest composer in the form of a short work that is in this week's Classical Works Spotlight.

Copland: QUIET CITY

There was no way imaginable that even the “Dean of American Composers” Aaron Copland could not be influenced by the increasingly popular style known as Jazz. Ironically, however, he didn’t develop his taste for it in America itself, but in France in the 1920s while studying with Nadia Boulanger, and witnessing the French population’s taste for it. The style would inform many of his best-known shorter orchestral works, one of which was the “urban nocturne” known as “Quiet City.” He had written this work in 1939 as part of incidental music for a production of the Irwin Shaw play of the same name, about two brothers, one of whom rejects his Jewish heritage to become a businessman, and the other who becomes a jazz trumpet player. For Shaw, this was one of his few works to be an unmitigated flop, closing after a mere two preview performances. But Copland managed to extract this work from the ashes, a work that is basically a mini-concerto for trumpet and English horn (the latter representing the businessman brother with a guilty conscience), and which, if nothing else, reflects the impressions that Copland always had for his native New York City, no matter how far afield his music may have wandered elsewhere.



Trumpet: NEIL BAUM
English Horn: MARK HILL

New York Chamber Symphony Orchestra/GERARD SCHWARZ (EMI)

Included:
CLARINET CONCERTO (Clarinet: DAVID SHIFRIN)
MUSIC FOR THE THEATRE (Clarinet: DAVID SHIFRIN) (Trumpet: NEIL BAUM) (English Horn: MARK HILL)
DANCE PANELS

[egoodstein]

I think I've only ever heard this piece once, and recall liking, particularly for the interesting combination of trumpet/English horn. Copland of course a fascinating composer of music that 'bridges' forms, and very adept at that. That's interesting that AC's interest in jazz came from Paris 'sojourn':  certainly an interesting perspective in those years.

Thanks for heads up-- I will definitely check out this recording. I like the clarinet concerto quite a bit too, and David Shifrin is fine player.

[erik]

"Quiet City" is, in some ways, a single-movement concerto for trumpet and English horn, although Copland himself usually referred to it is an "orchestral nocturne", which in a lot of ways it is as well. For a lot of those reasons, and not just out of what might be perceived as nationalistic American pride, he was one of the titans of 20th century music, a sentiment that many around the world share (IMHO).