how to listen to music if you don’t know your Beethoven from your Bach, XIII – Antonin Dvořák

American Gothic, 1930 - Grant Wood

    “American Gothic“ (1930) 

 

                Grant Wood        

 

                      ______

   

if you were able to hear the difference

in my last communication between

Vienna and New York in the two

rhapsodies I compared, contemporaries,

incidentally, you might be interested in

a European composer, highly

underestimated in my opinion, who

bridges both cultures by composing a

tribute to the country that receives him,

gloriously, for a couple of years, before

he returns, homesick, to his beloved

Bohemia, which is to say, Prague,

Antonín Dvořák, don’t ask, 1841 – 1904

 

here’s his 12th String Quartet, nicknamed

the “American”, listen, you’ll understand

why

 

here’s his New World Symphony, again

you’ll understand why

 

fun facts, Neil Armstrong brought a

recording of it, the New World

Symphony, with him to the moon

during the first manned landing,

back in 1969, can you get more

cool than that

 

also, this particular version is from

Pyongyang, which is to say, North

Korea, which is to say, the audience

here is nearly as interesting as the

symphony itself, do they even

speak the language, if they grew

up on Chinese opera

 

do you

 

 

R ! chard