Show 117: In Memory of My Mother

[Added on 2015/7/18:  This used to be called Show 17.  I've renumbered the shows, so that this one is Show117.  For instance, the July 4^th show for this year will be numbered numbered Show201, and so on.  If you didn't figure this out yet, my first show aired the week of July 4th, 2014.]

Introduction  Part 1

Greetings to all our listeners, and a happy new year for 2015! I have been away all of December, while Curt, the station engineer set up repeat programs from August and September, at my request.

Peter Jelosits and friends

One of the reasons I had been away was that I had planned a memorial gathering for my mother, who had died around Thanksgiving. For this weekend, I’m going to feature music that my mother liked, or music that reminds me of her. She loved music, and she taught me a lot of the music that I know.

Mein gläubiges Herze

When my mother was about 45, she decided to sit for music examinations, in music theory, and singing.  One of the pieces she sang was this Bach aria I have played before: the title in English translation is My Heart ever Faithful, or in German, Mein gläubiges Herze.  Here it is sung by a boy soprano.  Don’t forget to look out for the extended ending, which is a trio for violin, oboe, and cello; actually a baby cello, called a cello piccolo.

Elly Ameling

Der Nussbaum

Another song Mum sang was the Nut Tree, or Der Nussbaum, by Robert Schumann.  Here it is, sung by Elly Ameling.

Sheep may safely graze

A family friend once told me that the piece “Sheep may safely graze,” which is an aria from a Bach cantata, had been played at my parents’ wedding.  I heard a transcription of it, and liked it, and I learned to play it on the piano and the organ, but when I asked my mother whether it was true that it was played at their wedding, she claimed that it hadn’t been.  “It certainly is lovely, but no; I think it was something else!”  But she liked to hear it.  My Dad died some years ago, and we had a memorial service for him (at which I was at the organ), with lots of music, but afterwards, Mom said she had been waiting for Sheep may safely graze, and I had not played it, and she had been disappointed!  Anyway, here is an instrumental version of it.  It is my own arrangement, based closely on the Bach original, and performed by MIDI instruments.

Isidore Godfrey

I am the very model of a modern Major-General

Mom loved the D’Oyly Carte Operas, the light operas by Gilbert and Sullivan.  One of the most famous songs from them is from Pirates of Penzance: The Major General Song.  It is sung here by Isidore Godfrey.

The Donkey Serenade  Part 2

My mother learned a lot of songs from the movies of her time.  One of these was Donkey Serenade.  Here is Alan Jones singing it.  One of these days, I’m going to steel myself to actually watch the movie!

Weggis Song

This next song was one that my mother taught people to sing at various camps.  It is a yodeling song from the Swiss Alps, I believe, about a town called Weggis, on Lake Lucerne.  This is the Weggis Song.

Dona Nobis Pacem

This piece is a round my Mom taught at a camp once, and apparently it was a popular things to sing at impromptu gatherings.  Anyway, our generation heard it there for the first time, and we sang it every chance we got.

Thomas Arne: Where the Bee Sucks

A song my mother loved to sing: Where the Bee Sucks, by Thomas Arne.  (We've played this before on our program.)  This is Emma Kirkby.

Byrd: Ave Verum Corpus 

My mother and I learned this song together, when we joined a music society.  This is Ave Verum Corpus by William Byrd.

Handel: Return, O God of Hosts

This is a family favorite, by Kathleen Ferrier, who was also a favorite singer in our family.

Take a pair of sparkling eyes

This is a song my mother used to sing every once in a while.  She sang all the time, while she was cooking, or doing the mending, or tidying up the place.  This is from The Gondoliers, by Gilbert and Sullivan.

Haydn: On mighty pens --from Creation

At one time, my mother sang with a choir called the Colombo Philharmonic, and they sang Haydn’s Creation.  I used to get taken along to practices, and I got to know this song, sung not by my mother, but by a wonderful soprano soloist, Joan Cooray.  This is Emma Kirkby.

Non so piu cosa son, cosa faccio

Now, as I said, my Mom decided to take singing lessons, and tried some music exams.  She passed a few, but when she sang this one, they refused to pass her.  It is supposed to be sung by a young boy, and they thought the choice was not a good one for a woman of about fifty.  She sang it as well as she could, but the Italian alone was pretty difficult.

Paul Robeson

Jerome Kern:  Old Man River --from Showboat

My mother sang a lot of songs by Paul Robeson.  I’m not sure where she heard them, but these next few were some of her favorites.  "Old Man River" is from Showboat.  The others are:

• The Lonesome Road
• Song of the Volga Boatmen

Part 3

I Dream of Jeannie With the Light Brown Hair

A favorite Stephen Foster song, sung by John McCormack, a popular singer of my mother's youth.  Another is: 

• Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms

Rara Venu Gopa bala

When I was very little, my mother taught me an Indian song she had learned, probably in school.  It is a traditional song sung in Telugu, a language that my mom did not understand at all.  South Indian, and particularly Telugu music, is in the Carnatic tradition, in which music is written in ragas.  A raga is both a collection of notes, as well as rules about how you’re allowed to arrive at a certain note, and how you’re allowed to leave the note.  (In addition, there are little characteristic melodic phrases that must appear in any song in that raga.)  This is tricky for little people to learn, so in school they’re taught catchy melodies in each important raga —and of course, they can learn the less-important ragas when they grow up, right?— and the songs teach the kids the rules of the raga, by example.  First they learn an easy song, such as the present one, called a Swarajati, and then they learn a definitive song, called a Varnam.  So there is a Varnam for each raga.  If you want to compose a raga —which is a major undertaking, because, essentially, you’re creating a framework for the compositions of other people— you have to compose a Varnam for your raga.  And of course, your Varnam will be carefully examined for consistency.  So this song is a Swarajati for the raga named Bilahari.  The Bilahari raga has an ascending scale which is pentatonic, and a descending scale, which is our usual major scale.  The song is about Lord Krishna, when he was a young shepherd.

Kathleen Ferrier

Gluck -- Orfeo et Euridice: What is Life?

Kathleen Ferrier was a favorite singer in our home.  She was a gifted contralto, who lived around the time of World War 2, but she died very young, of throat cancer.  We know her mostly from the recordings she made, with quite famous accompanists, orchestras and conductors.
This first song is from the opera Orfeo, by Gluck, who lived about the time of Mozart.  In this song, Eurydice has just died, and Orpheus is grieving, disgusted, and furious with the gods.  He sings: What is life without Eurydice?
The next few songs by Kathleen Ferrier, many of them also sung by my mother, are:

• Handel: Largo Ombra mai fu (Serse)
• Mendelssohn: O Rest in the Lord (Elijah)
• The Keel Row
• Purcell: Sound the trumpet

the last sung by Kathleen Ferrier and Isobel Bailey.

• Schubert: To music
• Coming through the rye

both sung by Isobel Bailey.

Tom Lehrer: The Elements

Self-explanatory (Tom Lehrer introduces his song.)

Gerschwin: Overture to Porgy and Bess

[This segment is not included in the podcast, but in case you listened to the broadcast, and were wondering what it was, I include this information.]

Archie