Simple Gifts on internet radio

My Future Radio programme at 5.00pm UK time on Sunday November 25 has an all American theme for the Thanksgiving Holiday, but with an East Anglian twist. Aaron Copland’s first set of Old American Songs was commissioned by Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears for the 1951 Aldeburgh Festival here in East Anglia. There are five songs in the set, and the fourth is the traditional Shaker tune Simple Gifts, and that melody appears in different guises in all the works in the programme. I am playing Susan Chilcott's performance of the Old American Songs accompanied pianist Iain Burnside. Tragically Susan Chilcott died of cancer at the age of 40 just a year after this recording was made.

Simple Gifts has appeared in many different versions over the years, including one by Wilson Picket. But for the central sequence of the programme I'm going back to the song in its original version. It is sung by the Shakers of Sabbathday Lake in Maine augmented by the Schola Cantorum, Boston in a sequence of five Shaker chants and spirituals. The recording I am playing is a real find, read about it here.

For the final music in the programme I turn to one of the most celebrated re-imaginings of Simple Gifts. Aaron Copland's ballet Appalachian Spring was commissioned by the Martha Graham Dance Company, and uses the Shaker melody in the scene where the newly-weds are blessed. The ballet was first performed in Washington DC in 1944, and my header photo is from the original production.

Listen by launching the Radeo internet player from the right side-bar, or direct from the audio stream at 5.00pm on Sunday November 25. Convert to local time zones here. My programme of Simple Gifts is dedicated to Maurice Béjart who died on November 22, 2007, aged 80.

Now read how Aaron Copland found 'tis the gift to be free.
No photo credit, just who owns Martha Graham? Windows Media Player doesn't like the audio stream very much and takes ages to buffer. WinAmp or iTunes handle it best. Unfortunately the royalty license doesn't permit on-demand replay, so you have to listen in real time. If you are in the Norwich, UK area tune to 96.9FM. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Nice one BBC Radio 3

Nice that my article Classical music - revolutionary, elitist, popular supplied the closing moments for this morning's BBC Radio 3 programme on the French presidential elections. Even nicer that presenter Iain Burnside name checked On An Overgrown Path twice, and credited, my translation of Nicolas Sarkozy's comment. You can hear the programme here until 29th April; you need to listen at 1 hour 54 minutes, and there is a fast-forward facility.

As I've written here before Iain Burnside's Sunday morning programme is a shining example of intelligent radio, together with Michael Berkeley's Private Passions. It is surrounded by a rising tide of mediocrity, and is one of the few Radio 3 time-slots not yet infiltrated by 'classical joc' of the moment, the dreadful Petroc Trelawny. But for Iain's sake I hope BBC Radio 3 Controller Roger Wright didn't catch the mentions of On An Overgrown Path.

Not only is Iain Burnside an uncommonly intelligent radio presenter. He is also a very fine pianist who plays on one of my all time favourite CDs, Copland's The Gift to be Free, sung by the late-lamented Susan Chilcott - read the full story here.
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk