AMERICAN HIGHWAYS #74: REFUGEE COMPOSERS
These are troubled times, and given recent events, I wanted to highlight the amazing contribution refugees have made to American music in the last century. From Bartok and Kurt Weill up to Tania Léon and Gloria Estefan, as well as the younger generation of Kinan Azmeh: here is music that will entrance you, delight you, sadden you.
In addition to my usual research, I put out a call for suggestions on Facebook a few days ago, and got a tremendous reaction – so many composers whom I didn’t realize were refugees, and so many great musicians I hadn’t previously heard! So this evening will be followed by more broadcasts on the same theme. – Guy Livingston
More at GuyLivingston.com/radio
Theme Music :
Steve Reich. The Desert Music (1984)
First Movement (Fast).
Chorus of the Brooklyn Philharmonic, Members of the Brooklyn Philharmonic, Michael Tilson Thomas & William Carlos Williams.
Nonesuch Records 79101.
Kinan Azmeh
‘November 22’
Kinan Azmeh, clarinet; Fuse Ensemble
Broadcast 2016 Podium Witteman
Kurt Weill
September Song
Frank Sinatra, Axel Stordahl’s Orchestra
GEMM CDS 9294 Disc 2
Béla Bartók
Concerto for Orchestra, Sz. 116
Introduzione. Andante non troppo
Elegia. Andante non troppo Finale. Pesante – Presto
Pierre Boulez & Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Deutsch Grammophon D 103116
Ruth Schonthal
String Quartet No. 3, In Memoriam Holocaust:
Grave
Bochmann String Quartet
Naxos American Classics 8.5594451
Tania León
Horizons
NDR Sinfonie Orchester & Peter Ruzicka
2008 | Bridge
E. E. Garcia
Conga
Gloria Estefan & Miami Sound Machine
Epic – EK 53046
