William's Song a Day Blog - est. September 2007

From: Sergei Leiferkus sings Mussorgsky ; Year: 2016 (1875); Genre: Romance Period/classical Here's a short-but-sweet piece for piano and voice from maestro Modest Mussorgsky. While I have no idea when the vocalist is singing, since it is in Russian, which is not a language I know well enough other than a few words and phrases, but I will say the way the melody is sung along with the accompanying piano is superb. This one in reminds me of another Romance Period composer, Franz Schubert, his leids in particular. From wot I understand in Russia during the same time had a similar form called "Russian Songs," which this piece would be categorized under, so it's not a surprise.   Hear Misunderstood One performed by Sergei Leiferkus on YouTube.       My song pick 1 year ago today: Rush - Face Up   My song pick 2 years ago today: Jigsaw - Baby Don't Do It   My song pick 3 years ago today: Clifford Brown and Max Roach - Sandu   My song pick 4 years ago tod...

Year: 1867 (Approximately); Genre: Romantic Period/classical Got in the mood for some "big" music from the Romance Period, or as I call it sometime "from whence heavy metal started." Beautiful, powerful, and filled to the brim with the extremest of emotions; this music is something to behold. And none better from this period than Modest Mussorgsky in my opinion. Hear Intermezzo Symphonique in Modo Classico on YouTube. My song pick one year ago today: The Soul Seven - The Cissy's Thang My song pick two years ago today: Soundgarden - Fell on Dark Days My song pick three years ago today: Rush - Driven My song pick four years ago today: The Moody Blues - Go Now My song pick five years ago today: Queen - 39 My song pick six years ago today: Hawkwind - Standing at the Edge My song pick seven years ago today: Rush - Nocturne My song pick eight years ago today: Head East - Never Been Any Reason

From: Pictures at an Exhibition ; Year: 1971; Genre: Progressive Rock/classical The other night whilst I was driving home I was listening to some music from Emerson, Lake & Palmer. It's interesting, but at one point the strange noises that are normally part of their music made me think something was wrong with my car. Just a second later I realized that the odd sound was coming from my stereo and not a mechanical part of my automobile. Anyway, I thought it would be apropos to pick one of their songs today, and by "song" I actually mean a multiple section piece that last nearly 16 minutes. This is, as you might have guessed, their rendition of legendary master composer Modest Mussorgsky's epic masterpiece Pictures at an Exhibition . This is actually an excerpt contained on their album from the 2001 remaster, which contains six of the parts: Promenade, The Gnome, Promenade, The Sage, The Hut of Baba Yaga , and The Great Gates of Kiev . Hear Pictures at a...

1471 Modest Petrovitch Mussorgsky - Pictures at an Exhibition Years: 1874, 1886 Genre: Romantic Period, classical I've been meaning to pick this suite from Modest Mussorgsky for a bit now. Mussorgsky was supposedly inspired to write this 10 part suite of music after attending an exhibition of artwork from by his recently deceased close friend Viktor Hartmann in 1874; from what I've read about it, he wrote the entire piece in less than two months. However, it was apparently published posthumously in 1886 by his friend and fellow composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, who was also a member of The Mighty Handful . Here are the first two movements of the piece performed by Johnathan Plowright on YouTube. Here are movements 3 and 4 of the piece performed by Johnathan Plowright on YouTube. Here are movements 5 and 6 of the piece performed by Johnathan Plowright on YouTube. Here are movements 7 and 8 of the piece performed by Johnathan Plowright on YouTube. Here are ...

Continuing my workweek of "The Five" I decided on choosing my favourite of the "Mighty Handful:" Modest Mussorgsky. He was the extremest of the group with his Russian nationalism in his music. When I first heard his music my first impression was that it is insanity put to music, plus the popular portrait of him seemed to re-affirm this. All of his music has a lot of passion to it and is quite powerful. One of the aspects of his career that was interesting, but not unexpected, is that most of his contemporaries reviled him as a composer. His career also paralleled a lot of modern day musicians in that he was a substance abuser in the extreme and died young. However, this was normal in the day to protest by having an extreme lifestyle. This song, " Night on Bald Mountain " is probably his most famous piece of music today and was used in the Disney film Fantasia in the scene with the demon and skeletal warriors. Here is an orchestral performance of the ...