TheGaggle
Politics • Culture • News
Our community is made up of those who value the freedom of speech, the right to debate and the promise of open, honest conversations.

We don't agree on everything but we never silence our followers and value every opinion on our channel.
Interested? Want to learn more about the community?
The Gaggle Music Club: Ottorino Respighi’s "Ancient Airs and Dances"

This week's selection of The Gaggle Music Club is Ottorino Respighi’s "Ancient Airs and Dances." The composition consists of a set of three orchestral suites composed between 1917 and 1932, based on lute pieces from the 16th and 17th centuries.

Ottorino Respighi (1879–1936) was an Italian composer, musicologist, conductor and orchestrator. He studied composition in Bologna and later trained in orchestration under Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov in Russia. The Russian master-orchestrator strongly influenced Respighi's approach to tone color. Respighi went on to become one of the most important figures in Italian music in the early 20th century. A significant part of Respighi’s output was devoted to reviving and reinterpreting early music. He created orchestral versions of lute pieces, Gregorian chant and harpsichord works. Unlike his contemporaries in Italy, he had little time for atonality and serialism.

For "Ancient Airs and Dances," Respighi, a skilled musicologist, drew on transcriptions of Renaissance and early Baroque Italian and French lute music compiled by Oscar Chilesotti. The three suites that comprise Ancient Airs do not form a trilogy in the narrative sense, but are unified by their approach. Respighi transforms early dance and song forms into rich, orchestral textures while preserving the melodic essence of the originals.

Respighi did not simply orchestrate old lute music. He re-harmonized it, enriched its texture and invented transitions and connecting material. It resulted in a kind of neo-Renaissance impressionism—historical melodies are enveloped in modern harmonic colors and a Debussyan orchestral timbre.

The Ancient Airs and Dances proved to be very influential. It led to a revival of early music. At a time when much Renaissance music was known only to specialists, Respighi brought it to concert audiences.

Respighi was a pioneer in the neoclassical movement, although never embraced Stravinsky’s irony or rhythmic asymmetry.

Respighi also had an impact on film composers: His ability to evoke past eras through lush orchestration influenced film music. Composers like Miklós Rózsa, Bernard Herrmann and even John Williams owe some inspiration to his treatment of historical material.

At the time of their premieres, the suites were warmly received—seen as elegant and cultured, yet also emotionally appealing. Critics appreciated Respighi’s ability to balance respect for old forms with imaginative modern scoring. Today, the Ancient Airs and Dances remain among the most-performed of Respighi’s works.

00:44:59
Interested? Want to learn more about the community?
What else you may like…
Videos
Posts
Articles
TG 1945: Alaska Aftermath: All Still To Play For

George Szamuely and Peter Lavelle offer a post-mortem on the summit in Alaska between presidents Trump and Putin.

01:16:15
TG 1944: Anxious In Alaska?

George Szamuely and Peter Lavelle discuss the prospects for success at today's presidential summit in Alaska, and the possible consequences of failure.

01:56:56
TG 1943: Europe's Mounting And Dangerous Hysteria Over Alaska Summit

George Szamuely and Peter Lavelle discuss European leaders,' not to mention elite media's, growing and dangerous hysteria over the possibility--no matter how distant--that the war in Ukraine might be settled at the upcoming summit in Alaska between presidents Trump and Putin.

01:32:37
Monday Night At The Movies

Please choose which one of the following 8 movies you would like to have screened next Monday, Aug. 11.

The theme is "films in which people adopt fake identities."

Please continue to vote after Aug. 11, so that we can determine the runner-up. The runner-up will be screened on Aug. 18.

11 hours ago
12 hours ago

If you are still buying the BS at this stage you are fucking retarded.
https://x.com/BohemianAtmosp1/status/1956847175092355179
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has told his US counterpart Donald Trump that Kyiv rejects a demand put forward by Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin to cede the still-unoccupied areas of Donetsk Oblast to Russia in exchange for freezing the front in other regions, according to Reuters.
[The not-war must go on!]

January 21, 2023
More Leftie Than Thou
"Jacobin" Magazine Celebrates A Strike Against Ol' Blue Eyes

Here at "The Gaggle" we have very little time for the "more Leftie than thou" school of thought--that's the approach to life according to which the only thing that matters is whether you take the right position on every issue under the sun from Abortion to Zelensky. No one in the world meets the exacting standards of this school of thought; any Leftie leader anywhere is always selling out to the bankers and the capitalists. The perfect exemplar of this is the unreadable Jacobin magazine. 

The other day I came across this article from 2021. It's a celebration of trade union power. And not simply trade union power, but the use of trade union power to secure political goals. Of course (and this is always the case with the "more Leftie than thou" crowd), this glorious, never-to-be-forgotten moment on the history of organized labor took place many years ago--in the summer of 1974 to be exact. Yes, almost half a century has gone by since that thrilling moment when the working-class movement of Australia mobilized and prepared to seize the means of production, distribution and exchange. 

Well, not quite. Organized labor went into action against...Ol' Blue Eyes, the Chairman of the Board, the Voice; yes, Frank Sinatra. Why? What had Sinatra done? Sinatra was certainly very rich, and he owned a variety of properties and businesses. But if the Australian trade union movement were, understandably, searching for the bright, incandescent spark that would finally awaken the working class from its slumber there were surely richer, greedier, more dishonest, more decadent, above all more Australian individuals it could have discovered. Australia was never short of them. Rupert Murdoch immediately springs to mind. Why Sinatra?

 

Only for Supporters
To read the rest of this article and access other paid content, you must be a supporter
Read full Article
See More
Available on mobile and TV devices
google store google store app store app store
google store google store app tv store app tv store amazon store amazon store roku store roku store
Powered by Locals