JSO Adult Education - "Five Easy Pieces"

Adult Ed 102
7-8:30 PM Mondays October18 to November 15
Professor Andy Mead - at the JSO

Five Easy Pieces

Prerequisite – None!

This five-week sequence of classes takes a close look at five major works of the symphonic literature, each selected to illustrate aspects of the music to be encountered in this and future seasons of the JSO. Each work is treated as an outstanding representative of a style, a genre, or a given composer's oeuvre, and while each class meeting will concentrate on the details of a single piece, the observations will be used to open doors to understanding and enjoying additional music.



1: Beethoven: Symphony no. 5

This is one of the fundamental works of the concert repertoire, and one that is so well known that we hardly seem to know it at all. A close listening will link this work to Beethoven's other symphonies, as well as to his preoccupation with the key of c minor in this and several other compositions.



2: Tchaikovsky: Symphonic Poem, Romeo and Juliet

What makes a work a symphonic poem? Do works that have literary programs offer the same types of listening experiences one finds in works without such associations? Like Beethoven's Symphony no. 5, this is a work so familiar that we hardly pay attention to it any more, but close listening reveals not only a passionate sequence of emotions, but a sinewy underlying structure as well.



3: Hindemith: Symphony, Mathis der Maler

A symphony drawn from an opera about a painter - symphonic structure, a program, even melodies borrowed from early church music mix in this powerful work of the last century, all in a musical language that is both familiar and unfamiliar at once.



4: Debussy: Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun and Stravinsky: Petrouchka

All right, it's six pieces, but how have the composers of these two emblematic concert works changed how we listen to music?



5: Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto no. 3

When you've written one of the most popular concertos in the repertoire (no. 2), how do you top yourself?



$50/person
Registration and info:
517-782-3221
Email: jso2007@jacksonsymphony.org