Update
Helena Suite, Op. 44 (1992)
on the Works site, though leave the title picture,
which is decidedly different than the current one...
Also augment with more text
Book of Dreams, 2022, Op. 376 (2022)
March 9-10
2am Cliff Meets Us at the Corner of Yosemite and Grand Canyon, and the Jog Is Up...
9am Polyphony, Racing Across Town to Be a Student and Teacher,
Can't Find File Boxes and Other Media, Will Have to Do w/ a Few Random CDs,
Harriet Doing the Best She Can to Get Ready to Go....
and then there's transformation that is
Novel VIII. Nastagio degli Onesti, loving a damsel of the Traversari family,
by lavish expenditure gains not her love
(Songs, Drones, and Refrains of Death [1968]: III. Cancion de Jinete - Song of the Rider)
Ukraine!
Ukraine!
How we desire to gather you to a better life!
A dark day,
but OK here,
the 49th of spring,
high down 4 to 69,
but still light and warm enough for the
first Springfield High School '75 Alumni Zoom outside of the year,
then off to Davis Community Presbyterian Church Chancel Choir rehearsal,
happy to have Emma Turnbull and family safely back from their 3-week reunion vacation in Scotland (where, unforunately, they contracted Coronavirus but vacinatedly recovered without further incidence),
singin sequentially tenor and bass, as perceived needed --
other music of the day including
George Gershwin (1898-1937) - Rhapsody No. 2 (1931),
William Walton (1902-1983) - Symphony No. 1 in Bb Major (1935), and
Dmitri Kabalevsky (1804-1987) - The Comedians, Op. 26 (1940)...
Oh, and the 130th birthday of
Arthur Honegger (1892-1955) -- who, while characterized as Swiss, given his parentage, was born in Le Havre and lived most of his life in Partis... sounds pretty French to me (one of Les Six, after all, but OK, actually was a Swiss citizen), and had some amazing familial connections,
including a liaison with fabulous soprano Claire Croiza (1882-1946, seen here in 1907),
who aged well (clearly at right, 1916) and bore Honegger a child in 1926. But that same year the composer inexplicably (from this standpoint at least) married not her, but
Aimee Vaurabourg (1894-1980),
who was his partner previously (seen above with Arthur in 1925 theatrical garb) and became his wife by agreeing
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Honegger
"on the condition that they live in separate apartments because he required solitude for composing. Andrée lived with her mother, and Honegger visited them for lunch every day. They lived apart for the duration of their marriage, with the exceptions of one year from 1935 to 1936 following Vaurabourg's injury in a car accident, and the last year of Honegger's life, when he was not well enough to live alone. They had one daughter, Pascale, born in 1932. . . .
Honegger was widely known as a train enthusiast, and once notably said: "I have always loved locomotives passionately. For me they are living creatures and I love them as others love women or horses."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9e_Vaurabourg
As for Vaurabourg, she was the Young Woman with a Pipe (1920) by
Alice Bailly (1817-1938, seen here in her Self-Portrait, 1917 -- clearly another good-looker)
"In September 1934, while traveling in Spain, Honegger's car ran into a tree after a tire burst. He only broke an ankle, but Vaurabourg, in the front passenger seat, broke both knees and was unable to walk for almost a year. She never fully recovered from the accident. . . .
She studied piano at the Paris Conservatoire, receiving first prize in counterpoint. She often performed her husband's piano works.
Vaurabourg's students of counterpoint included Pierre Boulez" (1925-2016 -- OK some Boulez eventually!)
But, for now, let's re-listen to Honegger's
Symphony No. 1 (1930)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ddnp-GHn6M