Hear PYP Perform William Grant Still’s ‘The Far West’ from ‘The American Scene’

Posted on December 7, 2018

11.10.2018 - PYP and Musical Director David Hattner perform William Grant Still’s The Far West from The American Scene in the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall.

Click here to read our in-depth program notes about this piece.

PROGRAM NOTES: ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK’s Symphony No. 6

Posted on November 1, 2018

By Carolyn Talarr

The Sixth symphony by Czech composer Antonin Dvorak, while timelessly powerful and poignant, illustrates the extreme effects that nineteenth- and twentieth-century European nationalist politics had on the arts.  Although commissioned by the conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic, the symphony had to premiere in Prague in 1881 because of Viennese musicians’ protests against non-Germanic music.  The Vienna Philharmonic wouldn’t perform it until... Read More ›

PROGRAM NOTES: TCHAIKOVSKY’s Violin Concerto, Mvt. I

Posted on October 29, 2018

By Aaron Greene, winner of PYP’s 2018-19 Soloist Competition

Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto was not always one of the most recognizable pieces in classical music. In 1878, Hungarian violinist Leopold Auer was supposed to premiere the concerto, but declined at first, saying it was not well-suited to the instrument. Instead, Adolf Brodsky, who was concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic, gave the... Read More ›

WILLIAM GRANT STILL (part 1 of 5)

Posted on October 12, 2018

William Grant Still (with instrument case) with his friends at Wilberforce University, 1915. Photo from the holdings of the University of Arkansas Libraries’ Special Collections.

William Grant Still (1895-1978) is known as “The Dean of African-American Composers”, for good reason.  The standard sites and survey history books cite the same litany of impressive firsts:

—the first African-American to conduct a major American symphony orchestra,—the... Read More ›

WILLIAM GRANT STILL: EARLY ADULT YEARS (part 2 of 5)

Posted on October 10, 2018

Company photo, “Shuffle Along” on tour in Boston, 1921; Still is second from far left. Photo from Broadway Collection.

Even though William Grant Still never completed his Bachelor’s degree, in his twenties he managed to cobble together an astoundingly broad and deep musical education that was probably more multifaceted and multicultural in its outlook than any other single composer of his era.  Even... Read More ›

WILLIAM GRANT STILL: CRYSTALLIZING THE DREAM (part 3 of 5)

Posted on October 8, 2018

William Grant Still in rehearsal.  From Houston Public Media.

Still’s self-identified second period took its shape, as his wife Verna Arvey later related, from a “dream dating back to 1916 when as a young man, he went to Memphis to work with W.C. Handy” (Arvey, Memo to Musicologists).  Once he learned about the Blues in their original context, he resolved that he someday he... Read More ›