Professor Carol

Rossini, the master of bel canto opera, retired young, rich, and famous. Decades later, in old age and ill health, Rossini returned to composition and crafted a liturgical mass as his final work, a work both spiritual and theatrical, Petit Messe Solonnelle. Works Discussed: Rossini's Petit Messe Solonnelle

Tchaikovsky's music holds a sacred place in Russian culture.   Dmitri Shostakovich said, "Without Tchaikovsky we could not endure our sorrows."   Professor Carol examines his Fifth Symphony and considers his life, his personal struggles, and his professional successes. Works Discussed:   Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5, Symphony No. 4, The Nutcracker , Swan Lake , The Queen of Spades

Professor Carol considers the question "What is Music of the American Spirit?" by considering themes across two centuries of American choral repertoire.   She discusses the history, customs, and geography of America that inspire our diverse choral music, from Colonial times to the present, emphasizing texts of John Stirling Walker and Eric Johns, tunebooks and hymnals, liturgy, folk song, and spir...

John Gibson's choral work "Mockingbird Sings" utilizes Native American texts of the Yuma Zuni, Laguna, and Apache tribes. The title refers to the individual charged with remembering events and traditions and his recounting of this oral history in songs and stories.   In this interview, Gibson explains his approach to setting these unusual texts to music and factors that distinguish American music...

Professor Carol talks with Mary Preston, the resident organist of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, about the Lay Family Concert Organ. The organ built by C.B. Fisk for the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center is one of the finest instruments ever built. Mary Preston joins the Dallas Wind Symphony in a concert to be featured on Michael Barone's syndicated radio show "Pipedreams."; Works Discussed: Hind...

Chopin would have been surprised at the idea of a solo piano recital in a concert hall. Professor Carol talks about the programming of recitals and works of Bach-Busoni, Beethoven, Chopin, and Debussy. Works Discussed: Bach-Busoni Chorale Preludes; Beethoven Sonata No. 21, Opus 53 ("Waldstein"); Chopin Sonata No. 2; Debussy "Children's Corner"  

Professor Carol gives a biography of Schumann's early years, comparing Schumann's youthful work Papillons with his later Fantasy in C Major against the backdrop of his courtship of the young pianist Clara Wieck and the emerging Romantic image of the artist. Works Discussed: Schumann: Papillons , Op. 2; Fantasy in C Major, Op. 17

Hollywood is heir to the European musical traditions. The classic films were scored by composers trained in Europe and schooled in the classical traditions and by immigrant composers who escaped Germany after their work was denounced by the Nazis as "degenerate music" ( Entartete Musik ). Works Discussed: Bernard Herrmann: Psycho, Vertigo ; Erich Korngold: Robin Hood ; Aaron Copland: Red Pony ; Vi...

Military music inspires the troops, facilitates maneuver, intimidates the enemy, sends signals, marks daily events of camp life, entertains the troops in their leisure time, and comprises an important part of the pageantry and tradition of military life. Works Discussed: Scotland the Brave, Yankee Doodle, Mozart's Abduction from the Seraglio , Bugle Calls, The Army Song   

Carol interviews Dean Bouras, arranger for the Dallas Wind Symphony Big Band concerts, and John Trapani, leader of the John Trapani Big Band about the era, the music, and its popularity today. Works Discussed: Glenn Miller, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Woody Herman, Norman Leyden

A youthful Brahms finds his signature style early in the Opus 10 Ballades based on the Scottish Ballad "Eduard" by Herder. Works Discussed: Brahms: Four Ballades, Op. 10

Student players in the Greater Dallas Youth Orchestra Wind Symphony join the professionals of the Dallas Wind Symphony for a "side by side" concert, featuring music of Dmitri Shostakovich, Paul Hindemith, Donald Grantham, Dan Welcher, and Giovanni Gabrieli.

Beethoven sliced and diced his themes, using musical rhetoric that rebelled against the natural melodic style of Mozart and that charted a path into 19th-century Romanticism. Professor Carol uses the Piano Sonata in E-Flat, Op. 31, to show how he did it. Works Discussed: Beethoven: Piano Sonata in E-Flat, Op. 31

Slavic composers Smetana, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Rachmaninov cared deeply about their national roots and national identity, and each knew how to seduce the ear of listeners with gorgeous melody, ravishing orchestration, and a heart-racing sense of the dramatic. Works Discussed: Smetana's The Moldau , Rimsky-Korsakov's Sheherazade , and Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2

Slavic composers Smetana, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Rachmaninov cared deeply about their national roots and national identity, and each knew how to seduce the ear of listeners with gorgeous melody, ravishing orchestration, and a heart-racing sense of the dramatic. Works Discussed: Smetana's The Moldau , Rimsky-Korsakov's Sheherazade , and Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2   

The tone poem of the late romantic era painted pictures and portrayed stories with a rich orchestral style that became the model for film music. In Part 2, Professor Carol explains features of John Williams' famous film scores and how we hear music differently when it accompanies drama. Works Discussed: John Williams, E.T., Schindler's List, Jaws, Superman, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Harr...

The tone poem of the late romantic era painted pictures and portrayed stories with a rich orchestral style that became the model for film music. In Part 1, Professor Carol explains Gustav Holst's The Planets and some of the techniques that lead to the style of John Williams. Works Discussed: Gustav Holst, The Planets ; John Williams, Olympic Theme and Fanfare

What's this program about?    The final segment of Glenn Mitchell's interview of Carol on KERA Radio turns to the Library of Congress's American Memory Project, Bill Monroe, John Fogerty, Harry Partch, and Scott Joplin.

What's this program about?    Glenn Mitchell's interview of Carol on KERA Radio continues in Part 2 with a discussion of the Sacred Harp (shape-note singing), Stephen Foster, American film music, Louis Armstrong, Broadway, and Ernest Tubb.

What's this program about?    Carol pays tribute to the late Glenn Mitchell with a reprise of her appearance in September 2000 on his radio program, reproduced here as a three-part podcast courtesy of KERA Radio. Carol and Glenn begin their discussion of America's highly varied musical heritage with reference to William Billings, Jimmie Rodgers, Charles Ives, and Frank Zappa.

What's this program about? Professor Carol continues her interview of John Corigliano and Jerry Junkin. Corigliano talks about his approach to composition and how he, and other top composers, are turning to wind bands for an exciting new sound. Works Discussed: Corigliano, Circus Maximus

What's this program about? Professor Carol interviews two friends and collaborators, composer John Corigliano and Maestro Jerry Junkin. Circus Maximus , Corigliano's explosive third symphony, vividly portrays ancient Rome's fascination with perpetual entertainment and our own culture's similar obsession. Works Discussed: Corigliano, Circus Maximus

In post-revolutionary France, the piano had replaced the harpsichord and the driving force behind the arts was moving from the court to the salons of Paris high society. Two composers, Liszt and Chopin, capitalized on these changes in very different ways and between them defined the future of piano music.

Professor Carol interviews Groucho, the singing parrot who stole the show at the Dallas Wind Symphony's 2006 season opener. Groucho talks about his life on stage and reprises his performance at the Meyerson Symphony Center. Works Discussed: Foster, Camp Town Races ; Cohan, Yankee Doodle Dandy ; Alouette

Percy Grainger's life story reveals a most unusual personality who left an enduring legacy as a virtuoso pianist, an inventor of instruments, a collector of English folk songs, and a composer of music for wind band. Works Discussed: Grainger, Lincolnshire Posy, The Immovable Do, Molly on the Shore.