145. Representation and taxation: Copland, Fanfare for the Common Man

A short podcast about the shortest of pieces, yet Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man still packs a punch and seems to point to big issues.

‘No taxation without representation’? Perhaps today’s call should be ‘No representatives (from the Head of State down) who don’t pay their taxes!’

Listening time c10 minutes (podcast 6′, music 3′)… Listen

135. Uplifting melancholy and passionate languor: Granados Spanish Dances

Music that seems to conjure all the tastes, smells and senses of Spain – or my expectations of them (as someone who’s hardly been there): Spanish dances for piano by Enrique Granados. Perfect music if you just want to feel warmer, but it’s also an opportunity to bask (Basque? [sorry]) in some gloriously wistful melancholy that seems to underpin all six of these pieces. Somehow it’s not a melancholy that makes one feel sad – it seems as uplifting and nourishing as the warm sun on a cold winter’s day. Listening time: podcast 12 mins; music 25′.… Listen

134. The sound of the solar system? Kepler: Harmony of the World

An extraordinary, ambitious, blend of art and science, Johanes Kepler’s Harmony of the World is a 17th century attempt to understand what the then known universe sounded like – on a planetary level! In the 1970s, using the latest technology professors Willie Ruff and John Rodgers were able to make Kepler’s Harmony into music – an extended piece of electronica, hypnotic and thought provoking. (25’+ listening time)… Listen