Eloq uence SLEIGH RIDE A Christmas Festival Hallelujah Chorus Sleigh Ride The Nutcracker White Christmas Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Boston Pops Orchestra Arthur Fiedler
SLEIGH RIDE Arr. LEROY ANDERSON (1908-1975) 1 A Christmas Festival 9 40 Joy to the World Deck the Halls God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen Good King Wenceslas Hark! the Herald Angels Sing The First Noël Silent Night Jingle Bells O Come, All Ye Faithful GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL (1685-1759) 2 Hallelujah Chorus (from Messiah) 4 00 JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (1685-1750) 3 Jesu, joy of man s desiring 3 24 (from Cantata BWV 147 Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben ) 4 Shepherds Music 7 22 (from Christmas Oratorio) 5 Adagio 4 12 (from Sonata No. 3 for Solo Violin, BWV 1005, orch. Bachrich) 6 Sheep may safely graze 4 40 (from Cantata BWV 208 Was mir behagt, ist nur die muntre Jagd Hunting Cantata ) ENGELBERT HUMPERDINCK (1854-1921) 7 Dream Pantomime 9 13 (from Hänsel und Gretel) PIOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893) The Nutcracker 8 Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy 1 53 Leo Litwin, celeste 9 Dance of the Reed Pipes 2 07 0 Waltz of the Flowers 6 38 LEOPOLD MOZART (1719-1787)! Musical Sleigh Ride 2 48
LEROY ANDERSON (1908-1975) @ Sleigh Ride 2 54 JOHN FREDRICK COOTS (1897-1985) Santa Claus is coming to town (arr. Jack Mason) 2 36 JOHNNY MARKS (1909-1985) $ Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (arr. Richard Hayman) 2 15 IRVING BERLIN (1888-1989) % White Christmas (arr. Jack Mason) 3 23 Boston Pops Orchestra Arthur Fiedler Total timing: 68 29
When my father began conducting the Boston Pops he was actually the orchestra s seventeenth music director although after his 50-year reign most people think he founded the Pops the light classical musical repertory was rarely played. Symphony concerts concentrated on the big works, and the vast treasury of waltzes, ballet suites, overtures and tone poems went largely unperformed. Much of this music needs somebody to love it and caress it, he said once, to fondle and perform it not to look down his or her nose at it like a dirty thing. This has kept me alive musically. The only bad music, he would add, quoting Rossini, is the boring kind. I don t like bad music of any kind, my father would insist, so he only played music he liked serious works, show tunes, contemporary pieces he thought were accessible, Baroque works that didn t remind him of two skeletons copulating on a tin roof. His recorded legacy issued on Deutsche Grammophon gives a jaw-dropping display of his virtuosity, his lack of snobbery, and his sheer joy at working with his orchestra. The Pops musicians didn t necessarily find working with Papa a sheer joy. Before becoming Pops conductor he had been a member of the orchestra himself and there remained a simmering resentment at his success. Also my father tended to yell when upset, which was most of the time given the orchestra s antagonism. The orchestra delighted in playing practical jokes on him and Papa was equally inventive. He would conduct a march in waltz time or lead an entire piece with the baton upside down. For an entire season, the big hit was the theme from Jaws, which everyone, Papa included, loathed. One night, the brass section inflated a large rubber shark, which they launched over the orchestra toward my father. Without missing a beat, my father reached up with his baton and pushed it back. The trombones shoved it back and things deteriorated from there. But my father and his orchestra had outsmarted themselves. The shark and its perambulations became so popular that audiences insisted on Jaws as an encore every night. My father considered most of the Pops musicians (who were all members of the Boston Symphony) very snobbish about the kind of music he had them play. But it wasn t just the Pops musicians he accused of snobbery. He constantly complained about my elitist taste in music, and it was by going to the Pops that I learned about fine popular
music. My father s precise, clear-cut, loving performances taught me not to be the pretentious listener I had been. Papa and the Pops had fun, whatever problems existed. I believe you can hear this love of life and love of music in these performances. From a note by Johanna Fiedler Recordings: Boston Symphony Hall, Boston, USA Eloquence series manager: Cyrus Meher-Homji Art direction: Chilu www.chilu.com Booklet editor: Bruce Raggatt
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