Murphy Music

Mozart was in love with the sound of the clarinet. He wasn’t able to fully express on paper his adoration for the instrument until the last few years of his life when he met and befriended Anton Stadler. A close friend of Mozart’s and fellow Freemason, Stadler was one of the great clarinetists of Mozart’s time. He was Mozart’s inspiration for this piece as well as the Clarinet Concerto (K. 622). Both this piece and the concerto were written originally for basset clarinet, an instrument whose design was mostly improvisations by Stadler himself. (continue reading…)

Opera buffa in four acts, K492, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a libretto by lorenzo Da ponte after pierre-augustin Beaumarchais‘‘ play La folle journée, ou Le mariage de Figaro (1784, Paris); Vienna, Burgtheater, 1 May 1786 (continue reading…)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Symphony No. 9, in E Minor “From the New World” (Op. 95), popularly known as the New World Symphony, was composed by Antonín Dvořák in 1893 during his visit to the United States from 1892 to 1895. It is by far his most popular symphony, and one of the most popular symphonies in the modern repertory. (continue reading…)

New and old numberings for symphonies by Dvořák, Mendelssohn, Schubert, and Schumann. (continue reading…)

This was a chance of a lifetime! Only two performing ensembles from the United States were invited to play at this convention, which is only held every two years and in a different country each time. This year, WASBE (World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles) was to be held in Ireland. Everyone was very excited! We had prepared with weeks of rehearsing, concerts at school and at Carnegie Hall in New York. We all had a blast.