CLOSE-UP: MUSIC FOR CURIOUS YOUNG MINDS

Let’s get our concert off to a dancing start! Libertango is a fun mix of tango and jazz, full of energy and rhythm. Close your eyes and imagine dancers moving quickly—sometimes fast, sometimes slow, but always exciting! It was written by Astor Piazzolla, a musical rule-breaker from Argentina in South America, who loved to take the traditional dance music of the tango and twist it into something new and thrilling

A happy, bouncy ragtime tune that makes you want to tap your feet! It’s like a musical puzzle full of repeating patterns. American composer Scott Joplin, is sometimes called ‘the King of Ragtime’. He mostly wrote dancing piano music which you may have heard without knowing it: his music was used in Tom and Jerry cartoons and also in The Lego Movie.

A musical joke full of skips and hops! Alexander Zemlinsky was an Austrian composer who loved drama and fairy tales, and this piece is like a mischievous character darting around, surprising us with funny twists.  Who might they be? How are they moving? What do they look like and what, most importantly, are they up to?

Short but sweet and sounding like a musical smile: this cheerful piece was written by Ludwig van Beethoven, a German composer who changed music forever, writing huge symphonies for massive orchestras and tiny musical gems like this one.  Like the Scott Joplin piece, this was first written for a piano (which you can hear in the clip on this page) but takes on its own character when played by five wind musicians. How does changing the instruments but playing the same notes change this lovely piece?

Sometimes, like a thrilling story or film, what makes music exciting, also makes it strange and scary… This piece is like being inside a spinning top! Full of fast, twirling sounds, it’s magical whirlwind of strange, darkness. Like a real-life tornado is starts slowly, becomes furiously fast, and collapses back into silence. Per Nørgård is a Danish musical explorer, who loves creating music that feel like galaxies, storms, or even buzzing insects. This piece, he has described as “a water-world of ripples and bubbles”. Can you hear what he means?

This piece is like a musical chase! The flute, oboe, clarinet, horn, and bassoon take turns playing fast, playful tunes, as if they’re chatting like musical friends. The composer, Antón Reicha, loved puzzles and games—and you can hear it in how the instruments weave together in clever ways.

A musical conversation where each instrument has its own personality! Sometimes they agree, sometimes they argue—but it’s always fun. This section is a type of composition called a ‘theme and variations’ in which the Danish composer Carl Nielsen took a beautiful hymn tune he knew from church and used his imagination to change it a bit more each time we hear it, making something new out of something he found. It’s like musical recycling!

A bubbly, chirpy piece that sounds like a bird singing in a meadow! Emily Doolittle is a modern composer writing music today who loves nature, and her music often brings the outdoors to life.  Lots of composers have been inspired by birds: some have created musical pictures of them flying or getting up to adventues, others have tried to write down their beautiful song as if it were human music and get the instruments to do their best bird impressions. What sort of bird music do you think Emily Doolittle is writing here?

Bright and lively, this music is like a game of tag between the instruments! August Klughardt was a Romantic composer who turned music into storytelling—full of excitement and emotion.  Sometimes his work told stories using actors, singers and huge orchestras, sometimes it was inspired by myths and legends. This piece treats our wind players like five characters. What sort of story are they telling?

Luciano Berio was a musical inventor who loved turning everyday sounds into music. This is the last part of his ‘musical zoo’ where each section is a different animal! In this piece, our wind players have to use different sorts of musical voices: speaking as well as playing.  It’s like a musical cartoon of a pair of Tom Cats. How do they instruments bring the fighting cats to life?And what do you think happens in the end?