99: From Dusk Till Dawn

A saga continues; a glorious album; a call for scores

Name That Tune

This week’s Name That Tune is a Joey Special. Here’s your hint: this is an instrumentation by one composer, of a work by another composer, and it’s kind of a weird combo. We’ll take as much info as you care to guess on!

As always, your goal is to provide as much accurate analysis as possible. First try to get the nationality, year, and genre, then make educated guesses about the composer and — if possible— the piece. If you know the piece immediately, send us an email at toneprose@substack.com instead of commenting so the rest of us can have fun guessing. 

Last Week’s Results
Tone Prose 98
Jean Jacques Rousseau, “J’ai perdu tout mon bonheur” from Le devin du village

Leave it to the Tone Prose listenership to foil the best-laid plans of that mischievous musical imp, Listener Jeremy! Pride of place this week goes to Listener Eric who identified not only the composer but the piece itself! The mind reels.

I (Will) was first in to guess Rousseau (and I’ll also be the first to admit that, were it not for Joey’s clue, I would never have gotten there) and Listener Ellen was right there with me. Listener Gregor wrote in with the correct overall answer, but there seems to have been some Wikipedia use involved, so there will forever be an asterisk placed next to his name this week.

Think you can stump your fellow Listeners? Go ahead and try!

Head to our Google Form to upload a 30-second clip of an unidentified piece of classical music for us to try to identify.

Unfinished

There are new twists in the ongoing story of Cara Kizer, the horn player who has accused one of her former New York Philharmonic colleagues of rape and another of abetting. The Phil’s president, Gary Ginstling, recently stepped down, and it all seems to be connected to the fallout of this lamentable situation. Sammy Sussman, as dogged in his reporting as ever, writes in Vulture:

On July 11, the musicians of the New York Philharmonic received an unexpected invitation to a video call. They had just returned from China, where the orchestra gave five concerts in three cities, and the performers had been looking forward to some downtime before they traveled to Colorado for the Bravo! Vail Music Festival, as they do every year.

The surprise meeting was called by the co-chairs of the organization’s board, investors Peter W. May and Oscar L. Tang, who told the group that Gary Ginstling, the Philharmonic’s president since July 2023, had resigned, effective immediately. Until a new president could be named, Deborah Borda, the orchestra’s two-time former president and Ginstling’s immediate predecessor, would return as “executive adviser” to run day-to-day operations. The call lasted 18 minutes, and the musicians weren’t given a chance to ask questions.

Later that day, the Philharmonic sent out a press release with the news, including a statement from Ginstling, who wrote that “the New York Philharmonic is an extraordinary institution, and it has been an honor to be a part of it. However, it has become clear to me that the institution needs a different type of leadership, and I have tendered my resignation.”

I (Will) would encourage readers to delve into the whole article, which contains quite a bit of new information about Kizer’s hiring process; she has been formally released from her NDA with the Phil, and she’s at liberty to discuss what happened.

I would, however, recommend caution to anyone interested in wading into the comments section. This horrible episode has attracted competing armies of online warriors, and you’ll encounter some reprehensible accusations and rumor-mongering. As if the whole thing couldn’t get any worse!

Album Review: Fazil Say, Morning/Evening

Turning from something ugly to something unabashedly lovely, I (Will) now write to offer the most fawning of praise for this recent double album from Fazil Say. I’ve been listening to it nearly every day for the past month and I can’t say enough good things.

This album gives you what it says on the cover: music for the morning and music for the evening. It’s basically two very intelligent recital programs of gorgeous piano music, and I have found that the “Morning” album (Spotify) is a great way to get my day started and “Evening” (Spotify) works equally well for winding down.

The program spans everything from CPE Bach and Scarlatti to Satie and Ravel. Say’s own music makes a couple of very welcome cameos. Chopin, Liszt, and Haydn abound, and I just find that these albums are organized in such a way that they flow marvelously. You never get distracted and you never get bored.

Say has got to be reckoned one of the top pianists of his generation, but of course, the thing that makes him such an interesting figure is that, as a composer, he writes ginormous dramatic oratorios that fill arenas. I think that information is not particularly known outside of Turkey, but it should be, which is why I’m mentioning it now.

Top 10 (or however many) Concert Works of the 21st Century

Folks, just a reminder from the special edition of Tone Prose that we sent out last week: if you want to contribute to the Top Concert Works of the 21st Century list that is being amassed for next week’s newsletter, now’s the time to do it! Email toneprose@substack.com or comment on this week’s thread.

Tone Praise

Captaine Tobias Hume, “Tobacco”

In the time it takes to listen to this quirky little song, you can read the composer’s bio from Wikipedia, which I (Will)  include here in full:

Tobias Hume (possibly 1579 – 16 April 1645) was a Scottish composer, viol player and soldier.

Little is known of his life. Some have suggested that he was born in 1579 because he was admitted to the London Charterhouse in 1629, a prerequisite to which was being at least 50 years old, though there is no certainty over this. He had made his living as a professional soldier, serving as an officer with the Swedish and Russian armies.

His published music includes pieces for viols (including many solo works for the lyra viol) and songs. They were gathered in two collections, The First Part of Ayres (or Musicall Humors, 1605) and Captain Humes Poeticall Musicke (1607). He was a particular champion of the viol over the then-dominant lute, something which caused John Dowland to publish a rebuttal of Hume's ideas.

Hume was also known as a prankster, as some of his somewhat unusual compositions illustrate. His most notorious piece was "An Invention for Two to Play upone one Viole", also known as Prince's Almayne. Two bows are required and the smaller of the two players is obliged to sit in the lap of the larger player. This work was notated in tablature and is indeed technically possible to play.^] His instructions to "drum this with the backe of your bow" in another piece, "Harke, harke," from the First Part of Ayres, constitute the earliest known use of col legno in Western music.

At Christmas 1629 he entered Charterhouse as a poor brother. His mind seems to have given way, for in July 1642 he published a rambling True Petition of Colonel Hume to parliament offering either to defeat the rebels in Ireland with a hundred 'instruments of war,' or, if furnished with a complete navy, to bring the king within three months twenty millions of money. He styles himself 'colonel,' but the rank was probably of his own invention, for in the entry of his death, which took place at Charterhouse on Wednesday, 16 April 1645, he is still called Captain Hume.

Tone Prose is a co-production of William White, Joseph Vaz, and the Listeners (i.e. you.)