Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

More Songs for Christmas

More songs for Christmas!

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

(extract from cover of the Sam Smith single; amazon.com)

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Very popular Christmas song.

Memorable melody and catchy chord progression.

Written by Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane in 1943.

Introduced by Judy Garland in the movie Meet Me in St Louis (1944).
Note the evolution of orchestration, reharmonization and arrangement style over the years.

Circle of fifths harmony provides many opportunities for reharmonization and lush orchestration.

Wikipedia entry here.

Flight of the Bumble Bee

Flight of the Bumble Bee
(1899-1900)

by Russian composer Rimsky Korsakov
Originally an orchestral interlude for the opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan.
Now popular as a stand-alone virtuoso piece for piano.
Also transcribed for other instruments. 
Characterized by torrents of cascading chromatic semiquavers,
representative of a buzzing bumble bee.
See Wikipedia entry here for details and background.

My Favourite Things

My Favourite Things

Classic song from the broadway musical (1959)
and movie (1965) The Sound of Music.

Composed by Rodgers and Hammerstein.

Popular for jazz improvisations

because of its circle-of-fifths structure.

Wiki link here.

More Samba! (One Note Samba, I Go To Rio, Mas Que Nada)

This post is in conjunction with the Rio Olympics 2016.

(Ambigram of Rio2016 Olympics logo from 

https://twitter.com/hypergeometricx/status/765473293126111232)

In the spirit of the Rio Olympics, 
here are more catchy sambas,
in addition to the previous post on Aquarela do Brasil.

Enjoy!

Brazil - Aquarela do Brasil

This post is in conjunction with the Rio Olympics 2016.

Aquarela do Brasil (1939)
(Watercolours of Brazil)

Jazz Standard. 

A lively Samba.

One of the most famous Brazilian songs. 

Composed by Ary Barroso. 

First sung by Francisco Alves.

Wiki link here .

Royal Garden Blues

Royal Garden Blues (1919)
Dixieland Jazz Standard
Composed by Clarence Williams and Spencer Williams

Wiki link here.

Tiger Rag

Tiger Rag
(1917)

Traditional Jazz Standard.

Wiki link here.

Pentatonic May

Pentatonic May

The five-note scale for the fifth month.

A selection of  pieces with pentatonic melodies/motifs.

The April Post - Happy Birthday

The April Post

Happy Birthday

Some interesting jazzy acappella improvisations

By Simon Akesson 

(to Jacob Collier)

by Evan Sanders and JB Craipeau 

(to Andrew Kesler)

by Simon Akesson

(to Andrew Kesler)

Three Marches for March

Three Marches for March

__________

This Christmas

(posted in conjunction with the 12th day of Christmas)

This Christmas

Composed by Donny Hathaway. Released 1970.

Wistful but catchy. Interesting harmonic possibilities.

Not many remakes, possibly because of fairly complex chord progressions
and wide vocal range required.

Wikipedia entry here.

Star Wars Theme

(in conjunction with the recent premiere of Star Wars: The Force Awakens)

Star Wars Theme

Iconic movie theme
of this epic movie series.
Composed by prolific film composer
John Williams for the first Star Wars movie in 1977.
A full symphonic work. Rich texture. Memorable melody lines.
Bold brassy fanfare with abundance of macho suspension chords and cascading fourths.
Interesting mystique-sounding chords and woodwind lines in second part.
Effective use of all sections of the orchestra.
More information in Wikipedia entry here.

Happy New Year!

A nice summation.

Happy New Year!