Entertainment & Arts

My Nostalgic Song

i started writing this as an answer to someone's question about nostalgic songs, but it got going so i turned it into a My Take

this is a poem set to music, so i will count that as a song, The Pines of the Appian Way from The Pines of Rome by Ottorino Respighi

in his day Respighi was way more famous than Puccini or Verdi or Rossini, who were very prominent in the Hungry Hundreds of the Royal Navy, and whose names are still very well known to symphony and orchestra audiences today

this was the 4th movement from this piece i played in the first orchestra job i got paid for, with The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. By coincidence, and at the last minute, i'm in Rome right now (to watch tennis), but this piece definitely does make me feel nostalgic. i later played the same piece with The Philadelphia Orchestra, also in Pennsylvania of course, a Big Five orchestra and the largest orchestra in the world. As good as the Pittsburgh Symphony was, that was another big step up

by the way it's weird being in Rome while the pope thing is going on holy moly

My Nostalgic Song

As it turned out in this job, i only played the rehearsals, as i often did, because the player i was subbing for came back for the shows, but it was quite a step up from the conservatory orchestras i had played in up until then, and i really had to be a "grownup" (both musically and in maturity) to pull it off, and to continue getting work

this is the French conductor Georges Pretre, who died just a few years ago, with a very fine German orchestra, playing about as an Italian piece as you can get

if you want to get right to it, start about halfway in the video, but the whole thing is just glorious

then listen to it again 😊

My Nostalgic Song
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