Pacific Symphony will present and produce Ron McCurdy’s Langston Hughes Project at Irvine Barclay Theatre on Feb. 27.
Rodion Shchedrin: ‘Naughty Limericks’
The Concerto for Orchestra No. 1, “Naughty Limericks,” by the brilliant Russian composer Rodion Shchedrin (born 1932), composed in 1963. Great fun. Evgeni Svetlanov conducts the USSR Symphony Orchestra.
Classical cover: ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’
From 1972. Here’s how the opening of Richard Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra sounds in its original form, as famously used to launch Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey.”
Bernstein: ‘Prelude, Fugue, and Riffs’
In the run-up to Leonard Bernstein’s 100th birthday, I’ve been highlighting some of his lesser known music. Here’s his jazz/classical fusion piece “Prelude, Fugue and Riffs,” originally written, like Stravinsky’s “Ebony Concerto,” which it resembles, for Woody Herman’s big band.