Melancholy Mixtape / September 2024

Seven moments of music that channel the beauty and nostalgia of nature's golden-hued journey from summer into autumn.

Edvard Munch (Norwegian, 1863–1944). Melancholy, 1894–1896. Oil on canvas. Bergen Kunstmuseum, Bergen

Welcome to the latest Melancholy Mixtape, a Shades of Blue series that weaves together moments of melancholy classical music to help you cultivate calm, connection, and healing throughout the month. (If you're a new subscriber, head over here to check out previous installments.)

This month, we'll explore works that channel the beauty and nostalgia of nature's golden-hued journey from summer into autumn — from a pastoral song of the night for flute and harp to a testament of gratitude for tranquil summer evenings surrounded by those we love.

Regardless of how you consume these Melancholy Mixtapes — getting to know each work one by one here on Substack, or listening to them all at once on YouTube, Spotify, or Idagio — I hope you enjoy this month's selections.

Erik Satie / Gnossienne No. 1

Bruce Liu, piano

With its muted minor-key harmonies and serpentine melodies that slither across the ear, Satie's gnossienne — a reference to Knossos, the ancient capital of Crete — arrests the heart and hypnotizes the mind, drawing us into a shadowy landscape where we feel a sense of infinity.

Lili Boulanger / Nocturne for Flute and Harp

János Bálint, flute
Deborah Sipkai, harp

Painted with the primal instrumental colors of flute and harp, Boulanger's nocturne — written when the composer was just 18 — is a fleeting work of pastoral poetry that seemingly stands outside of time, sounding both ancient and modern.

Alberto Ginastera / Variaciones Concertantes, VI. Canonic Variation for Oboe and Bassoon

Trygve Aarvik, oboe
Embrik Snerte, bassoon
Norwegian Radio Orchestra
Miguel Harth-Bedoya, conductor

Over a bed of hazy, pulsating strings, oboe and bassoon enchant with a graceful game of imitation — Narcissus and Echo journeying between calm and sorrow before arriving at a moment of hushed benediction.

Ludwig van Beethoven / Sehnsucht (Longing) 

Ian Bostridge, tenor
Antonio Pappano, piano
(Follow along with the German text and English translation.)

"Alone and cut off from every joy," the speaker of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's poem sighs while scanning the horizon for his distant beloved. "My head reels, my body blazes. Only those who know longing know what I suffer!"

Manuel de Falla / Homenaje pour 'Le tombeau de Claude Debussy' (Tribute for "The Tomb of Claude Debussy")

Miloš Karadaglić, guitar

A gentle stream of tears runs through de Falla's memorial to his close friend, the French composer Claude Debussy. Suffused with elements of the habanera and the flamenco, the guitar's song of heartache evokes the sights and sounds of Granada, the Spanish city Debussy had so vibrantly portrayed in his own music.

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy / Venetianisches Gondellied (Venetian Boat Song)

Andreas Ottensamer, clarinet
Schumann Quartet

Inspired by the late-night gondola ride that ushered him into Venice for the first time in 1830, Mendelssohn's Venetian Boat Song captures the composer's awe and wonder taking in his first journey through the city's undulating arteries. "The gondoliers are crying out to one another again, and the lights are reflected deep in the water," Mendelssohn wrote to his family, "One is playing the guitar and singing. It is a merry night."

Samuel Barber / Knoxville: Summer of 1915

Sylvia McNair, soprano
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra
Yoel Levi, conductor
(Follow along with the English text.)

With rhapsodic lyricism, Barber sets to music James Agee's prose poem of childhood nostalgia, a meditation on loss that recounts the summer before the writer's father was killed in a car crash and the Agee family left Tennessee forever. An idyllic scene of lush lawns, porch swings, and horse-drawn buggies evolves into a testament of gratitude for the handful of moments we're blessed to spend surrounded by those we love:

By some chance, here they are, all on this earth; and who shall ever tell the sorrow of being on this earth, lying, on quilts, on the grass, in a summer evening, among the sounds of the night.

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Listen to this month's Melancholy Mixtape on YouTube, Spotify, and Idagio.

Want to share your experience with one of the works I've shared this month? I'd love to hear about it! Leave a comment below or reply to this email. (And if you enjoyed your time here today, would you ever so kindly tap that little heart below? 👇🏼)

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