The best free cultural & educational media on the web
The best free cultural & educational media on the web
≡ Category: Life, Music | ≅ 4 Comments
The place: A produce market in Valencia, Spain. The day: Just a day like any other. But then suddenly Verdi’s La traviata booms out over the speakers, and opera singers, initially masquerading as shopkeepers, take center stage. Stick with it until the end. The customer reaction is precious. We’ve added this one to our YouTube [...]
≡ Category: Music | ≅ Leave a Comment
The BBC brings you Folk America, a three-part documentary series on American folk music, “tracing its history from the recording boom of the 1920s to the folk revival of the 1960s.” We feature above the third segment, Blowin’ in the Wind, which takes you straight to the 1960s, when Bob Dylan and Joan Baez [...]
≡ Category: Music, Television | ≅ Leave a Comment
In the mid-1950s, the American composer Leonard Bernstein made several appearances on Omnibus, a television show dedicated to covering the sciences, arts and humanities. During his visits, Bernstein walked audiences through the art of making music. Take for example the clip above where he breaks down the making of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. Just how did Beethoven [...]
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A few resources for classical music lovers. They come recommended by Robert B, one of our faithful readers.
ArsAntiguaPresents.com offers a series of free audio programs of music from the Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical eras, all performed on period instruments. This month’s edition focuses on Mozart’s Salzburg Symphonies. You can start listening via mp3 right here.
Art [...]
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Django Reinhardt, one of Europe’s finest jazz guitar players, would have turned 100 on January 24. It’s fairly astonishing to think that he mastered the guitar as he did, elevating it to a lead jazz instrument, despite being self taught, and having lost the use of two fingers in a fire. (More on that in [...]
≡ Category: Music | ≅ 1 Comment
The Notre Dame Marching Band hit the field (a real field), where they performed OK Go’s “This Too Shall Pass.” The performance was arranged by Notre Dame’s director of bands, Dr. Ken Dye. And it was all recorded live on the spot. You can watch the video in a larger format here. Incidentally, if you’re [...]
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Once they were part of the counter culture. Now they’re getting the red carpet treatment in the establishment. (Not that I have a problem with that!) Last night, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez and others performed in the East Room of the White House. It was all part a program called “A Celebration of Music from [...]
≡ Category: Music | ≅ 6 Comments
Great find by Robert B., who captions this clip: “the teenage Glenn Gould at his Canadian home.” Gould is playing here J.S.Bach’s Partita #2. Give this a minute to get going. It’s a pretty awesome display of Gould’s talents. Thanks for sharing Robert…
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As we’ve mentioned in the past, Archive.org hosts some wonderful free, public domain media. Many of their classic films appear in our collection of Free Online Movies. And they also provide access to lots of free public domain music (including a large Grateful Dead concert archive). Thanks to a new site, Dewey Music, you can [...]
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We take you back to The Beatles (who were still The Quarrymen) in 1957. George Harrison is 14, John Lennon is 16, and Paul McCartney is 15. Click on the image to enlarge.
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≡ Category: Music | ≅ 1 Comment
Vladimir Horowitz, one of the great pianists of the 20th century, left Russia to settle in the United States in 1939. But, once the Cold War thawed, he famously returned home and played before rapt audiences. What we have here, I believe, is Horowitz playing Mozart’s Sonata in C Major during a 1986 recital Moscow. [...]
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Here we have Daniel Barenboim, the Argentinian conductor, leading the Berlin Philharmonic at Waldbuhne in Berlin, 1998. The clip is already pushing 1,000,000 views on YouTube. Part 1 is above. And Part 2 (already over 1 million views) is here. You can find a released recording on Amazon as well.
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≡ Category: Music | ≅ 1 Comment
I like to bring this one back during the holidays. In 1977, just a month before Bing Crosby died, the 40s crooner hosted David Bowie, the glam rocker, on his Christmas show. The awkwardness of the meeting is palpable. (Crosby had no real familiarity with Bowie, and Bowie wasn’t crazy about singing The Little Drummer [...]
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A little something for Neil Young fans. Right now, you can stream online (click and scroll down) his new album, Dreamin’ Man Live ‘92. It’s a live performance of Young’s 1992 album Harvest Moon, which itself returned to the sounds of Harvest, Young’s classic 1972 recording. A good find by About.com.
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The anniversary of John Lennon’s death jogged my memory, reminding me of this lengthy 1970 interview. Conducted by Jann Wenner, the founder of Rolling Stone Magazine, this important conversation (listen via iTunes – Feed – Web Site) was recorded shortly after The Beatles’ bitter breakup. Running over 3 hours, it is one of Lennon’s most extensive [...]
≡ Category: History, Music | ≅ Leave a Comment
Amazingly today marks the 29th anniversary of John Lennon’s murder in New York City. Below, you can listen to what NYC residents heard on the radio that night. The sound file was originally posted by WFMU’s Beware of the Blog. WFMU is also the force behind the The Free Music Archive, which offers up over 10,000 [...]
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The University of Michigan now offers a course designed to help students turn their iPhones into musical instruments. The video above shows footage from one of their practice sessions held in November. A final concert will be held on December 9. You can read more about this project here. Also see Stanford students playing the [...]
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A quick freebie mention: Amazon.com is currently giving away $3 worth of MP3’s until November 30th. That amounts essentially to three free songs. Just click to this page, follow a few easy steps (including using the code code MP34FREE), and you’ll be on your way.
via Lifehacker
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We take you back to 1967, to the three-day Monterey Pop Festival in California, which was kind of a precursor to the Woodstock Festival held in 1969. Monterey marked, among other things, the first major American appearances by Jimi Hendrix and The Who. Above, we give you Hendrix covering Bob Dylan’s anthem Like a Rolling [...]
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It happened 40 years ago. A 14-year-old Beatles fan named Jerry Levitan managed to sneak into John Lennon’s Toronto hotel room and asked for an interview. And he got one. Now, there’s a short animated film that brings that encounter back to life. I Met the Walrus was nominated for the 2008 Academy Award for Animated Short. [...]
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