'made in america': unknown copland
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Over the years, the popularity of Aaron Copland's ballets _Appalachian Spring_, _Rodeo_ and _Billy the Kid_ — with their tuneful, wide open spaces — have overshadowed some of his
earlier works. As a young composer just back from studying in Paris, Copland wrote a Symphony for Organ. It inspired a famous quote by conductor Walter Damrosch: "If a gifted young man
can write a symphony like this at age 23, within five years he will be ready to commit murder." A couple of years later Copland wrote his Symphonic Ode. It doesn't sound
"murderous," though its sounds are more angular than those of _Appalachian Spring_. Copland called it "a transitional work, a summing up as well as a look ahead."
We're spending this week highlighting music by American composers, as played by the Seattle Symphony and conductor Gerard Schwarz. Host Fred Child talks with Schwarz about Aaron
Copland, and we hear the Seattle Symphony perform Copland's Symphonic Ode. Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.