“20th Century Good-bye” written and orchestrated by Reynold D. Philipsek copyright 1997 Zino-Rephi Music (BMI) In 1997 I prepared for the end of the century with what, for me, was an ambitious project. I wanted to create an “orchestral” album and this was the title track. The album did receive some nice reviews at the time but maybe was a […]
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“St. Germain Street” (Written by Reynold Philipsek, 2012 copyright) all instruments by Reynold, except drums by Michael Bissonnette June 15, 2018 marked 50 years since the untimely death of Jazz guitar great Wes Montgomery. Summer always puts me in a Wes Montgomery mood. I associate his sunny disposition with this season, and definitely with a certain period of my life.
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“The Juggler” (written and performed by reynold d. philipsek 2018 copyright Zino-Rephi Music BMI) In July of 2016 I stumbled upon a short video of a juggler doing his routine. The film was from the “silent era” and if I had to venture a guess it originated from some place in Western Europe in the early 1900’s. The juggler was
Milstein was a Ukrainian-born American virtuoso violinist. Being a contemporary of the great Heifetz might have seemed an undue burden to some violinists, but Milstein rose to the challenge. In his early days, he toured Russia with Horowitz, and toward the end of his life he recorded some of the best solo violin I have heard. The recordings of Bach
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Music history is replete with stories of artists meeting an early demise: Chopin, Django, Dinu Lipatti, William Kapell, and even Scriabin all passed on young. Perhaps Lipatti and Kapell are less well known, but they are very important musicians in my estimation. Lipatti (1917-1950) was a fantastic composer and pianist who thankfully left us some recordings, though precious few, and
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In the past month I have written two pieces. Rather, I thought I wrote two pieces of music. At best, new music comes with difficulty in recent years. This wasn’t always so, but as S. J. Perelman said, “with each piece you use up a part of yourself.” And having written about 225 pieces of music in my life so