Boston pops
The Boston pop provides music lovers in Boston and the rest of the country the opportunity to hear good music in all its flavours. Every year this popular orchestra in Boston offers concerts in Symphony Hall which includes a spring season from May to early July and a month of holiday concerts in December. The start or rather the beginning of Americas most loved musical institutions, the Boston Pops dated back in 1885. A large, elite and fashionable crowd gathered on a spring evening at the Boston Music Hall for the first ever Promenade Concert. It was in the air that Boston Symphony had promised them that the programs for these concerts will be made of basically light music and will have the best class. This was how America's most popular orchestra was born.
The Boston Pop was originally founded to present light and soothing kind of music to the public. These performances usually combined light classical music, tunes from the current hits of the musical theater, and an occasional novelty number. Over the course of a century with many changed taste and preferences, the Boston programs of today are still similar to the early programs conducted 115 years ago. The concert still has three sections which are divided by two intermissions. The evening's heaviest part was always sandwiched in the middle. But it is said that the event's character as a whole has changed.
It is said that the founder of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Henry Lee Higginson had proposed this new series of light music to recreate the ambience of spring and summer evenings in the concert gardens in Vienna where he had been a music student. He also had another motive which was to provide employment for the members of the Boston Symphony. The people of Boston who always had a soft corner for music accepted the offer to relax in a fantasy of European pleasure.
As many know that the first program conducted at the Boston pop was by Adolf Neuendorff, which included a novelty number titled "An Evening with Bilse, This was a perfect blend of Beethoven and Strauss, Wagner and Weber. It has been written by critics that the Boston Pop originally began as a copy of the German institution but within its first century it became purely American. The reason behind this was the development of American music itself in the 1890s.
Arthur Fiedler was a conductor of Boston Pops for tenure of fifty years. After he became the conductor, the Boston pops orchestra was much more acclaimed throughout the world. In those days there was a reputation that classical music was only for the rich famous, aristocratic, elite upper class segment of the society. Arthur Fielder was very unhappy with such reputation of classical music. He then made efforts to bring classical music to the common mass. By doing this he could bring classical music to a much wider audience. He took an initiative to conduct a series of free concerts at the Hatch Shell on the Esplanade which is a public park along the Charles River. The pops orchestra played well known classical pieces along the riverside. In this the then conductor of Boston Pop, Fiedler tried to open a new side in popular culture which encouraged the popularization of classical music on a larger scale.
Many other cities have tried their hands in pops orchestras, but Boston Pops still remains the most famous and well known as it has a unique class and a style of its own. Amongst the various pieces produced by the Boston Pops over the years, the most famous is the Fiedler's production of Leroy Anderson's "Sleigh Ride." Under Fiedler's direction, the total number of albums, singles, tapes, and cassettes sold by the Pops exceeded fifty million. During that period Boston Pops made more and more commercially available recordings than any other orchestras in the world. Fielder is also remembered for the Fourth of July Pops concert. It is perhaps the best attended Independence Day celebrations in the country which is attended by 200,000-500,000 people. Also during the tenure of Fiedler the Pops and local public television station had developed a series of weekly televised broadcasts which was recorded during the pops performances at the Symphony Hall, Evening at Pops.
After Fiedlers demise the Boston Pops passed on to John Williams. He continued with the Pops tradition of bringing classical music to the mass. He initiated concerts at Boston College and also added his own library of well known movie soundtracks. The Laureate Conductor of Boston Pops and the Academy Awards winner, Williams conducts pop concerts every year.
In 1995 Keith Lockhart took over as the principal Pops conductor. Till today he remains the same. He too has kept the basic tradition of Boston Pops but has added flamboyance and flair to his performances. Keith Lockhart is said to have brought various pop music acts to play along with the orchestra which includes Rock Pella, My Morning Jacket and many more.
Boston has always been considered a highly cultured city because of its intellectual reputation. The city had a number of ornate theatres and performing arts group. Boston Pop is amongst such world renowned arts group which has always been Americas hot favorite.
Other Articles
