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Broadcasting as a Community Service  

91 .3FM
 


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WWUH 91.3 FM
Program Guide
March/April, 2019
In This Issue
Flashback: 1968
The Battles Zone
How To Listen
WWUH Archive Now Online
Be On The Radio
Classical Listing
Scholarship Fund Update
Community Affairs on 91.3
Composer Birthdays
Sunday Afternoon at the Opera
Join Our List
 


I'm thrilled to announce two items which I'm hoping will help you enjoy your WWUH listening experience.

First, we have completely updated our Program Archive so that it is now compatible with most if not all mobile devices. 

The archive allows you to listen on demand to any WWUH program that has aired over the last two weeks. 


 

    Second, we've doubled the number of people who can listen simultaneously to our live stream so if you've gotten a "all streams busy" message previously that shouldn't be a problem going forward.


 

 

Our Spring Fund drive kicks off Sunday, April 7th and runs for two weeks with a goal of $70,000.  It's an ambitious goal but we need the funds to finish out of FY in the black.  We'll have a special 50th anniversary white T-shirt available as a premium.

 

If you just can't wait to donate, feel free to use this link:

 CLICK HERE

 

 

 

John Ramsey

General Manager

 50 Years Ago:
The Start Up Of WWUH
1968
 
My Experiences During the Startup of WWUH,  By Harold Kramer,  University of Hartford, Ward Technical Institute Graduate 1968

     This is my recollection of my experiences during the startup of the University of Hartford radio station, WWUH. I believe that I have all the facts straight, however, these events took place over 50 years ago, so my memory of these events may not be perfect. Please forgive me for any inadvertent errors of fact.
     I was student at Ward Technical Institute, University of Hartford, from September 1966 until August 1968, when I graduated and received my AAS degree. I think that it was in the fall of 1968 when a person from the University of Hartford main campus visited our electronics class at Ward, which was then located on Hudson Street in Hartford. I think that his name was Randy. A visitor from the main campus was unusual, since, in those days, Ward valued its independence, and the student body was only very loosely connected to the University of Hartford main campus.
     This person spoke to about 20 of us in the second-year electronics class about helping the University start a campus FM radio station. He said that WTIC-FM in Hartford was replacing their FM transmitter and donating it to the University. They were looking for volunteers to assist with the technical end of the station and they thought that the Ward students could help. I volunteered along with four or five other guys in the class. One of the others was Lenny Berman, who I just reconnected with a few years ago on Facebook. Another Ward volunteer was Bob Haight, who I lost touch with, but I heard that Bob became an engineer for Paramount Studios.
     I believed that I could be of some value to the station engineering team. At that time, I was working part-time for State Sales and Service on Albany Ave. in Hartford repairing televisions and other electronic equipment. I was a licensed State of Connecticut Certified Radio and Television Technician since I had been working at TV Engineers, a large television service company, in Waterbury, since I was 17. I was a licensed Amateur Radio operator since I was 14.
     The first thing that I remember about WWUH was attending an organizational meeting on the 2nd floor of the Gengras Center. The University gave the station two rooms, and we decided to use one room for the radio studio and the other for the office and the transmitter. Since none of us had ever built a broadcast radio station we decided to visit other college stations in New England to learn how they operated. We visited four of five stations. I remember visiting the Harvard Radio Station and WFCR in Amherst. We visited a few others, but I can't remember exactly which ones. We did come away with a lot of ideas and technical knowledge about broadcast radio and station layout.
     Our group from Ward was mostly interested in the technical aspects of broadcasting. A different group was handling the programming and management. This group included Clark Schmid and Bob Skinner. In my opinion, it was Clark whose vision, knowledge, and drive made WWUH a reality. He and I reconnected on LinkedIn a few years ago.
      At first, I was assigned to the RF (Radio Frequency) team that was responsible for the transmitter and antenna. I recall carrying the bulky transmitter up the stairs at the Gengras Center. I took about six of us to carry it. It occupied a full-size floor to ceiling rack, and we called it "Mother." It was a vacuum tube transmitter. I remember that it had a circuit with an electric motor that turned a capacitor to correct frequency drift. When we first fired it up, the power transformer arced. I remember that Bob Haight took it apart, rewound it, put it back together again and it worked fine after that. I also remember running hardline cable from the transmitter room to the roof. I did not go up on the roof, I just helped with the interior cabling.
We had applied to the FCC for five different call signs. In those days, the FCC assigned a station's call sign. A station did not have any influence over their decision. When we found out that we had been assigned WWUH, we were disappointed. We had wanted WUHR. We had a good laugh trying to pronounce WWUH with the two "W"s."
     I recall visiting Mr. Harold Dorshug, the Chief Engineer at WTIC his office in WTIC's Broadcast House on Constitution Plaza in Hartford. I was impressed with his fancy office and I remember him having a TV set to monitor WTIC-Channel 3, along with two large VU meters on the top of the set. One meter was for WTIC AM and the other for WTIC FM. Mr. Dorshug treated me very kindly, and we talked for quite a while about the plans for WWUH. He then took me to the WTIC storage room in the lower level of the building where WTIC had stored some broadcast turntables and cart machines. He said that if we wanted them, WTIC would donate them to the University. This equipment was still in good working order. They were in storage since WTIC had fully depreciated them and replaced them with newer equipment. This equipment from WTIC was used by WWUH at its inception.
      By spring semester, my involvement with the station slowed down since Ward's final courses were difficult and I had to put in more time studying. However, during this time, I did manage to repair an Ampex reel-to-reel tape deck that the station had acquired. I think that it was an Ampex 601, but I am not sure. It was a heavy-duty, broadcast quality machine, and the mechanical components worked fine. The problem was that It had an intermittent clicking and hissing sound in the playback audio. I replaced the tubes in the audio section but that did not help. I ended up replacing almost all the capacitors in the audio chain and that fixed it. WWUH also acquired a Viking 88 reel-to-reel tape deck that was in excellent condition. We bought It from my boss at TV Engineers, who sold it to the station for $50. At that low price, it was more of a donation than an actual sale
One of the most unusual events happened one evening when a bunch of us were sitting in the WWUH office. I remember that WWUH had begun some minimal campus news reporting and we were trying to figure out how a new device, a Norelco cassette recorder, worked. We wanted to use it to record campus events, particularly since there was a special event that evening. Andy Warhol was speaking on campus. We thought that the cassette recorder would work since was relatively small and a lot easier to use than a portable reel-to-reel recorder. Besides, the station did not have a portable reel to reel recorder.
     We were fiddling with the cassette recorder when three or four women burst into the office. The door was closed but not locked. Usually, most people knocked before they entered the WWUH office. One of the women wore bright purple and was yelling at us! They were screaming about sex, art, and the media. It made no sense to us. I forgot who it was, but one of the guys was very angry and asked them to leave. In fact, he just about shoved them out the door. The whole thing was quite a scene. After that, we went downstairs in Gengras to see Andy Warhol. The news guys wanted to interview him and his entourage. We were surprised that the women who broke into our station were part of Andy Warhol's presentation. The woman in purple turned out to be Ultra Violet an artist closely associated with Warhol. I can't remember if the news department got an interview, but it was certainly a strange night.
     My involvement with the station ended when I left Hartford to move back home to Waterbury. It was just too expensive for me to live in Hartford. I finished my sixth and last semester at Ward and graduated in August 1968. At that time, Ward had no transfer credits to the academic programs on the main campus. There was no BS degree in electronic technology as there is now. I would have needed to start all over again if I entered the U of H Electrical Engineering program. So, I went back to work for TV Engineers in Waterbury and transferred to the University of Connecticut Waterbury Branch. I eventually moved to the UConn campus in Storrs where I got a job at the UConn Radio-TV Center as a broadcast technician. After graduating UConn, I went on to a 40+ year career in cable television, broadcasting, and communications. Thanks to WWUH for my first job in broadcasting!

The Battles Zone

wwuh logo 2
WWUH is celebrating its 50th anniversary, and as a person who takes an active interest in listening to the radio (otherwise you wouldn't be reading this), you're likely to be aware of where radio broadcasting has been in the past half century. When WWUH was founded in 1968, FM radio broadcasting was still in its adolescence; FM as a technology had existed since 1933, although the FM radio frequency band (88-108 MHz) wasn't adopted until around the end of WWII. It took a while to catch on; there weren't many people listening to FM at first. 
     As late as the 1960s, radio meant the standard AM band, and it was mainly hobbyists and enthusiasts who had invested in the equipment to receive FM broadcasts. There was a time when cars didn't even come with an FM radio! Without many listeners, commercial broadcasters didn't pay much attention to FM, it was originally seen as an elite, specialized medium for radio and hi-fi nerds and wealthy people who could afford fancy receivers. Most of the programming was classical or easy listening cocktail music that sounded classy in a spiffy mansion or doctor's office. Commercial radio focused on blasting out the top pop hits and news on the AM dial for the great unwashed masses, while the landscape of FM was ignored as a worthwhile business endeavor. 
     As the 1950 and '60s rolled around, the frequencies down in the lowest segment of the dial that had been set aside for noncommercial and educational institutions (88-92 MHz) began to be used by universities, and the world of college radio was born. At first mainly used for academic and educational purposes, the youth culture that was growing among the ranks of the baby boomer generation discovered the opportunities presented by these stations, and soon some hippie-dippie kids convinced the stodgy college administrators to let them in the door to play with these mainly overlooked stations, and they began to gain a following among American youth who were embracing the subversive, underground, counterculture, anti-Establishment attitude of the times. These crazy kids were actually playing albums, not the "safe" hit single 45s on the AM dial, and they were playing music with themes of sex, drugs, partying, anti-war, anti-big business, anti-parents, and an overall vibe of anything opposite the square world of their parents' generation. WWUH was founded more or less in that era and in that mold. A bunch of shaggy college kids wanted to do something that was an alternative to the world of commercial radio, a sort of protest, and they wanted to be free to present alternative music, news, commentary, public affairs and other content the commercial broadcasters wouldn't touch. The staff was comprised of volunteers, who were passionate and committed to this philosophy. To avoid the need to please advertisers and so they would never have to pander to the mass audience, they intentionally chose to be funded by listener contributions, on the theory that if people in the neighborhood liked what they heard and wanted to keep listening to it, they'd happily pay for it. And let's face it; if nobody likes it enough to pay for it, there's probably no point in doing it after all. Somehow that model has proven to be successful for 50 years.

Here's how the Battles Zone fits in: In the early 1970s Brian Battles and his friends started operating a rinky dink low-power unlicensed basement station in East Hartford as a middle school hobby, trying to sound like the broadcasters they were hearing, and hoping to follow in their footsteps. He joined WHUS while a student at UConn in 1975 and enjoyed experimenting with format-free rock, jazz, blues, soul, classical, and whatever else he could delve into. From there it was a career in commercial FM rock radio, which started out as an exciting opportunity to continue pumping out a variety of thrilling music, although from the 1970s through the 1980s the commercial radio broadcasting industry began to shrivel from a loose, open style of programming to tighter and tighter playlists, and less room for creative and innovative content. Nowadays it's been whittled down to a handful of automated, computerized stations without live personalities, playing limited, repetitive libraries of a handful of songs by a small group of artists, and it's gotten to where it mostly sounds stale, boring and tired. 
     Professionals in the broadcasting industry lament that young people show little interest in listening to the radio, and young and old have begun to give up and resort to the internet to find the fresh, vibrant world of entertainment they used to hear on across the radio dial, anywhere they went. Fortunately, however, WWUH, has resolutely kept that commitment alive, and so a few years ago Brian became a volunteer at the station to join its other geniuses, misfits, experts, maniacs and outsiders offering their skill and experience to keep exciting radio going into the 21st century!
     On Monday mornings from 3-6 AM The Battles Zone keeps the style of radio going from the founding era of WWUH, when the freeform "no rules" attitude meant you could hear almost any imaginable artist from within the enormous realm known broadly as rock, and spans pop music, fusion, jazz, blues, R&B, even world and ethnic music...whatever suits the mood and flow. If it's creative, quality and fun to listen to, it can fit the mix. We even add a dash of original comedy, sometimes you'll hear bits and pieces from The National Lampoon, Monty Python, Cheech & Chong, The Firesign Theater, SCTV, Family Guy, Rick & Morty, the Conception Corporation, TV and film comedy, and even weirder stuff. The general idea is to keep it fresh, fun and entertaining, without normal limits or boundaries. Requests are welcome, and we try hard not to be repetitive or predictable. You'll hear a carefully crafted and curated music mix crossing all decades from the 1950s to the latest releases, selected to make you want to turn it up and tell all your friends that you've discovered the coolest radio station ever!
     Give it a try, and if you like it, let us know; if you don't, tell us why or call in your requests and make it better!


How To Listen To WWUH
Many Options Available
 
In Central CT and Western MA, WWUH can be heard at 91.3 on the FM dial.  Our programs are also carried on:
WDJW, 89.7, Somers, CT


You can also listen live using your PC, tablet or smart device. Listen  here.

We also recommend that you download the free app "tunein" 
here to your mobile device. 

You can also access on demand any WWUH program which has aired in the last two weeks using our newly improved Program Archive feature:  Archive

    
It makes listening to WWUH on the go very easy, 
wherever your travels might take you.**

 **Undersea listening results may vary. 
Never Miss Your Favorite WWUH Programs Again!
WWUH Round Logo The WWUH Archive!

We are very excited to announce
that our archive has been completely upgraded so that it is usable on most if not all devices.  The archive allows you to listen to any WWUH program aired in the last two weeks on-demand 
using 
the "Program Archive" link   on our home page,  
 
CALLING ALL
FORMER WWUH VOLUNTEERS
WWUH Round Logo Th is is WWUH's 50th Year!

If you are a former UHer we'd like to
hear from you. Please Email Us

DO YOU HAVE AN IDEA
FOR A RADIO PROGRAM?
If you have an idea for a radio program and are available to volunteer late at night, please let us know.

We may have some midnight and/or 3am slots available later this year. Email station manager John Ramsey to find out more about this unique and exciting opportunity for the right person.

Qualified candidates will have access to the full WWUH programmer orientation program so no experience is necessary. He/she will also need to attend the monthly WWUH staff meetings (held on Tuesday or Sunday evenings) and do behind the scenes volunteer work from time to time. This is a volunteer position.

After completing this process, we will review the candidate's assets and accomplishments and they will be considered for any open slots in our schedule.
Classical Music's Home in Hartford















WWUH Classical Programming - March/April 2019
Sunday Afternoon at the Opera... Sundays 1:00 - 4:30 pm
Evening Classics... Weekdays 4:00 to 7:00/ 8:00 pm
Drake's Village Brass Band... Mondays 7:00-8:00 pm

March
Fri
1
Music from Connecticut Summerfest 2018
Sun
3
Rameau: Nais
Mon
4
More Selections from The Compassion Project - Including Foss: Round a Common Center; Fuchs: Piano Concerto "Spiritualist"; Black Composers Series Volume 1 - Music of Joseph Bologne Saint-Georges; Price: Symphony #1
Drake's Village Brass Band...Brass Roots with the L A Brass Quintet and Percussion Ensemble
Tue
5
MĆ©hul: Symphony #1 in g; FaurĆ©: Messe Basse; Raff: Symphony #4 in g, Op. 167; DvoÅ™Ć”k: Piano Quintet #2 in A, Op. 81
Wed
6
Brusa: Symphony No. 1; Austin: Ach die Nachdeborgen; Garrop: String Quartet; Bliss: String Quartet; Handel: Suite
Thu
7
On Beyond Bach: Fasch: Overture (Suite) in D FWV K:D2; Fischer: Overture (Suite) in Bb Op. 1 No. 3; Wilbye: Madrigals; Vitali: Chaconne; Ravel: Pavane pour une infante defunte, Sonatine, Rapsodie Espagnole; Eller: Estonian Suite; AlbƩniz: Rapsodia EspaƱola Op. 70.
Fri
8
And God Created Great Whales and other works of Alan Hovhaness
Sun
10
Doyle: Heresy
Mon
11
Daugherty: Night Owl; Barber: Piano Concerto; Black Composers Series Volume 2 - Still: Afro-American Symphony (#1); Coleridge-Taylor: African Suite; Price: Symphony #3
Drake's Village Brass Band...Maslanka: Symphony #3
Tue
12
Shostakovich: 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87, Nos. 13-16; Weinberg: String Quartet No. 4, Op. 20; Telemann: Ouverture Suite in F Major, TWV 55:F14; Weinberg: Symphony No. 5 in F Minor, Op. 76; Cecile Chaminade: 6 Romances sans paroles, Op. 76; Handel: Concerto Grosso Op. 6, No. 4 in A minor; Couperin: Pieces de clavecin, Book 3: 18th Ordre in F major-minor
Wed
13
Gliere: Symphony No. 1; Dudley: Songs; Mayer: String Quartet; Pejacevic: Cello Sonata; Arne: Piano Trio
Thu
14
On Beyond Bach: Fƶrster: Horn Concerto No. 1 in E Flat; Fux: Partita Turcaria, K331; Telemann: Recorder Sonata in f TWV 41:f1, Concerto in D for Trumpet, Violin and Strings TWV 53:D5, Sinfonia in G TWV 50:1 "Grillen-Symphonie"; Stepan: Keyboard Sonata in B-Flat; Goldberg: Trio Sonata in c; Strauss, Sr: Chinese Galoppe, Sperl Galopp, Waltz a La Paganini, Marien-Walzer.
Fri
15
Music to celebrate St. Paddy's Day
Sun
17
Dvorak: Saint Ludmila
Mon
18
Black Composers Series Volume 3 - Kay: Markings; Walker: Trombone Concerto; Britten: Spring Symphony
Drake's Village Brass Band...U.S. Marine Band - To Make Us Proud - Leonard Bernstein Tribute Part 1
Tue
19
Chabrier: EspaƱa; Dussek: Concerto in B ā™­ for 2 Pianos, Op. 63; Mozart: String Quintet #2 in e, K. 406 (516b); Rachmaninov: Die Glocken - The Bells, Op. 35
Wed
20
De Boeck: Symphony in G; L. Boulanger: Songs;; Elfrida: Piano Trio; Chausson: Symphony in B Flat; Price: Piano Sonata
Thu
21
On Beyond Bach: Gallo: Trio Sonata No. 1 in G; Geminiani: Concerto Grosso in c Op. 2 No. 1; Bach: Partita for Solo Violin No. 2 in d, BWV 1004 - Chaconne, Widerstehe doch der Sunde BWV 54, Concerto for Two Violins in d BWV 1043, Cantata BWV 174 Concerto; Mussorgsky: Hopak, Boris Godunov - A Symphonic Synthesis.
Fri
22
Spring has sprung....
Sun
24
Porpora: Il Gedeone
Mon
25
Copland: Piano Quartet; Faure: Piano Trio; Black Composers Series Volume 4 - Cordero: Concerto for Violin and Eight Miniatures for Orchestra; Shostakovich: Symphony #4
Drake's Village Brass Band... U.S. Marine Band - To Make Us Proud - Leonard Bernstein Tribute Part 2
Tue
26
"March Madness" - Variations on La Folia
Wed
27
Elgar: Symphony No. 2; M. Franck: Psalms; Grier: Spoon River Songs; Saint-Saens: Violin Concerto; M. Brouwer: Clarinet Quintet
Thu
28
On Beyond Bach: Graun: Concerto for Recorder & Violin in C; Graun: Overture in d. New Releases. A Sampling of new acquisitions from the WWUH Library.
Fri
29
Classical Conversations - A special edition discussing the New World Trio with Ann Stowe
Sun
31
Handel: Deborah

April
Mon
1
Black Composers Series Volume 5 - Jose Garcia: Requiem Mass; Foss: Symphny #1; Barber: Violin Concerto; Schuman: Judith - Choreographic Poem
Drake's Village Brass Band...Frederick Fennell and the Cleveland Symphonic Winds - At the Dawn of the Digital Era- Holst/Bach and Handel
Tue
2
Crusell Clarinet Quartet #3 in D, Op. 7;   HolmĆØs: AndromĆØde, poeme symphonique;   Shostakovich: String Quartet #7 in f#, Op. 108; Mendelssohn-Bartholdy: Symphony #2 in B ā™­ , Op. 52 'Lobgesang'
Wed
3
Beck: Symphonies; Hartmann: Symphony No. 6; Dalberg: Songs; Clark: Harp Pieces; Arensky: Piano Trio
Thu
4
On Beyond Bach: Graupner: Overture in F for Recorder and Strings; Guretzky: Cello Concerto in a; Zingarelli: Sinfonia No. 4 in D; Bozza: Sonatine for Brass Quintet; E. Bernstein: Prelude from The Ten Commandments.
Fri
5
TBD - Possibly host's choice, as I may be doing taxes that night!
Sun
7
Rossini: Mose in Egitto
Mon
8
Eubie Blake - Volume 1 with Harold Browning; Black Composers Series Volume 6 - JosƩ White Lafitte: Violin Concerto; D. Baker: Cello Sonata; E. Power Biggs - Music for Organ and Orchestra of Poulenc/Barber/ R. Strauss
Drake's Village Brass Band...Frederick Fennell and the Cleveland Symphonic Winds - At the Dawn of the Digital Era- Macho Marches
Tue
9
Special Lenten program featuring:
Buxtehude: Membra Jesu Nostri; Handel: Brockes Passion
Wed
10
Host's Choice
Thu
11
On Beyond Bach: Hasse: Recorder Sonata in Bb; Heinichen: Concerto in F; Melgaz: Salve Regina; Philidor: Recorder Sonata in d; Mouret: Suite de Symphonies; Lickl: String Quartet No. 2 in G; Ginastera: Estancia Suite.
Fri
12
Ben Yarmolinsky's music for the season and host's choice, as I will be doing taxes that night.
Sun
14
Telemann: Seliges Erwagen
Mon
15
Schuman: Night Journey; Price: Symphony #4; Black Composers Series Volume 7 - Still: Sahdji Ballet; Sowande: African Suite; Walker Lyric for Strings
Drake's Village Brass Band... Frederick Fennell and the Cleveland Symphonic Winds - At the Dawn of the Digital Era- Arnaud/ Grainger/ Vaughan Williams
Tue
16
Berkeley: Crux fidelis, Op. 43, #1; Debussy: String Quartet in g, Op. 10; Roussel: Symphony #4 in A, Op. 53; Haydn: Die Sieben Letzten Worte unseres Erlƶsers am Kreuze, Op. 51, Hob. III:50-56
Wed
17
Haydn: Symphony No. 88; Giannini: Symphony No. 3; Fine: Missa Brevis; Chaminade: Concertstuck; Clarke: Violin Works; Bloch: Suite for Viola and Piano
Thu
18
On Beyond Bach: Hertel: Trumpet Concerto #3 in D; Hellendaal: Concerto III; Carissimi: Exsurge cor meum; Suppe: Overtures; Rozsa: Spellbound Concerto.
Fri
19
Tax Season is over! I should be vacationing at Niagara Falls. Or should it be the Grand Canyon?
Sun
21
Elgar: The Kingdom
Mon
22
Music for Earth Day 2019 - Price: The Oak; Bates: Anthology of Fantastic Zoology; Rutter: For the Beauty of the Earth; Fuchs: Glacier Concerto for Electric Guitar; Zwillich: Symphony #4 "The Gardens"; Hovhaness: And God Created Great Whales; Maslanka: Symphony #6 "Living Earth"; Williams: Treesong
Drake's Village Brass Band... Penn: A Cornfield in July; Lovatt-Copper: Within Blue Empires; Ball: ...all the flowers of the mountains
Tue
23
Kabalevsky: Violin Concerto in C, Op. 48; Haydn: String Quartet in G, Op. 77, #1, Hob. III:81;   Bizet: Symphony in C; Franck: Piano Quintet in f
Wed
24
Shostakovich: Symphony 7, "Leningrad"; N. Boulanger: Songs; Fanny Mendelssohn: Piano Sonata; Liadov: Baba Yaga; Eriksson: Guitar Pieces
Thu
25
On Beyond Bach: Janitsch: Sonata da camera in D Op. 5 No. 1 'Echo'; Jiranek: Trio sonata in Bb; G. Muffat: Toccata Quarta. New Releases. A Sampling of new acquisitions from the WWUH Library.
Fri
26
The "New Age" of classical music
Sun
28
Rachmaninoff: Russian Easter Vesper Mass, Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, The Miserly Knight
Mon
29
Monday Night at the Movies...Legrand: The Umbrellas of Cherbourg Symphonic Suite; Herrmann: The Bride Wore Black; Nascimbene: The Vikings
Drake's Village Brass Band...More from Frederick Fennell
Tue
30
Shostakovich: 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87, Nos. 17-20; Weinberg: String Quartet No. 5 in B-Flat Major, Op. 27; J. S. Bach: Cantata for Quasimodogeniti [1st Sunday after Easter]: BWV 42 "Am Abend aber desselbigen Sabbats"; Weinberg: Symphony No. 6, Op. 79; Handel: Concerto Grosso Op. 6, No. 5 in D major; Couperin: Pieces de clavecin, Book 3: 19th Ordre in D minor
 
 

The WWUH Scholarship Fund


   
Audrey Morgan was the first recipient of a grant from the WWUH Scholarship Fund.

 In 2003 WWUH alums Steve Berian, Charles Horwitz and Clark Smidt helped create the WWUH Scholarship Fund to provide an annual grant to a UH student who is either on the station's volunteer Executive Committee or who is in a similar leadership position at the station. The grant amount each year will be one half of the revenue of the preceeding year.

To make a tax deductable donation either send a check to: WWUH Scholarship Fund
c/o John Ramsey
Univ. of Hartford
200 Bloomfield Ave.
W. Hartford, CT 06117 

Or call John at 860-768-4703 to arrange for a one-time or on-going donation via charge card.

If you would like more information please contact us at  wwuh@hartford.edu


Real Alternative News
For over 50 years WWUH has aired a variety of unique community affairs programs.


Here is our current schedule:
Monday: Noon - 1pm  Alternative Radio
8:00 - 9:00 pm Radio   Radio Ecoshock
Tuesday: Noon - 12:30 pm  New World Notes
12:30 - 1:00 pm  Counterspin
8:00 - 9:00 pm  Black Agenda Report
Wednesday: Noon - 12:30 pm  911 Wake Up Call
12:30 - 1:00 pm  Building Bridges
8:00 - 8:30 pm  911 Wake Up Call
8:30 - 9:00 pm  New World Notes
Thursday: Noon - 1:00 pm  Project Censored
7:30 - 8:00 pm  Making Contact
8:00 - 8:30 pm  This Way Out
8:30 - 9:00 pm Gay Spirit
Friday: 12:00 - 12:30 pm  New Focus
12:30 - 1:00 pm  TUC Radio
Sunday: 4:30 - 5:00 pm  Nutmeg Chatter
 Composer Birthdays

 
Thursday Evening Classics - March/April
Composer Birthdays


March 7
1574 (bapt) John Wilbye
1663 Tomaso Antonio Vitali
1875 Maurice Ravel
1887 Heino Eller
 
March 14
1681 Georg Philipp Telemann
1726 (bapt) Josef Antonin Stepan
1727 (bapt) Johann Gottlieb Goldberg
1804 Johann Strauss, Sr
 
March 21
1685 Johann Sebastian Bach
1839 Modeste Mussorgsky
 
March 28
 
April 4
1752 Niccolo Zingarelli
1905 Eugene Bozza
1922 Elmer Bernstein
 
April 11
1638 Diogo Dias Melgaz
1681 Anne Danican Philidor
1682 Jean-Joseph Mouret
1769 Johann Georg Lickl
1916 Alberto Ginastera
 
April 18
1605 (bapt) Giacomo Carissimi
1819 Franz von Suppe
1907 Miklos Rozsa
 
April 25
1690 Gottlieb Muffat
 

 Sunday Afternoon at the Opera

 
Your "lyric theater" program
with Keith Brown
programming selections
for the months of March/April, 2019
Sunday 1-4:30pm



SUNDAY MARCH 3RD Rameau, NaisIt's remarkable the attention that's being paid now in the twenty first century to opera of the French baroque. There were some very fine historically informed recordings of those antique works in the discography by the end of the twentieth century. They are being supplanted by even better ones. Consider Nais (1749), a pastorale heroique by Jean Philippe Rameau. In 1980 the French Erato label released an LP recording of Nais, as it was staged at the 1980 English Bach Festival with the eminent baroque specialist Nicholas McGegan conducting the period instrument players and festival chorus. The live-in-performance tapings were made at the Opera Royal, Versailles. This modern revival of the opera observed cuts in the score made during Rameau's lifetime. I broadcast the Erato LP's on Sunday, December 8, 1991. After Erato reissued Nais on two CD's in 1995 I broadcast the opera again (Sunday, January 23, 2000). Now along comes a new, much more musically complete Spanish Glossa label recording made in Budapest in 2017 in co-production with the Center for Baroque Music at Versailles. Gyorgy Vashegyi directs the Purcell Choir and Orfeo Orchestra with an international cast of vocal soloists. Glossa released their Nais in 2018 on two generously timed compact discs. The opera was originally commissioned in 1749 in celebration of the peace treaty concluding the War of the Austrian Succession. It contains some of Rameau's most beautiful music for the stage. The orchestral music of the prologue is a particularly powerful stroke of dramatic genius. The story of the opera concerns the sea god Neptune's infatuation with the nymph Nais. After reading Cuthbert Girdlestone's definitive biography of Rameau I became convinced that he is one of the greatest of all baroque composers, one who should rightly be ranked alongside Bach and Handel. He was certainly the greatest composer of French opera in the eighteenth century. Rameau's lyric theaterworks represent the culmination of almost a century of development of the operatic model established by Lully.
 
SUNDAY MARCH 10TH Doyle, Heresy This past Wednesday was Ash Wednesday in the traditional church calendar, beginning the forty day penitential season of Lent: the time when good Catholics are supposed to devote themselves to fasting, prayer and the contemplation of the doctrines of the Faith. On the first Sunday of Lent, 2019 this program gets off entirely on the wrong foot with an opera (God forbid!) about heresy. Irish electro-acoustic composer Roger Doyle (b. 1949) stumbled into the composition of his first and only opera Heresy (2013) because of a friend of his in the recording industry who had an independent label of his own called Heresy Records. Eric Fraad suggested the topic of heresy and Doyle picked out the name of a famous heretic, the Italian Renaissance intellectual Giordano Bruno (1548-1600). He was a pantheist at the wrong time in history. Bruno's concepts of the cosmos go beyond Copernicus to prefigure the understanding of the universe we have today through the science of astronomy. After a nine year-long heresy trial by the Roman Catholic Inquisition, he was burned at the stake, a martyr for the truth. The Irish literary genius James Joyce idolized Bruno and referred to him obliquely in Finnegan's Wake. That Joyce connection gave Doyle the impetus to compose his electronic opera Heresy in 2013, with Bruno as its tragic hero. The official premiere of Heresy took place at the Project Arts Centre in Dublin in 2016 and it was broadcast the following year over Radio Ireland Lyric FM. The 2018 release of the opera on two Heresy Records CD's conflates the 2016 recorded production with tracks from a previous tryout staging in 2013. Doyle also thinks of Heresy as his 'Space Opera" because it ends in outer space.
 
 
SUNDAY MARCH 17TH Dvorak, Saint Ludmila On this second Sunday in Lent I'm bringing out for a fourth airing our station's old Supraphon recording of Antonin Dvorak's oratorio St. Ludmila. I had presented this same three-LP set on three previous occasions during the Lenten/Paschal period in 1986, 2007 and 2013. A thousand years ago the pagan Czechs received Christian missionaries from the West, representing the Roman Catholic faith, and from the East, bearing with them Slavonic Orthodoxy. A Bohemian princess Ludmila sided with the proselytizers from the East. A power struggle ensued within the royal house of Bohemia over the conversion of Ludmila to Orthodox Christianity. She was assassinated and soon came to be revered as a holy martyr. The cult of St. Ludmila served in later centuries as a rallying point for Czech nationalism. Her martyrdom was exactly the right subject for the leading nineteenth century Czech nationalist composer to set to music. Dvorak's St. Ludmila premiered in Birmingham, England in 1886 with considerable success. (The English public have welcomed new oratorios since the time of Handel, and the Victorians also very much liked Dvorak's music.) Supraphon, the old Czechoslovak state record label, recorded this masterwork in 1965, when Vaclav Smetacek conducted the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus, with five native Czech speaking vocal soloists.
 
 
SUNDAY MARCH 24TH Porpora, Il Gedeone Oratorio as a musical genre is Italian in origin, and the development of the Italian sacred oratorio paralleled that of the Italian baroque opera seria. They were twin sisters stylistically, so when Lent came and Italian opera houses closed for the duration, the staged sister artform simply switched places with the unstaged form of the same music. One excellent specimen of the Italian baroque oratorio is Nicola Porpora's Il Gedeone, which was commissioned for performance during Holy Week of 1737 before the Imperial Court of the Hapsburgs in Vienna. The oratorio tells the Old Testament story of Gideon, the righteous judge and military hero of the Israelites. Porpora's musical handling of the libretto is as emotional and dramatic as what he did for any opera seria. Il Gedeone was recorded in Vienna for release in 1999 through the German cpo record label. Martin Haselbock directs the Wiener Akademie period instrument ensemble and the Vokalensemble Nova, with countertenor Kai Wessel heard in the title role. I last broadcast Il Gedeone on Sunday, April 2, 2000.
 
 
SUNDAY MARCH 31ST Handel, Deborah In his early years as a composer, during his sojourn in Italy (1706-10) George Frideric Handel wrote an Italian language sacred oratorio, La resurrezione
(1708), which you have heard on this program around Eastertime in 1994 and 2012. Deborah (1733) is Handel's first full-scale oratorio in English language. It was the highly successful revival of Esther that stimulated the composition of Deborah. Composed in 1718 for private performance, Esther was a much less ambitious choral work than Deborah. Bernard Gates' production of Esther showed the English public the potential grandeur of Handel's unique oratorio style. Eventually Handel reworked Esther on a larger scale, but from the first he crafted Deborah in his truly grand manner. The Old Testament heroine of that name is an Israelite woman who assassinates the leader of an invading army. Conductor Robert King, a specialist in baroque performance practice, collaborated with Handel scholar Anthony Hicks in putting together a complete performing score of Deborah, drawing upon previously unavailable manuscript sources. They restored the splendid overture, with echoes of the Royal Fireworks Music, that was used in revivals of this oratorio in 1744 and '49. Deborah was recorded in 1993 for the British Hyperion record label. King leads his own King's Consort of period instrumentalists, the Choir of New College, Oxford and the Choristers of Salisbury Cathedral, with soprano Yvonne Kenny featured as the Jewish prophetess. That Hyperion recording I last broadcast on Sunday, March 17, 1996. There was a subsequent Naxos recording of Deborah that I presented on Sunday, November 4, 2002. This Sunday I return to the Hyperion release.
 
 
SUNDAY APRIL 7TH Rossini, Mose in Egitto The Italian oratorios of the eighteenth century may have been unstaged operas, but there were also staged Italian lyric theaterworks dealing with Biblical subjects. One such from the early nineteenth century is Gioacchino Rossini's Mose in Egitto (1818). I featured a PHILIPS label LP recording of "Moses in Egypt" on Palm Sunday,1986. I confess I forgot about this Rossini masterpiece thereafter. Only now in the twenty first century did I think back to it, and so I feature it again for this Fifth Sunday of Lent, 2019. Rossini created this work in the sub-genre of azione tragico-sacra, as it's styled in Italian language. Mose in Egitto began as a fiasco in its premiere staging in Naples. A year later in 1819 Mose was produced again in revised version and became one of Rossini's most popular operas. In 1827, after he had moved to Paris, Rossini rewrote the opera yet again to a French libretto. This new Moise opera was also hugely popular, so popular it was translated back into Italian and completely replaced the 1819 original. That earlier version was recorded in digital sound for PHILIPS with Claudio Schimone conducting the Philharmonia Orchestra and Ambrosian Opera Chorus. Mose in Egitto has more choral writing like an oratorio. It includes some of Rossini's finest music for solo voices as well, and the plot has enough love interest to satisfy those who expect high operatic passions. Italian basso Ruggiero Raimondi sings the leading role of the great Hebrew prophet. Pharao is the distinguished German bass Siegmund Nimsgern.
 
SUNDAY APRIL14TH Telemann, Seliges Erwagen I customarily offer listeners a Passion oratorio or something similar on Palm Sunday. The most famous of such works is, of course, Bach's St. Matthew Passion. Bach's colleague Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767) wrote many more Passion settings than Bach and long outlived him. In fact, Telemann was one of the single most prolific composers in the history of music.) Over three decades plus of Palm Sundays I have aired recordings of some of Telemann's output of Lutheran church music for Eastertide, for instance, his setting of Brockes Passion (1716), which went over the air on March 28,2010 (Jacobs/Akademie fur Alte Music Berlin/RIAS Kammerchor, Harmonia Mundi CD's, c2009).    
Many of the leading composers in Northern Germany in the early eighteenth century took on Brockes Passion (Handel included). Seliges Erwagen or "Blessed Contemplation" is not a musical setting of the Passion narrative of one of the four Gospels. Rather, it is a sequence of nine cantatas which are dramatic meditations on the suffering and death of Christ. In its earliest form it may have been performed in 1719. It definitely was given during Holy Week of 1722 in Hamburg in its revised form and became one of the most widely played works of its kind throughout Central Europe in the eighteenth century, surpassing even Brockes Passion. "Blessed Contemplation"has no Evangelist or narrator. It does have solo singing roles for Jesus, Peter, the High Priest Caiaphas and the allegorical figures of Devotion or Faith and Zion (ie. The Church). Seliges Erwagenwas recorded live in performance by NDR North German Radio in the course of the 2017 Hamburg Telemann Festival. Gottfried von der Goltz conducts the period instrument players of the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra. The French Aparte label issued this Telemann oratorio on two compact discs in 2018.
 
 
SUNDAY APRIL 21ST Elgar, The Kingdom Sir Edward Elgar's popularity in his home country rested on his oratorios. The English have always loved choral singing. Choral societies abounded in the grim industrial cities of Victorian England. It was for the Three Choirs Festival at Birmingham
that Elgar wrote his last oratorio The Kingdom
(1906). Elgar compiled his text for The Kingdom mainly from passages of the first four chapters of the Acts of the Apostles plus other verses drawn from the Gospels. Some critics think Elgar never again matched the sublime excitement of The Dream of Gerontius (1900). The Kingdom is in its own way a great work in the oratorio genre. It was intended to be the second part of a trilogy of sacred musical dramas that Elgar never completed. It is, however, not really a dramatic musical conception, but something of an essentially reflective nature. If it has any dramatic content, that would lie in the mystic drama that transpired between Jesus Christ and his disciples in the Upper Room. The great English conductor Sir Adrian Boult left us his interpretation of The Kingdom on EMI LP's. In the 1969 recording for EMI Boult led the London Philharmonic Orchestra and a stellar cast of English vocal soloists of that period. The Boult recording I broadcast on Easter Sunday, 1988. Not long after that, on Sunday, February 26,1989. I presented what was then a new RCA Red Seal compact disc release of The Kingdom with the American Leonard Slatkin conducting the London Philharmonic and Philharmonic Choir. This 1988 Red Seal release on two CD's I feature again this Easter Sunday.
 
 
 
SUNDAY APRIL 28TH Rachmaninoff, Russian Easter Vesper Mass, Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom,The Miserly Knight Due to the "Old Style" Julian calendar that Eastern Orthodoxy follows Russian Easter falls on this Sunday. That gives me the opportunity to present one of the treasures of Russian Orthodox choral music, Sergei Rachmaninoff's Russian Easter Vesper Mass, Op. 37 and the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, Op.31 (1910). The Liturgy music predates Rachmaninoff's better known All Night Vigil Vespers (1915) for Holy Saturday evening, Op. 37, numbers from which were extracted for concert performance. (Curiously, Rachmaninoff was never an observant Orthodox Christian, but he always loved the Old Slavonic monadic liturgical chants and studied them intensively in preparation for his harmonized choral treatments of them.) The Vespers treatments have been more frequently recorded. I have presented various recordings of the Op. 37 Vespers at Eastertime in years past. On April 14, 1985 I broadcast a liturgically complete recording of Rachmaninoff's All Night Vigil music. It was styled Evening Service when it was presented on three Musical Heritage Society LP's. The choral forces in this case were the Johannes Damascenus Choir of Essen and the Choir of the Papal Russian College in Rome. All the music of Op. 31 and what other recordings left out of Op.37 was recorded in 1994 for the Austrian Capriccio label. The recording was made in the St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Sofia, Bulgaria. Two choral groups participated in the effort, neither of them Russian: the Bulgarian National Choir and the Sofia Orthodox Choir. The two audio CD's and a documentary DVD were issued by Capriccio first in 1996 and again in 2009. I last presented the Mass and Liturgy on Russian Easter Sunday, May 5, 2013.
   There will be time remaining to present something else by Rachmaninoff: his hour-long opera in two acts The Miserly Knight (1904) in its 2004 release on a single Chandos silver disc. The Miserly Knight was recorded in studio production in the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory with Valeri Polyansky directing the Russian State Symphony Orchestra. The Baron, who is the miser, is bass Mikhail Guzhov. The story of the opera Rachmaninoff derived from one of the four "Little Tragedies' of the nineteenth century Russian writer Alexander Pushkin. The sin of greed is the focus of Pushkin's tale. The Miserly Knight from Chandos I aired previously on Sunday, June 22, 2008.
 

Hartford Symphony Orchestra - 
fireworks-summer.jpg

Our Mission:  To enrich lives and community through great music. Our Vision: HSO will be widely known for and unrivaled in its ability to: Openly engage our community and its diverse people Foster joy for music and an appreciation...

Connecticut Valley Chamber Orchestra

Great music and great musicians! Food for the soul! Affordable prices! The Connecticut Valley Symphony Orchestra offers these benefits to all of you in the greater Hartford Community. 

The CVSO has been operating for 88 years. Our musicians, serious amateurs and music educators, range from teenagers to seniors, and have a fabulous 2018-2019 season of classical, romantic and modern music lined up for your listening pleasure. Here are our scheduled performances:

April 7, 2019: Vive la France!
Paul McShee, conducting
Chabrier: EspaƱa
Saint-Saens: Morceau de concert
Susan Knapp Thomas, harp
Franck: Symphony in D minor

June 2, 2019: Pops: Dance!
de Falla: Spanish Dance from La Vida Breve 
Prokofiev: Montagues and Capulets
from Romeo and Juliet
Tchaikovsky: Romeo and Juliet
Dvorak: Slavonic Dances (selected mvts)
Borodin: Polovtsian Dances
Saint-Saens: Danse Macabre
Lehar: Waltz from Merry Widow

Sibelius: Symphony No. 2

Concerts are Sunday afternoons at 3:00 p.m. at Congregation Beth Israel, 701 Farmington Avenue, West Hartford.

site.
The West Hartford 
Symphony Orchestra
In Collaboration with the WWUH Classical Programming we are pleased to partner with the West Hartford Symphony Orchestra to present their announcements and schedule to enhance our commitment to being part of the Greater Hartford CommunityIn Collaboration with the WWUH Classical Programming we are pleased to partner with the West Hartford Symphony Orchestra to present their announcements and schedule to enhance our commitment to being part of the Greater Hartford Community

West Hartford Symphony Orchestra
Richard Chiarappa, Music Director
whso.org
(860) 521-4362

Upcoming Concert:

2019 Annual Pops Concert
Saturday, May 18, 2019,  7:00 PM
West Hartford Town Hall

The Musical Club of Hartford
The Musical Club of Hartford is a non-profit organization founded in 1891. Membership is open to performers or to those who simply enjoy classical music, providing a network for musicians from the Greater Hartford area.
 
Club events take place normally on selected Thursday mornings at 10:00 a.m, Fall through Spring. The usual location is the sanctuary at Westminster Presbyterian Church, 2080 Boulevard, West Hartford, CT (between Ridgewood and Mountain Avenues). Information on time and location is given at the bottom of each event description.
 
The Hartford Choral

Hartford Chorale 2018-2019 Season
 
Vaughan Williams & Mendelssohn
Heavenly voices will fill Belding Theater in April! Vaughan Williams' blissful Fantasia on "Greensleeves" was originally used in his opera, Sir John with Love, inspired by Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor. His haunting Dona NobisPacem is a plea for peace in the years leading up to World War II. Mendelssohn's elegant Symphony No. 2 "Lobgesang" ("Hymn of Praise") echoes Beethoven's Ninth, and is a celebration of the German Reformation.
Hartford Symphony Orchestra
Friday April 12, 2019 - 8:00 pm
Saturday April 13, 2019 - 8:00 pm
Sunday April 14, 2019 - 3:00 pm
Belding Theater, The Bushnell
Carolyn Kuan, Conductor


The Manchester Symphony
Orchestra and  Choral

Bringing Music to our Community for 59 Years!
 
The Manchester Symphony Orchestra and Chorale is a nonprofit volunteer organization that brings quality orchestral and choral music to the community, provides performance opportunities for its members, and provides education and performance opportunities for young musicians in partnership with Manchester schools and other Connecticut schools and colleges.
   
Concert 4 - Chorale/Orchestra "Mozart Requiem"
Saturday, April 27th, 2019 at ? pm
(Location TBD, Worcester, MA)
Sunday, April 28th, 2019 at 4:00 pm
Bailey Auditorium, Manchester High School, Manchester, 
Combined with MHS and Master Singers of Worcester
Mozart: Ave Verum
Beethoven: Egmont Overture
Mozart: Requiem Program details are subject to change.
 

Beth El Temple

Music at Beth El Temple in West Hartford is under the aegis of The Beth El Music & Arts Committee (BEMA). With the leadership of Cantor Joseph Ness, it educates and entertains the community through music.
 
Open to the Public. Plenty of FREE Parking.
Beth El Temple
2626 Albany Ave, West Hartford, CT 06117
Phone: (860) 233-9696

Friday April 12, 2019 - 8:00 pm
Saturday April 13, 2019 - 8:00 pm
Sunday April 14, 2019 - 3:00 pm
Belding Theater, The Bushnell
Hartford, CT
Carolyn Kuan, Conductor

MUSIC UNIVERSITY: BEETHOVEN INTENSIVE I / II - MARCH 6/11

IT'S ALL ABOUT THE DRAMA - SUNDAY, APRIL 7, 7PM

MUSIC UNIVERSITY: MUSIC OF THE AGES I / II - MAY 1/6 AND MAY 15/20

THE POWER OF MUSIC - SUNDAY, JUNE 2, 7PM
Serve Harmony: 
Voce's 2019 Concert Season
Serve Harmony: Voce's 2019 Concert Season
 
Light Eternal: The Music of Thomas LaVoy - Composer-in-Residence
MARCH 3, 2019 - 3:00 PM
ST. PATRICK - ST. ANTHONY CHURCH
285 CHURCH ST, HARTFORD, CT 06103
Thomas LaVoy, emerging as one of the finest composers of our era, will join Voce as Composer-in-Residence in "Light Eternal." A former student of Paul Mealor, Thomas brings unique colors to some of the most profound poems and sacred scriptures ever penned. His music is warmth to the ears and will evoke a song in your heart with subtle harmonies, ethereal tones and tenderness.
 
With One Voice
MAY 11, 2019 - 7:30 PM
ST. PATRICK - ST. ANTHONY CHURCH
285 CHURCH ST, HARTFORD, CT 06103
The music of Whitacre, Gjeilo, Mealor, Esenvalds and others will captivate the soul and delight the senses in the tenderness and joy of serving harmony. Voce culminates its season with an invitation to unity, joy, light and the collective devotion to the gift of song.
 
www.voceinc.org                                                               

Who Else
WWUH Radio 91.3 FM : Celebrating 50 Years of Public Alternative Radio
 
Our programming can also be heard on:
WDJW - Somers, 89.7 Mhz