Posted Dec 10, 2003

When I was in sixth grade (at the school where I sometimes was assigned to the cafeteria) a local woman came to my class one day with some classical music LPs. I was so taken with Alexander Borodin's "In the Steppes of Central Asia" that I talked my father into running out and buying me an album that included the piece. Over the next few years I nibbled here and there. It's a vast field, and purchases can be pretty hit-or-miss based on the album art! My parents were unable to offer much guidance, being of the literary rather than the musical persuasion. For instance, when my father was 13 he was staying with a family in France. They took him to see Carmen. He told me about that performance several times, but not about the muisic or even the story. He almost jumped out of his seat when the dead Carmen rose to her feet to take her curtain call!

In highschool my nodding acquaintanship flowered into genuine interest because of two friends. I met one at a poetry workshop: Patrick, an SIU student a few years older than myself, who was heavily into Wagner at the time. The other was Gene, an older friend of my (then boyfriend, now husband) Jim.

Gene was a collector. Not only of LPs, but of 78s, piano rolls, and wax cylinders. His interests and collections were so broad that while he ran some things past me to broaden my experiences (like the entire Verdi opera, "Attila") he didn't mind spending many more pleasant evenings deepening my acquaintanceship with works that had a more immediate appeal to me.

As a consequence, by the time I graduated from college, while I described myself as a fan of classical music, what I really meant was late nineteenth and early twentieth century nationalist composers, and primarily their works for full orchestra: Mussorgsky, Wagner (orchestral highlights appealed to me more than the operas in their entirity), deFalla. Beethoven had his moments, but for the most part he left me cold. Bach or Mozart? Pretty fluff. Vivaldi? If you like elevator music Chamber music? Give me a break.

Then I started working at Hillside Nursery and Garden Center, where the rule was that the only radio the customers could be exposed to was the local Public Radio station. As fate would have it, I was assigned Sundays, and I stumbled across Saint Paul Sunday Mornings.

Bill McGlauchlin's voice enchanted me from the first. There was a man I yearned to have coffee with! And for me, who had never been around musicians, it was so much fun hearing him and his guests discuss the music, that I listened to it at first as a talk show. After all, it was a live chamber music show, and I didn't like chamber music. But I listened anyway for the scraps of discussion between the pieces. And I often found that I enjoyed the pieces more than I'd expected to.

Then The Canadian Brass were the guests, and they were playing their own transcriptions of parts of The Four Seasons. A modern brass quartet playing elevator music that had already been done to death, on the wrong instruments? I would have snapped off the radio for anyone but Bill McGlauchlin. Instead I sipped on my coffee and listened. The Canadian Brass brought out the invention and the wit of the piece. The Four Seasons wasn't a tired warhorse trotted out in reverence in their hands, but a sparkling and vivacious piece as fresh and invigorating as my coffee.

I checked my record club for their album, but it wasn't out yet. I settled for Isaac Stern doing Vivaldi straight. And guess what? It wasn't elevator music with him, either. It became my most-played album for the next few months.

That broadcast opened me up to composers I'd consigned to the attic and pieces I would have resisted listening to. If Vivaldi was good, what about Bach, Mozart, Beethoven? The Bach suites for solo cello, Mozart's 40th (the Great G Minor), Beethoven's Late Quartets - I might never have listened to them if it hadn't been for Saint Paul Sunday Mornings.

I made a real effort to listen every week. But budget constraints forced my local station to drop the show. I mourned as for the death of a friend, and every year I'd look up on at least one Sunday, sigh, and check to see if it were back. It never was.

This week, after 2 years of surfing the 'Net, it finally occured to me that they might be broadcasting on the Web. And lo and behold, they are! It's "Saint Paul Sunday" now, but it has the same host. My eyes misted over when I heard Bill McGlauchlin's friendly voice, and I listened to this week's offering. I'll be spending a lot of time at their audio archive (in Program Catalog)! They aren't yet accessible to every audio player (they're working on it, so check back if you can't pick them up), but if you want to check them out, here's the link to their homepage.

By Ruby Jung, even the background. All rights reserved to the story. If you care for the background, you're welcome to copy it and use it.