WorldView Episode 56: Karl Jenkins
Episode fifty-six of WorldView features four artists from three different nations—Brazil, Wales, and the United States. The composer heard first in this hour is Karl Jenkins, a rock, jazz, and classical artist born in Glamorgan County, Wales, in 1944. After studying music at both Cardiff University and the Royal Academy of Music, Jenkins joined various jazz and rock ensembles throughout the United Kingdom.
Early in his career, Jenkins was widely recognized as a baritone and soprano saxophone player, as well as a keyboardist and oboist. In 1969, he co-founded the jazz-rock group Nucleus, which released the album “Elastic Rock” in 1970. Two years later, Jenkins joined the Canterbury-based rock group Soft Machine. He recorded five albums with the group between 1973 and 1981, serving primarily as Soft Machine’s lead song writer. After the band’s slow dissolution in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Jenkins shifted his focus towards advertisement and classical music.
Jenkins’s first major classical work was the album series “Adiemus”, which features purely phonetic vocals and orchestra accompaniment. The titular track, “Adiemus: Songs of Sanctuary” topped the Billboard classical music chart in 1995. His next large-scale work, “The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace”, premiered in 2000. It is often considered to be his greatest contribution to classical music. “The Armed Man” is dedicated to the victims of the Kosovo Crisis, which took place from 1998 to 1999. In episode fifty-six of WorldView, violinist Daniel Hope performs an arrangement of the movement “Benedictus”, written for violin, string orchestra, choir, piano, and timpani. Enjoy.
WorldView Episode Fifty-Six Playlist:
Karl JENKINS, “The Armed Man (A Mass for Peace): Benedictus”, {Daniel Hope (vn)} - Deutsche Grammophon
Heitor VILLA-LOBOS, “Symphony No. 7 (1945)”, {Sao Paolo Symphony Orchestra, Issac Karabtchevesky} - Naxos
Scott JOPLIN, “Weeping Willow”, {Marcus Eley (clar), Lucerne DeSa (pf)} - Sono Luminus
Judith SHATIN, “Penelope’s Song”, {Borup-Ernst Duo} - innova
WorldView is a classical music radio show featuring composers from everywhere in the world - except Western Europe. Tune in to hear works by lesser-known artists such as Nancy Dalberg and Isang Yun, and widen your knowledge of classical music. Hinke Younger hosts each week’s episode of WorldView on Mondays at 9AM and 6PM (with a rebroadcast Saturdays at 2PM) on Charlottesvilleclassical.org.