Classical Connections

[Michael]

Sorry, but it's the only title I could come up with on the spur of the moment.
Have any classical works (or even musical phrases within that work) suggested a popular tune to anyone?
I'll kick off with the Beethoven Cello Sonata, Opus 102, No. 2 (his last one).
In the middle movement, he anticipates the main theme of "Gone with the Wind". (There are three sections to the movement and this comes right at the end of the flowing middle section just before the music returns to the opening theme.)

[Michael]

Yes. The Star Wars theme and the main theme in Bruckner's IVth : TA-TA-ti-ti-ti-TA-TA (the ti-ti-ti as crotchet triplets in 4/4 time).

Whereabouts in the Fourth? (It's Bruckner, you know, and life is short).
(Must be the first movement, now I come to think of it.)

[Peter]

Sorry, but it's the only title I could come up with on the spur of the moment.
Have any classical works (or even musical phrases within that work) suggested a popular tune to anyone?
I'll kick off with the Beethoven Cello Sonata, Opus 102, No. 2 (his last one).
In the middle movement, he anticipates the main theme of "Gone with the Wind". (There are three sections to the movement and this comes right at the end of the flowing middle section just before the music returns to the opening theme.)

A theme (not the main one) from the slow movement from Elgar's 2nd symphony reminds me of "Gone with the wind". Also Beethoven's king Stephen overture reminds me of Jesus Christ Superstar!

[Michael]

Life is indeed short, Michael, but art is longer! Anyway, the "Star Wars" theme comes in (1st movement) at 1'57" (Karajan/Berlin Philharmonic/1970). I would normally give you the bar number reference, but I don't have the score to hand, and I'm not trying to settle an old score.

Yes, I think Williams probably did steal a few Brucknarian phrases. Damn it, now I feel like listening to the whole symphony (I have Ormandy's Philadelphia version) - and there's the evening gone.
Don't come up with any Mahler references, please!
(I may need the bar number later - that is, if they deliver drinks!)

[PDG]

The opening theme (chords and melody) of the slow movement to LvB's Op. 31/3 sonata in E flat, reminds me uncannily of The Carnival Is Over (UK no.1 hit for The Seekers in 1965).

[Michael]

The opening theme (chords and melody) of the slow movement to LvB's Op. 31/3 sonata in E flat, reminds me uncannily of The Carnival Is Over (UK no.1 hit for The Seekers in 1965).

"The Carnival is Over" was adapted from a Russian folk tune. And the Seekers also swiped the "Ode to Joy" theme for their single "Emerald City."

[PDG]

"Lead us to the Em'rald City, la la-la la la la la laaa....." Great stuff. I wondered where Beethoven had nicked his theme from...

[PDG]

You pop experts will have to help me : there is a song (solo male voice, plus acoustic guitar, a sort of ballad, I suppose) whose title I vaguely recall - the Streets of London, or something like that. Was not this melody lifted from B's piano sonata n° 30, opus 109, first movement, main theme?

Ralph McTell, "The Streets of London" (a UK no.2 hit: December 1974). You're right but I never realised it before! (McTell changes chord at 4/4 intervals, against LvB's 2/4).

[PDG]

And let us not forget that long haired and bearded hippy and wanna be 'popster' Johannes Brahms who "kind of almost" borrowed B's Ode to Joy theme for his rock n' roll Symphony n° 1 (last movement).

With that beard it's no wonder Brahms got the Santa gig every Xmas at Debenham's! (or Macy's for our US friends...)

[Michael]

Leonard Bernstein's "There's a place for us" from West Side Story starts with a phrase taken from the second movement of the "Empereror Concerto". This was probably deliberate as Bernstein was a Beethoven nut.

In one of my first forays into the internet, I mentioned this on a Beethoven website (now defunct). I pointed out the resemblance between the tunes, and, with my usual devastating wit, joked that Beethoven must have heard the soundtrack to "West Side Story". I was gravely informed by an American lady that I was mistaken: Beethoven died over a hundred years before that musical was written.

(No wonder I splatter icons all over the place!)

[Michael]

And let us not forget that long haired and bearded hippy and wanna be 'popster' Johannes Brahms who "kind of almost" borrowed B's Ode to Joy theme for his rock n' roll Symphony n° 1 (last movement).

The so-and-so also stole the chimes from Big Ben for that same movement!

[atserriotserri]

I think all a part of the theme of the 1st. mov of Shostakovich's 5th symphony is the theme of the "Theme from S.W.A.T.", from the TV series.

In http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_cD6Ug3xzk (Bernstein directing NYPO) you can find it for example at 0:50 or 5:00.