Program Notes by Lucinda Mosher, Th.D.

Cole Porter Salute, arranged by John Whitney purchased through Alfred music

Wealthy and flamboyant, Cole Porter (1891–1964) was a musician from Indiana with a taste for luxury and a flair for life in Paris and New York. Precocious and doted upon as a child, he learned to play the violin and the piano at an early age. While an undergraduate student at Yale, he was a soloist with the university’s Glee Club; a member of the a cappella group, The Whiffenpoofs, and the composer more than 300 songs. While music was not the initial focus of his graduate studies at Harvard, it soon became so. By 1915, he was achieving success as a Broadway composer; by the 1930s, he was renowned as a tunesmith for stage and screen who could write his own exceedingly clever lyrics—and he would go on to compose many dozens! Composer John Whitney showcases four timeless Porter hits in a symphonic medley. Having gotten our attention with a big orchestral swirl, Whitney has the brass introduce “Another Op’ning, Another Show,” from Porter’s Tony Award-winning Kiss Me, Kate (1948). Decades later, this song would find its way into an episode of The Muppets! Listen for the melody to be passed from brass to strings. Bounce gives way to shimmering, over which a solo horn lilts a second Porter hit: “In the Still of the Night,” written for the film Rosalie (1937), about a West Point cadet who falls in love with a princess in disguise. Listen for the cello, and then the full orchestra, to take a turn with this tune. In third position is a rhythmically intricate setting of “Anything Goes” (1934) from an eponymous musical about shenanigans aboard an ocean liner sailing from New York City to London. To close the medley, Whitney gives us “Night and Day” (1932), intoned by low brass. It is an unusual piece. Its tune features lots of repetition of a single pitch; and, where most ballads of its era have 32 bars; this one has 48. Hugely popular, “Night and Day” has been recorded by a long list of performers—among them: Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, and far more recently…Willie Nelson! Listen for the trumpets to claim their moment with this tune. Then, with sparkles and swells, the full orchestra sings it as the medley comes to a grand conclusion. Numerous excellent recordings of Cole Porter’s many wonderful song help to sustain their popularity. So does a composition like John Whitney’s Cole Porter Salute, by making it possible for them to be appreciated anew by today’s orchestral concert audiences.