A Maure, since the 11th century, is the symbol of an African head. The term has Phoenician and Greek origins; see Moors.

Flags, seals, and emblems[link]

This symbol is used for political purposes.

The Maure[link]

The Maure is the African Unification Front's flag and emblem.

[edit] Flag of Corsica

The Corsican emblem

The main symbol in the coat of arms in Corsica is U Moru, Corsican for "The Moor", originally a female Moor blindfolded and wearing a necklace made of beads. No use is attested prior to 1736, when it was used by both sides during the struggle for independence.

In 1760, General Pasquale Paoli ordered the necklace to be removed from the head and the blindfold raised. His reason, reported by his biographers, was "Les Corses veulent y voir clair. La liberté doit marcher au flambeau de la philosophie. Ne dirait-on pas que nous craignons la lumière ?" (roughly: "The Corsicans want to see clearly. Freedom must walk by the torch of philosophy. Won't they say that we fear the light?") Later the blindfold was changed to a headband.

The current Corsican flag is the Bandera testa Mora ("Flag with head of Maure"), is male rather than female, and has a regular knot at the back of the head.

[edit] Flag of Sardinia

The Sardinian emblem

The flag of Sardinia is informally known as the Four Moors (Italian: I quattro mori, Logudorese: Sos Bator Moros, Campidanese: Is Cuatru Morus) and comprises four Moor heads. The origin of these figures on the flag is disputed. The fact that the seal has varied across the centuries, with the Moors variously being blindfolded, bareheaded, crowned, close-eyed, open-eyed, and wearing headbands, and facing in various directions, has only increased confusion.

The current coat of arms of Aragon features four heads of Moors.

Some sources^[who?] state that the flag is of Spanish origin and represents four Moorish invaders blindfolded for execution. However, the Sardinian Autonomous Region's web site proffers the explanation that whilst the emblem dates back to 1281, and can be seen on a seal of the Royal Chancellery of Peter the Great of Aragon, it was only in the 14th century, when the Kingdom of Sardinia became part of the Confederation of the Crown of Aragon, that the Four Moors came to be associated with Sardinia. It was not until the 18th century that the arrangement of the heads was fixed, with the Moors facing left and being blindfolded. On July 2, 1952, by decree the emblem became the official symbol of the region, and on April 15, 1999, the official flag, but this time with the Moors facing the fly, wearing headbands, and with their eyes open.

References[link]

• "Heart of Independent Sardinia". giampiero6's Orgosolo Page. http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/da2b/23e51/. Retrieved April 22, 2005. 
• "Sa Bandela de Sos Bator Moros". Sardinian Autonomous Region. http://www.sitos.regione.sardegna.it/4mori/4mori_sardo.htm. Retrieved April 22, 2005.  which in turn cites
  • B. Fois (1990). Lo stemma dei quattro mori, breve storia dell'emblema dei Sardi. (editor Carlo Delfino) Sassari. 
• "The Historic Significance of the Muare". African Unification Front. http://africanfront.com/umorusymbolism.php. Retrieved April 22, 2005. 
• "L'Histoire d'U Moru". Extraits de l'Ouvrage: "Trois Etudes Sur Paoli". http://perso.wanadoo.fr/bludimare/maure.htm. Retrieved April 22, 2005. 
• "U Moru (English translation)". Extracts from "Trois Etudes Sur Paoli". http://perso.wanadoo.fr/bludimare/maurang.htm. Retrieved April 22, 2005. 

Juan D'Arienzo, 1972.

Juan d'Arienzo (December 14, 1900 – January 14, 1976) was an Argentine tango musician, also known as "El Rey del Compás" (King of the Beat). Departing from other orchestras of the golden age, D'Arienzo returned to the 2x4 feel that characterized music of the old guard, but he used more modern arrangements and instrumentation. His popular group produced hundreds of recordings.

His music is played often at milongas in Buenos Aires, and the instrumentals are the classic harder rhythmic tangos with a strong staccato dance rhythm. He also recorded many great milongas and fast valses.

On his death in 1976, Juan D'Arienzo was interred in the La Chacarita Cemetery in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

External links[link]

• Todo Tango Biography

This article about an Argentine composer is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Ernest Alexandre Ansermet (pronounced [ɛʁ.nɛst a.lɛk.sɑ̃dʁ ɑ̃.sɛʁ.mɛ], 11 November 1883 – 20 February 1969) was a Swiss conductor.

Biography[link]

Ansermet was born in Vevey, Switzerland. Although he was a contemporary of Wilhelm Furtwängler and Otto Klemperer, Ansermet represents in most ways a very different tradition and approach from those two musicians. Originally he was a mathematics professor, teaching at the University of Lausanne. He began conducting at the Casino in Montreux in 1912, and from 1915 to 1923 was the conductor for Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. Traveling in France for this, he met both Debussy and Ravel, and consulted them on the performance of their works. During World War I, he met Stravinsky, who was exiled in Switzerland, and from this meeting began the conductor's lifelong association with Russian music.

In 1918, Ansermet founded his own orchestra, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (OSR). He toured widely in Europe and America and became famous for accurate performances of difficult modern music, making first recordings of works such as Stravinsky's Capriccio with the composer as soloist. Also, Ansermet was one of the first in the field of classical music to take jazz seriously, and in 1919 he wrote an article praising Sidney Bechet.^[1]

After World War II, Ansermet and his orchestra rose to international prominence through a long-term contract with Decca Records. From that time until his death, he recorded most of his repertoire, often two or three times. His interpretations were widely regarded as admirably clear and authoritative, though the orchestral playing did not always reach the highest international standards, and they differed notably from those of other famous 20th-century specialists, notably Pierre Monteux and Stravinsky himself. Ansermet disapproved of Stravinsky's practice of revising his works, and always played the original versions. Although famous for performing much modern music by other composers such as Arthur Honegger and Frank Martin, he avoided altogether the music of Arnold Schoenberg and his associates, even criticizing Stravinsky when he began to use twelve-tone techniques in his compositions.^[2] In Ansermet's book, Les fondements de la musique dans la conscience humaine (1961), he sought to prove, using Husserlian phenomenology and partly his own mathematical studies, that Schoenberg's idiom was false and irrational.

In his last years, he and his ensemble surprised many by issuing discs devoted to Haydn, Beethoven and Brahms. These performances were not at all conventionally Germanic, and were much criticized at the time of their appearance, but during recent years their vivacity has come to be appreciated more.^{[citation needed]}

In May 1954, Decca recorded Ansermet and the orchestra in Europe's first commercial stereophonic recordings. They went on to record the first stereo performance of the complete The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky on LP (Artur Rodziński had already recorded a stereo performance on magnetic tape, but this had been released on LP only in mono). Ansermet also conducted early stereo recordings of Debussy's Nocturnes and the Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune. Part of his recording of The Rite of Spring, augmented by a rehearsal recording unobtainable elsewhere, was used by Decca on the company's 1957 stereo demonstration LP, A Journey into Stereo Sound. The conductor's clear and methodical counting of beats is a distinct feature of this rehearsal sequence.

Ansermet was an ardent man who argued his opinions vehemently. He was notable in Britain for his argumentative rehearsals with British orchestras, who were used to the more jovial style of Sir Thomas Beecham or the more restrained manner of Sir Adrian Boult. His last recording, of Stravinsky's The Firebird, was made in London with the New Philharmonia Orchestra, which included a recording of the rehearsal sessions made as a memorial to him. Another late recording for Decca, also issued as a memorial album, was with L'Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and was devoted to Albéric Magnard's Symphony No. 3 and Édouard Lalo's Scherzo for Orchestra.^[3]

Ernest Ansermet (1965)

Ansermet composed some piano pieces and compositions for orchestra, among them a symphonic poem entitled Feuilles de Printemps (Leaves of Spring). He also orchestrated Debussy's Six épigraphes antiques in 1939.^[4]

He died on 20 February 1969 in Geneva at the age of 85.^[5]

Notable premieres[link]

In concert[link]

• Stravinsky, Histoire du soldat, Lausanne, 28 September 1918
• Stravinsky, Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra, composer as soloist, 6 December 1929

On stage[link]

• Manuel de Falla, The Three-Cornered Hat, Ballets Russes, Paris, 1919, a ballet for which Léonide Massine created the choreography and Pablo Picasso designed the sets and costumes. (Ansermet later recorded this in stereo.)
• Stravinsky, Pulcinella, Ballets Russes, Paris, 15 May 1920
• Prokofiev, Chout, Ballets Russes, Paris, 1921
• Stravinsky, Renard, Ballets Russes, Paris, 18 May 1922
• Stravinsky, Les noces, Ballets Russes, Paris, 13 June 1923
• Benjamin Britten, The Rape of Lucretia, Glyndebourne, 12 July 1946

On record[link]

• Stravinsky, Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra, composer as soloist, May 1930

Writings[link]

• Ansermet, Ernest. 1961. Les fondements de la musique dans la conscience humaine. 2 v. Neuchâtel: La Baconnière. New edition, edited by J.-Claude Piguet, Rose-Marie Faller-Fauconnet, et al. Neuchâtel: La Baconnière, 1987. ISBN 2-8252-0211-8
• Ansermet, Ernest. 1973. "L'apport de Paul Hindemith à la musique du XXe siècle." In Hommage à Paul Hindemith: 1895-1963 : l'homme et l'œuvre. Yverdon: Éditions de la Revue musicale de suisse romande.
• Ansermet, Ernest. 1983. Ecrits sur la musique. Edited by Jean-Claude Piguet. New rev. ed. Neuchâtel: La Baconnière. ISBN 2-8252-0207-X

Correspondence[link]

Ansermet and Wilhelm Kempff (1965)

• Piguet, Jean-Claude (ed.) 1976. Ernest Ansermet, Frank Martin: Correspondance, 1934–1968. Edited by Jean-Claude Piguet, with notes by Jacques Burdet. Neuchâtel: La Baconnière.
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 2006. Ernest Ansermet, correspondances avec des compositeurs américains (1926–1966): d'Aaron Copland à Virgil Thomson, les grands maîtres du nouveau monde. Geneva: Georg.
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 1999. Ernest Ansermet: Correspondances avec des chefs d'orchestre célèbres (1913–1969): précédées d'un Souvenir d'Arturo Toscanini par Ernest Ansermet (1967). Geneva: Georg. ISBN 2-8257-0662-0
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 1998. Correspondance E. Ansermet - J.-Claude Piguet (1948-1969) . Preface by Philippe Dinkel, postface by Jean-Jacques Langendorf. Geneva: Georg Editeur.
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 1990–91. Correspondance Ansermet-Strawinsky (1914–1967). Geneva, Switzerland: Georg.
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 1989a. Correspondance Ansermet-Ramuz, 1906–1941. Preface by Maurice Zermatten. Geneva: Georg; Paris: Eshel. ISBN 2-8257-0183-1
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 1989b. Lettres de compositeurs suisses à Ernest Ansermet, 1906-1963 Avant-propos by Conrad Beck; postface by Julien-François Zbinden. Geneva: Georg. ISBN 2-8257-0169-6
• Tappolet, Claude (ed.). 1983. Correspondance Ernest Ansermet, R.-Aloys Mooser: 1915-1969. Précédée d'un Voyage à Munich (1924) et suivie d'un Hommage à Ernest Ansermet par R.-Aloys Mooser (1969). Preface by René Dovaz. Geneva: Georg. ISBN 2-8257-0092-4

References[link]

External links[link]

• Ernest Ansermet at Allmusic
• Ernest Ansermet biography at the Bach Cantatas Website
• Ernest Ansermet discography