Ravinia 2026 Issue 2

Hartford Quartet, a group created specifically to promote sales of the company’s songbooks. Brumley composed the most enduring of his more than 800 songs in 1929— “I’ll Fly Away,” a rousing hymn of eternal salvation. “When I die, Hallelujah, by and by,/I’ll fly away.” In 1932, Brumley sold his music to Hartford Music Com- pany, where it first appeared in the collection Wonderful Message . “I’ll Fly Away” has been printed in roughly 80 hymnals and has been unofficially proclaimed “The Most Recorded Gospel Song” in history, beginning with the first known recording by Rev. JM. Gates, pastor of Mount Calvary Baptist Church in Atlanta, GA, in 1940. Brumley purchased Hartford Music Company in 1948, and moved the publishing company to Powell, MO. “Ill Fly Away” was in- ducted into the Society of European Stage Au- thors and Composer (SESAC) Hall of Fame in 1986. “When the Saints GoMarching In” likely origi- nated in the late-19th century, perhaps earlier, as an African American spiritual. A closely titled gospel song, “When the Saints Are Marching In,” was published in Songs of the Soul No. 2 , an 1896 hymnal edited by James M. Black and published in Cincinnati by Curtis & Jennings and in New York by Eaton & Mains. The lyrics by Katharine E. Purvis (also the author of “Abide with Me”) and music by Black do not resemble the well-known song. Another similar hymn, “When the Saints March in for Crowning,” with text by Harriet E. Jones and music by James D. Vaughan, was published as No. 49 in Vaughan’s Crowning Praises (1911). As with the earlier Pur- vis and Black hymn, there is little resemblance between its text and melody and the anonymous African American spiritual. The first hymnal to include “When the Saints Go Marching In” in the version known today seems to have been Songs of His Coming , published by Thoro Harris in Chicago in 1925. Louis Armstrong remem- bered hearing “When the Saints Go Marching In” played at celebrations and funerals as a boy growing up in New Orleans. While living in the Colored Waif ’s Home for Boys—after being ar- resting on December 31, 1912, for discharging a gun in the air—the second song Armstrong learned to play on the cornet was “The Saints.” Ten years later, Armstrong moved to Chica- go, joined King Oliver and His Creole Band, formed his own quintet, sextet, and big band, and signed a contract with OKeh Records. One of his unfulfilled wishes with OKeh was record- ing “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Three years after signing with Decca Records in 1935, Louis Armstrong & His Orchestra finally en- tered the studio on May 13, 1938, to set down their long-awaited New Orleans-style rendition. This track was added to the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress in 2020. Dancer and choreographer Agnes de Mille ap- proached Aaron Copland (1900-1990) with an idea for a one-act “cowboy” ballet score. Cop- land’s immediate response was predictable: “Oh no! I’ve already composed one of those [ Billy the Kid for Eugene Loring]. I don’t want to do an- other cowboy ballet.” But de Mille’s scenario and dancing style differed so radically from Loring’s that Copland agreed. He composed the bulk of the music at Tanglewood a few months before rehearsals with the Ballets Russes were sched- uled to begin. Copland brought the completed score of The Courting at Burnt Ranch , later re- named Rodeo , to de Mille in Lee, MA, a short distance from Tanglewood. The music breathed life into the tale of a cowgirl in love with the head wrangler on a ranch. Copland and a young assistant played the music, as de Mille became increasingly more involved in the picturesque score. “So, we started. I got more and more excit- ed and finally I was just screaming, yelling, and dancing. He’d written the music on transparent paper that kept slipping, and during the waltz it fell to the ground. The boy with Aaron kept pushing the music back in place. Aaron said to him: ‘Could you play the treble part? I can’t play it.’ This boy played wonderfully. I said in the waltz part, ‘Aaron, this section is pretty dull.’ He giggled and said: ‘I think it is, too. I’ll do some- thing about it.’ The friend said: ‘You’d better!’ I remember thinking: ‘Of all the impudence! To talk to the Maestro like that!’ The boy was Leon- ard Bernstein.” Rodeo debuted in New York on October 16, 1942, with de Mille dancing the lead (and receiving 22 curtain calls) and Franz Allers conducting. “Hoe-Down,” one of the most pop- ular episodes, contains two authentic folk tunes: McCleod’s Reel and Bonyparte . “Rhode Island Is Famous for You” comes from the 1948 Broadway music review, Inside U.S.A. , with music by Arthur Schwartz (1900-1984) and lyric by Howard Dietz (1896-1983). Literary inspiration came from John Gunther’s recent non-fiction book based on visits to 300 commu- nities in all 48 states (Alaska and Hawaii had not yet received statehood) over a two-year period. Gunther organized his chapters according to a giant geographic loop, beginning in California, across the Pacific Northwest, Central Plains, and Midwest, down the Atlantic coast, west through Texas and Oklahoma, and concluding in the two newest states, New Mexico and Arizona. De- spite its massive 52 chapters and 979 pages, In- side U.S.A. sold more than 500,000 copies in its first printing and was the third best-selling non- fiction book of 1947. Schwartz and Dietz were quick to capitalize on this success. The episodic nature of Gunther’s book was reimagined for the stage as a series of state-based sketches written by Arnold M. Auerbach, Moss Hart, and Arnold B. Horwitt. “Rhode Island Is Famous for You” is a playful love song that travels rapidly from state to state, highlighting the product that gives each its claim to fame. The lyrics always circle back to Rhode Island and the person addressed who is the source of its renown. New York-born composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz (b. 1948) has enjoyed equal success on Broadway and in Hollywood. Schwartz scored one of his greatest Broadway successes with the enchanted musical Wicked (2003), based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West in an adaptation by Winnie Holzman, which is itself loosely derived from L. Frank Baum’s The Won- derful Wizard of Oz and the classic Wizard of Oz movie. The musical received 10 Tony Award nominations, one Drama Desk nomination, 10 Outer Critics Circle Award nominations, and a Grammy Award for the original Broadway cast recording. “For Good” is the farewell duet be- tween Elphaba (the Wicked Witch of the West) and Glinda (the Good Witch of the North), who have discovered a life-changing friendship but now must part forever. Schwartz delayed writ- ing this finale until late in the compositional process: “I knew that it was key to the show and that if we solved the song, we had the show. And if we didn’t solve the song, it didn’t matter what else we did in the show.” A conversation with his daughter Jessica about her difficult relationship with a girl from her childhood named Sarah provided inspiration for this touching scene. What would Jessica say to Sarah knowing that she would never see her again? The instanta- neous response provided the opening line to Schwartz’s duet. “People who are important to you come into your life for a reason,” Jessica replied, “and sometimes you don’t know what that is right away.” Recipient of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Litera- ture, musician, poet, and activist Bob Dylan (b. 1941) has been the voice of generations of listeners seeking personal freedom, social jus- tice, and political change. Robert Zimmerman spent his first 20 years in Minnesota, teaching himself piano and guitar, forming high school bands, absorbing diverse musical influences from Hank Williams to Woody Guthrie, and adopting the stage name “Bob Dylan” in hom- age to the Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas. Dylan moved to New York in 1961, becoming a central figure in the Greenwich Village folk scene. He signed with Columbia Records and released a series of landmark albums whose songs fueled the civil rights and antiwar movements. He later sparked controversy and disillusionment among folk music fans by playing electric gui- tar at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. In “The Times They Are a-Changin’,” Dylan drew from the Irish and Scottish ballad traditions, creat- ing “a big song, with short, concise verses that piled up on each other in a hypnotic way. The civil rights movement and the folk movement were pretty close for a while and allied together at that time.” The lyrics challenge complacent writers, critics, politicians, and parents, warning that a sweeping social upheaval is underway and that those clinging to old ways must adapt or be overtaken by change. Dylan composed the lyrics and music to “The Times They Are a-Changin’ in September and October 1963, recording the RAVINIAMAGAZINE • JULY 20 – AUGUST 2 , 2026 100