Michael Tilson Thomas, 61, the music director of the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, has a new project, the ambitious Keeping Score which he hopes will help make symphonic music less intimidating.

Chron.com reports: “Envisioned as a five-year, $23 million project, Keeping Score features a PBS series, a national radio series, an interactive Web site and outreach programs that organizers hope will involve 500 teachers and 75,000 students around the country.”

Thomas commented: “It presupposes the idea that there are intriguing things to find out about classical music– about the back story of the particular performance, and certainly the back story of the piece itself and the era of which it comes, and that it’s all fun to actually learn to comprehend things about the way music itself works.”

With Thomas in the updated Bernsteinesque role as guide, the TV series will debut in November, promising three ear-opening documentaries over successive weeks exploring Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony, Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring and Aaron Copland’s life and music.

The radio series, “The MTT Files,” will feature eight hourlong installments about life, music and art, including a Thomas interview of soul singer James Brown.

“The website will help novices and sophisticates better understand the piece’s themes, structure, orchestration and mood-changing keys. As the music plays, users can follow the score even if they can’t read notes. In a variation of follow the bouncing ball, the main themes will be highlighted as the music plays, enabling users to see how the composer tosses around melodies and harmonies to different instruments”.

David Kennard, who worked with Michael Tilson Thomas as co-producer of the TV series, said: “You can produce all that ‘Tubby the Tuba’-type thing, which these days doesn’t go down. What we tried to do is to capture him talking to us as individuals, to the single documentary camera, to really share why he constantly puts himself on the line in terms of exhaustion and everything else. There are you know a number of great conductors. But he’s a great conductor who can actually talk.”

This compilation of recordings is my favorite for the works of Aaron Copeland, that great American picture-maker in music. He captured so much of the sense and sensibility of America in wonderful pieces like, The Rodeo, and Appalachian Spring. His “political” piece, Fanfare for the Common Man, by contrast, comes across as stiff and boring.

Leonard Bernstein is just the conductor for Copeland with his fierce, unstoppable energy and exuberance. Here’s David Hurwitz’s assessment of this CD at Amazon.com:

“Happy is the composer who has an advocate as passionate and talented as Leonard Bernstein. These Copland performances have been the preferred versions since they were first issued–better even than the composer’s own, later recordings. Originally they were spread over two discs, but thanks to the extended playing time of the compact disc, you can now get all three great Copland ballets together, along with the ever popular Fanfare for the Common Man. Bernstein brings to this music the right sharpness of rhythm but also a typically open-hearted warmth. He coaxes a virtuoso response from the New York Philharmonic, which knows this music as well (or better) than anyone. Self-recommending.”

And here’s what you get for your dollars:

Appalachian Spring, concert suite for full orchestra
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Rodeo, selections from the ballet (including “Four Dance Episodes”) Buckaroo Holiday
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Introduction: the Open Prairie
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Street in a Frontier Town
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Mexican Dance and Finale
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Prairie Night
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Gun Battle
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Celebration
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet Billy’s Death
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Billy the Kid, orchestral suite from the ballet The open Prairie again
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

Fanfare for the Common Man, for brass & percussion (from Symphony No. 3)
Composed by Aaron Copland
with New York Philharmonic
Conducted by Leonard Bernstein

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