[Moo] Music That's Older Than You Think

[Maven]

Most people have some familiarity with Tchaikovsky's _Sleeping Beauty_, 
and have probably heard the pompous pavane-like theme with which the 
suite (and the ballet) ends. And most people don't realize that 
Tchaikovsy was a musical magpie, picking up themes from anywhere and 
everywhere that struck his fancy.

The other day I was listening to the Finale of Rossini's _Il viaggio a 
Reims_ ("The journey to Reims" - the joke is they never get there), 
which was composed in 1825 for the coronation of the French king Charles 
X (very topical). Anyway, the finale involves a sing-off of various 
patriotic and regional themes (German, British, Italian, French, 
Tyrolean, etc. - most of them more or less recognizable, though Rossini 
tarted up the "Marseillaise" so much that only an off-key trumpet gives 
it away. And it concludes with a shockingly familiar piece of music: the 
same one Tchaikovsky ended _Sleeping Beauty_ with.

Rossini was an even bigger musical magpie, as the above Finale indicates 
- but there's no way he swiped it from Tchaikovsky (_Sleeping Beauty_ 
was composed in the late 1880s). So, where /did /he get it from?

A bit of research led to a surprising answer: it's an old French 
monarchicial anthem, referred to as the "Marche Henri IV" - and, as the 
name implies, it is *period*, dating back to 1590.

That's right - the reason it sounds like a pavane is that it *IS* one - 
and always was.

And now that we know that - now what?

Yours with amusement,

Maven Whitlocke

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