Robert Wyatt

Steps in Time: Fred Astaire
2023-01-09 15:00 - 16:30 (America/New_York) | Florida Atlantic University, Barry and Florence Friedberg Auditorium, Boca Raton Campus, Boca Raton, FL, United States
Light on his feet, Fred Astaire revolutionized the movie musical with his elegant and seemingly effortless dance style. He may have made dancing look easy, but he was a well-known perfectionist, and his work was the product of endless hours of practice.
Astaire started performing as a child, partnering up with his older sister Adele. The two toured the vaudeville circuit before making it to Broadway in 1917. Among their many productions the brother-sister team starred in the 1927 George and Ira Gershwin musical Funny Face. For all his early success, though, career in the movies eluded Astaire. He had done a screen test, but he failed to attract any interest. A studio executive wrote at the time, “Can’t sing. Can’t act. Slightly balding. Can dance a little.” He eventually appeared in 36 musical films.

Steps in Time: Fred Astaire
2023-01-10 13:30 - 16:30 | Residences at MorseLife, 4847 David S. Mack Drive, West Palm Beach, FL, 33417, United States

The Hollywood Musical: Part IV - The 1960s
2023-01-10 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States
Films created during the 1960s belong to the most creative era in cinema history, a time of tremendous social change, the Vietnam War, fashion, fads, rock ‘n’ roll and the acceleration of technological ingenuity. However, movie audiences were rapidly diminishing due to the dominance of the television industry and only 145 musicals were produced in the decade, compared to the 453 all-singing, all-dancing extravaganzas churned out in the 1930s.
Be entertained throughout an evening which features dazzling film clips of your favorite stars and a historical narrative by American music specialist, Robert Wyatt. Enjoy the emergence of Barbara Streisand, witness Julie Andrews transform from a nanny to a nun in only a year, and reserve a front row seat while drifting back to a time when admission to a movie house equaled a six-pack of beer!

Women Sing the Blues
2023-03-05 10:30 - 12:00 | West Falmouth Public Library, 575 West Falmouth Highway, West Falmouth, MA, 02574, United States
Although blues music was sung as an oral tradition by enslaved people on southern plantations, classic female blues emerged early in the 20th century as a mixture of traditional folk blues and urban theater music. Appearing onstage with pianists or small jazz combos, dazzling pioneers like Ma Rainey, Betsy Smith, Memphis Minnie and Mamie Smith catapulted the vocal form onto the world stage. With new technologies in sound recording coupled with the advent of national radio broadcasts, the blues grew as one of the most popular forms of jazz. And then Ethel Waters, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday changed everything.

A Musician with Magic: John Williams
2023-04-04 13:30 - 16:00 | Residences at MorseLife, 4847 David S. Mack Drive, West Palm Beach, FL, 33417, United States
n a career that spans five decades, John Williams has become one of America’s most accomplished and successful composers for film and for the concert stage. Mr. Williams has composed the music and served as music director for more than one hundred films. His 40-year artistic partnership with director Steven Spielberg has resulted in many of Hollywood’s most acclaimed and successful films, including Schindler’s List, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, Jaws, Jurassic Park, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, four Indiana Jones films and Saving Private Ryan, to name just a few.
In this lively evening, pianist, raconteur, and American music specialist Robert Wyatt celebrates the life and works of John Williams. Fasten your seat belts…it’s going to be a fabulous ride!

A Musician with Magic: John Williams
2023-04-04 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States
In a career that spans five decades, John Williams has become one of America’s most accomplished and successful composers for film and for the concert stage. Mr. Williams has composed the music and served as music director for more than one hundred films. His 40-year artistic partnership with director Steven Spielberg has resulted in many of Hollywood’s most acclaimed and successful films, including Schindler’s List, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, Jaws, Jurassic Park, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, four Indiana Jones films and Saving Private Ryan, to name just a few.
In this lively evening, pianist, raconteur, and American music specialist Robert Wyatt celebrates the life and works of John Williams. Fasten your seat belts…it’s going to be a fabulous ride!

The Life and Music of J. S. Bach
2023-04-24 15:00 - 16:30 | The Gables at East Mountain, 200 Gables Place, Rutland, VT, 05701, United States
Johann Sebastian Bach is considered to be the “father of Western music.” He not only excelled in composition but also masterminded a host of theoretical properties which allowed future composers to advance their own ideas. The most versatile of geniuses, Bach was a fine organist, a loving husband and father, and a creative thinker whose interests were boundless. The program will combine a discussion of his life and will feature an wide array of his works chosen for their brilliance and historical importance.

The Magical Kingdom of Walt Disney
2023-04-25 10:30 - 12:00 | ESI, 112 Exchange Street, Middlebury, VT
During a 43-year Hollywood career, Walter Elias Disney established himself and his products as an authentic part of Americana. Beginning his career as an advertising cartoonist in Kansas City, he relocated in Hollywood in 1923 where he created and marketed his first original animated cartoons. Mickey Mouse entered popular culture in 1928, followed by a host of other characters which became the perpetual delight of American children and their parents. Disney Land was completed in 1955, the same year that The Mickey Mouse Club was first aired on television. Walt Disney World opened to the public in October 1971 with the Epcot Center launched a year later. While gathering 32 personal Academy Awards, Walt Disney did more to touch the hearts and minds of people around the world than any other man in the 20th century. Enjoy stories of his artistic life in a lively program by Robert Wyatt in which he combines history and photography within a multitude of video clips which will heighten your appreciation of Disney’s genius.

George Gershwin: Our Love Is Here to Stay
2023-05-23 18:30 - 20:30 | Smithsonian Dillon Ripley Center, 1100 Jefferson Dr SW, Washington, D.C., DC, United States
Although his career covered less than two decades, and ended with his tragic death in 1937, his music endures. Join pianist and Gershwin-authority, Robert Wyatt, co-editor of Oxford University Press’ The George Gershwin Reader, in this lively lecture exploring Gershwin’s life and legacy. The program includes a chronology of the composer’s meteoric life, his 1924 recording of the Rhapsody in Blue, samples of early and unpublished music and footage from the Gershwin brothers’ four Hollywood films.

A Musician with Magic: John Williams
2023-05-30 14:00 - 15:30 | Residence at Otter Creek, 50 Lodge Road, Middlebury, VT, 05753

Sergei Rachmaninoff: Giant of Romanticism
2023-06-30 15:30 - 17:00 | Eastview at Middlebury, 100 Eastview Terrace, Middlebury, VT, 05753, United States
Stravinsky portrayed him as “a six-and-a-half-foot scowl,” a man who remained aloof and pensive while creating music that was anything but introspective. Certainly he was an enigma, both as an individual and as a composer who was equally gifted as a pianist and conductor. Rachmaninoff speculated about “chasing three hares,” wondering whether his inability to balance his three passions might diminish his reputation. Yet in 2022, one year shy of the 150th anniversary of his birth, his legacy is not only intact but his works remain symbolic of all that is alluring in Western classical music.
Through a presentation highlighted video presentations, archival recording (Rachmaninoff cut more than 350 discs, both acoustic and electronic) as well as recent recordings, experience the genius of one of the greatest composers of symphonic, choral and piano music.

The Enchantment of Rodgers and Hammerstein
2023-09-05 14:00 - 15:30 | Residence at Shelburne Bay, 185 Pine Haven Shores, Shelburne, VT, 05482
In this lively and engaging afternoon, pianist, raconteur, and American music specialist Robert Wyatt celebrates the lives and works of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Through original cast recordings, film clips, interviews, correspondence, and other primary materials furnished by The Library of Congress and The Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization, learn about the lives of these two icons of the American musical, experience their great productions, and listen to their music which has kept the American public hopeful through wars, recessions, natural disasters, and political intrigue.

Cole Porter: Sophisticate of American Song
2023-09-07 13:30 - 15:00 | University of Vermont, St. Johnsbury, 1325 Main Street, St. Johnsbury, VT
Dilettante, hedonist, elitist, snob: Cole Porter was called all of them during his glittering yet troubled life. Whatever detractors may have said about him personally, Porter’s reputation as a musical genius has never been questioned. The lecture surveys Porter’s life on Broadway and in Hollywood, covering 40 years that produced 33 stage works and the music for 23 films. Rare archival film clips and recording of original cast members, including Ethel Merman, Fred Astaire, Louis Armstrong, and Bing Crosby are featured, along with Porter himself singing and playing “You’re the Top”—which he was.
Through the use of a grand piano and a PowerPoint presentation, the audience will sway with the songs that people enjoy humming, masterworks like “Night and Day,” “Another Op’nin’, Another Show,” “Begin the Beguine,” “I Love Paris” and many, many more. American music specialist Robert Wyatt will walk you through Cole Porter’s dramatic and fascinating life.

The Brothers Gershwin
2023-09-27 11:00 - 12:30 | University of Vermont, Greg Brown Lodge, St, Albans, VT, 05478
American music specialist Robert Wyatt walks you through the lives of the Gershwin brothers, from their simple roots, through their Tin Pan Alley apprenticeship and to the glory years which proved to be so very short. Through original cast recordings, film clips, interviews, intimate home movies, correspondence and other primary materials furnished by The Library of Congress, the Museum of the City of New York and the Rare Documents Collection at the New York Public Library, learn about the lives of these two icons of the American musical, experience their greatest productions, and listen to their music which is as poignant and beloved now as it was during their lifetimes.

Fred Astaire: A Step in Time
2023-09-29 14:00 - 15:30 | Residence at Otter Creek, 50 Lodge Road, Middlebury, VT, 05753

The Magical Kingdom of Walt Disney
2023-10-03 10:30 - 12:00 | Congregational Church of Middlebury, 2 Main Street, Middlebury, VT, 05753, United States

The Enchantment of Rodgers and Hammerstein
2023-10-16 16:00 - 17:30 | Eastview at Middlebury, 100 Eastview Terrace, Middlebury, VT, 05753, United States

Stephen Sondheim: the Wizard of Broadway
2023-10-24 18:30 - 20:30 | Smithsonian Portrait Gallery, 8th and F Streets, NW , Washington, DC
For over five decades he spun his words and music to be sung on the stages of Broadway theaters. Two other musical poets, Irving Berlin and Cole Porter, had crafted their musical dramas earlier in the century but Stephen Sondheim’s work is simply different: it transforms musical theater into psychodrama, exploring feelings and emotions in such a novel and robust way that no one ever leaves the theater quietly after a Sondheim musical.
American music specialist Robert Wyatt takes you along a path through Sondheim’s life and creations, from the trailblazing contributions of West Side Story, Follies and Company, to the animated precision of shows like A Little Night Music and Sweeney Todd, and along to the boldness of later works like Assassins and Passion. Come witness the wizardry of Stephen Sondheim as he pairs the virtuosity of his words with the passion of his music, allowing you to exit the theater with “Send in the Clowns” ringing in your ears.

The Golden Age of Jazz
2023-10-29 16:00 - 17:30 | West Falmouth Public Library, 575 West Falmouth Highway, West Falmouth, MA, 02574, United States
Jazz music is now more than a century old and any of the turbulent periods through which the art form has passed could be accurately justified as having been a ‘Golden Age’. The music’s incubation in New Orleans, its travel up to Chicago, the Swing era, and the Be-bop revolution all occurred within the relatively brief time frame of sixty or so years, each successive style having its ardent believers and its cynical detractors. This was the age of classic Jazz, an era in which the originators and leading lights of the music’s development co-existed side by side with some of its finest consolidators, the years in which the jazz message travelled all over the United States from New Orleans to Chicago, to New York, Los Angeles and beyond.

A Musician with Music: John Williams
2023-12-04 12:30 - 14:00 | Florida Atlantic University, Barry and Florence Friedberg Auditorium, Boca Raton Campus, Boca Raton, FL, United States

Women Sing the Blues
2023-12-05 13:30 - 16:30 | Residences at MorseLife, 4847 David S. Mack Drive, West Palm Beach, FL, 33417, United States
Although blues music was sung as an oral tradition by enslaved people on Southern plantations,
classic female blues emerged early in the 20th century as a mixture of traditional folk blues and urban theater music. Dazzling
pioneers like Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, Memphis Minnie, and Mamie Smith catapulted the vocal form onto the world stage. With
new technologies in sound recording coupled with the advent of national radio broadcasts, blues singers Ethel Waters, Ella
Fitzgerald, and Billie Holiday took blues to the next level. And the list goes on and on. Dr. Wyatt will trace the growth of the blues
as one of America’s most popular forms of jazz using audio and visual clips from the 1920s to the present. The music is glorious.

Women Sing the Blues
2023-12-05 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States

The Magical of Walt Disney
2024-01-08 16:00 - 17:30 | Florida Atlantic University, Barry and Florence Friedberg Auditorium, Boca Raton Campus, Boca Raton, FL, United States

The Magical Kingdom of Walt Disney
2024-01-09 13:30 - 16:30 | Residences at MorseLife, 4847 David S. Mack Drive, West Palm Beach, FL, 33417, United States

The Magical Kingdom of Walt Disney
2024-01-09 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States

Porgy and Bess: A Folk Opera
2024-02-01 18:30 - 21:00 | Smithsonian Dillon Ripley Center, 1100 Jefferson Dr SW, Washington, D.C., DC, United States
Porgy and Bess, “an American folk opera,” opened in New York City on Oct. 10, 1935, and ran for 124 performances before closing in financial ruin.
George Gershwin, his brother Ira, and the author and co-librettist, DuBose Heyward, had crafted an intense musical drama that ultimately spawned a furious debate about authenticity, musical style and form, racial prejudice, and national identity. But the music and lyrics have survived for almost 90 years and the work’s stature is unsurpassed in the American operatic repertoire.
Explore this pivotal work from its beginnings to its revivals, in a lively evening led by Gershwin scholar and pianist Robert Wyatt.

Women Sing the Blues
2024-04-01 16:00 - 17:30 | Florida Atlantic University, Barry and Florence Friedberg Auditorium, Boca Raton Campus, Boca Raton, FL, United States

Sergei Rachmaninoff: Giant of Romanticism
2024-04-02 13:30 - 16:30 | Residences at MorseLife, 4847 David S. Mack Drive, West Palm Beach, FL, 33417, United States

Sergei Rachmaninoff: Giant of Romanticism
2024-04-02 19:00 - 20:30 | Florida Atlantic University Jupiter Campus, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL, 33458, United States

The King of Jazz: Louis Armstrong
2024-04-20 10:00 - 11:30 | FL
One of the earliest trumpet sensations, Louis Armstrong pioneered the groundwork which shifted the newly founded jazz from collective improvisation to solo performance. His distinctive singing voice was also used as an improvisatory tool, and we owe scat singing to his list of inventions. The pairing of his unique instrumental gift and a charismatic personality won him universal and eternal appeal as the “Satchmo,” king of all jazz aficionados.
