I was thinking hard about classical items about fire, smoke, burning, etc., and after hours managing the thread I finally hit on Wagner. Of course, right after that Mary Lou jumped in with all the stuff I should have thought of.
LOL!
I inherited my Classical Music Tastes from my Dear Departed Daddy.
At the age of sixteen, he was working as an usher in a movie theater. The theater was gearing up for a huge premier of a monumental film that used a large wide screen projector which required extreme coordination between the reels, sensitivity to the sound levels, matching the film as it went through several projectors for a seamless performance. When Dad showed up for work, the projectionist was passed out on the projection room floor, drunk. After checking for signs of life, and ascertaining that the man would eventually “recover”, Dad opened the film cans, loaded up the projectors, and flawlessly presented the Boston Premier of “Gone With The Wind”.
He walked home the Candy Counter Girl, and 13 years later she became my Mom.
My Dad’s approach to Classical music was the same. He was totally self-taught, was METICULOUS about the sound quality and performance standards, and preferred music that was HUGE, Emotional, Bombastic, Exotic, Scary, and used the entire Orchestra, and then some. I grew up with Moussorgsky, Borodin, Beethoven, Verdi, Wagner, Carl Orff, Mahler, Seant-Seans, Prokofiev, Rimsky-Korsakov, The Red Army Chorus, The Don Cossacks, and the Movie Soundtracks to Lawrence of Arabia and A Clockwork Orange (LOL!). Also, it was well before the days of VCR’s, but Dad had two 16mm Projectors and a king-size sheet on the living room wall, and we watched classic feature movies right at home. Movies like GWTW, 2001 a Space Odyssey, The Great Race, Some Like it Hot, ALL the old Operettas, Phantom of the Opera, etc etc.
It was easy for me to come up with a couple of fiery musical numbers! LOL!