Ricky’s response sends the I Love Lucy studio audience into a hearty laugh and the sitcom’s titular character into a fury. Lucy, you see, has been hiding on a ledge outside the Ricardo’s apartment, hoping to make the others think she met a gruesome fate, but they know she’s out there and just want to — oh, never mind. That’s not the point. The point is that, even in the 1950s, when some old social norms had begun to fade, a quick remarriage was still considered unusual enough to be the stuff of jokes. So imagine the 1850s, when something like that would have raised more eyebrows than chuckles, would have been the source of serious scandal and recrimination — or much worse.

Which brings us to “The Wood Dove” (sometimes translated as “The Wild Dove”), a dark saga about a widow and her unfashionably fast romantic rebound. It’s one of a dozen Grimm-like fairy tales and legends told in verse by Czech writer and archivist Karel Jaromír Erben and gathered into a slender volume, A Bouquet of Folk Poetry, published in 1853. Among the collection’s admirers was Antonín Dvořák.

The composer turned one bloom from the Bouquet into a cantata in 1885 (The Specter’s Bride, about a young woman, a wicked ghost, and a wild night in a cemetery), then revisited the book years later and found himself particularly drawn to four poems. Each is spooky, if not downright gruesome: “The Water Goblin” ends with a baby’s decapitation, “The Noonday Witch” with another child’s awful death; “The Golden Spinning-Wheel” turns a Cinderella-ish tale into a slasher-gouger horror show; and “The Wood Dove” finds Edgar Allan Poe-tential in a slice of country life. Inspired by these four vivid stories, Dvořák created four equally vivid “symphonic poems” in 1896 that demonstrate a mastery of form and orchestral coloring.

The Wood Dove derives almost entirely from the first theme — just a few notes going up and back down — that emerges above a sober funeral march. The first three rising notes alone are enough for Dvořák to generate many a subsequent melodic idea. We know something is not quite right about the gloomy scene when the violins suddenly let out loud bursts of descending notes that sound like a combination of sobbing and laughing (if you’ll pardon another classic sitcom reference, just think of Mary Richards losing control at the wake for Chuckles the Clown in The Mary Tyler Moore Show). These startling utterances tell us all we need to know of the newly widowed woman in the funeral procession; she hopes her way-over-the-top grieving will keep everyone from guessing that she just poisoned her husband. She might have gotten away with her act if she had settled down to a nice long bereavement, but she doesn’t even get to the graveyard before catching sight of a dashing young man on horseback across the field  (a perky trumpet solo signals his arrival). Although the funereal music resumes, you can tell that the widow no longer has her mind on the burial. Sure enough, the orchestra is soon awash in buoyant rhythms and folksong themes with the flavor of Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances, conveying that the now dry-eyed woman has wedded the horseman — a mere month later.

The music then slows to suggest the passing of time, a period long enough for a tree to grow above the grave of the woman’s first spouse, a tree that attracts a dove who sits on top day after day. An eerie twittering effect from flutes, oboe and harp portrays the bird’s persistent, edgy cooing, which chills the woman and eats at her conscience. To a burst of orchestral drama, with the three-note motive piercingly prominent, she drowns her guilt-ridden self. As her recovered body is carried by villagers, the funeral march that opened the score returns. But Dvořák lightens the mood at the very end with a change of key from C minor to C major and a gentler, ultimately redemptive reprise of the dove’s strangely potent song.

“Where are all the black people in comics?” This is a question posed by the creative duo, Black Kirby (John Jennings and Stacey Robinson). Based heavily in Afrofuturism, Black Kirby’s characters show black people as heroes using ancient customs and futurist motifs from the African and African American diaspora. This piece is inspired by the many heroic characters found in the work of Black Kirby, but mainly Motherboxx Connection. (Black Kirby: In Search of the Motherboxx Connection)

According to scholar, Regina N. Bradley, Motherboxx Connection is “a pun on Jack Kirby’s motherbox, a living computer connected to the world, the Motherboxx too is a living computer with a heightened awareness of racial and sexual discourses surrounding the black body. The motherboxx is the technological equivalent of the “mother land” in the black diaspora imagination. She is where black identities merge and depart.”

To represent the power and intelligence of the motherboxx, I have composed a short fast moving musical idea that constantly weaves in and throughout the orchestra. A majestic, fanfare-like also provides the overall mood of strength and heroism. I imagine the motherboxx as an all-knowing entity that is aware of the multi-faceted aspects of blackness.

Once all Africans could fly, but lost their ability once they crossed the Atlantic Ocean as enslaved humans. This story tells how one African maintained the ability and secretly passed the gift to others. The Negro Spiritual, “Steal Away” is referenced in the woodwinds, as well as the the cello section while the upper strings hover effortlessly in the higher register.

Steal away, steal away, steal away to Jesus
Steal away, steal away home
I ain't got long to stay here

The Jewish biblical story of the Plagues of Egypt resonated with the enslaved and they created songs that related to this story of bondage. While the horrific plagues that swept across Egypt are compelling in and of itself, the focus of this piece is recounted from the perspective of the stubborn Pharaoh, who unwillingly loosens his grip on the enslaved people. Pharaoh's hardened heart is conveyed through two sharp, accented chords. The spirit of God, represented by light, heavenly, metallic sounds from the percussion, signal the beginning of each new plague. Frogs, pestilence, sickness and are not enough to break the Pharaoh's will. It is only with the “Angel of Death”, which takes the life of Pharaoh"s first-born child, represented by dark, brooding harmonies, that he relents in despair. The orchestral texture grows thinner and thinner as Pharaoh loathes in emotional anguish. The once prideful Pharaoh is now broken down to a powerless whimper. I use the Negro Spiritual, “Let My People Go (Go Down Moses)” as a musical framework throughout this movement.

Go down Moses
Way down in Egypt land
Tell ol’ Pharaoh to
Let my people go!
When Israel was in Egypt land
Let my people go!
Oppressed so hard they could not stand
Let my people go!

The story of John Henry is traditionally told through the work song, each with wide-ranging and varying lyrics. The well- known narrative ballad of "John Henry" is essentially the battle between man versus machine. Enslaved/prisoners would would usually sing the story more slowly and deliberately, often with a pulsating beat suggestive of swinging the hammer.

These songs usually contain the lines "This old hammer killed John Henry / but it won't kill me." Writer Scott Nelson explains that:

“... workers managed their labor by setting a "stint," or pace, for it. Men who violated the stint were shunned ...

Here was a song that told you what happened to men who worked too fast: they died ugly deaths; their entrails fell on the ground. You sang the song slowly, you worked slowly, you guarded your life, or you died.”

The piece begins with neither violin nor orchestra, but, of all things, just a timpani, softly tapping out the note D five times. That would be cool enough, but, this being Beethoven, things get even cooler. Just as he used the famous four-note kick-off of his Fifth Symphony to fuel the first movement (the whole symphony, really), he employs the timpani’s five-note opening to unify the first movement of the Violin Concerto. That reiterated-note pattern pops up all over (sometimes only four notes instead of five, but still unmistakable), helping to provide melody, accompaniment, and rhythmic pulse.

After emphasizing the concerto’s home key of D major with those timpani notes and an elegantly undulating first theme that rises in the woodwinds at the moment the timpanist taps the fifth D, Beethoven introduces a little surprise. The first violin section responds to the woodwind’s sweet theme by playing four D-sharps, an out-of-left-field sound that would have perked up early 19th-century ears and still makes a piquant effect. A new theme, seeming like little more than a scale rising and falling, becomes more expansive and lyrical, with both light and dark shades of harmony (those D-sharps make a telling return here).

Once all these building blocks have been revealed by the orchestra, the patiently waiting solo violinist enters with a series of bold, ascending flurries, from the low end of the instrument’s range to the highest. This suggests that we’ll be in for a lot of look-at-me playing, the kind so often expected (and indulged) in concertos. But there’s really nothing showy about the violin’s role. The soloist often takes on the demeanor of a party guest who’s happy to join, but not necessarily dominate, the conversation. And with frequent moves into the upper register, the violin sometimes seems to hover above the orchestral action.

(Beethoven tailored this not-too-extravert solo part for the technique and stylistic temperament of eminent Viennese violinist Franz Clement, concertmaster and music director of the orchestra at the Theater an der Wien. Although Clement’s playing at the premiere won praise, the concerto itself didn’t set the world on fire. It wasn’t until 1844 in London, where no less than Felix Mendelssohn conducted a performance with a preteen Joseph Joachim as soloist, that the work’s greatness registered in a big way.)

The first movement, which lasts longer than some entire Mozart violin concertos, makes its way unhurriedly toward a pause for a cadenza. Beethoven didn’t write out any for this concerto, leaving it to the soloist (for his NSO appearances, James Ehnes will play the brilliantly inventive ones by Fritz Kreisler that have been widely popular since first published in the 1920s). But the composer did create a marvelous transition out of the cadenza — the violin gently recalls the lyrical, scale-like theme, with just pizzicato backing from the orchestra’s strings. After this dreamy mood gets further enhanced by bassoon and cello contributions, an emphatic push from soloist and ensemble ends the movement.

Beethoven then turns to one of his favorite forms, theme and variations. His theme is soft and stately, almost hymn-like, with a graceful, upward motion. The orchestra takes the spotlight for the first three variations, while the soloist plays second fiddle, so to speak, adding exquisite embellishments around the edges of the music. The violin then spins out improvisation-like filigree before intoning a serene, poignant melody that ushers in the fourth variation. A startling fortissimo from the orchestra signals that it’s time to wrap things up with a quick cadenza and charge right into the finale.

The main theme for this rondo has the jaunty air of a traditional hunting song, which keeps returning after assorted, contrasting episodes. Beethoven slips a surprise into one of those episodes — two soft, pizzicato notes for the violin, the only time the soloist uses that technique in the concerto. Amazing how charming a couple of unexpected plucks can be. After a cadenza, Beethoven continues to extract spirited mileage from the melodic material before taking everyone down to an unexpected pianissimo level. The soloist then spiritedly leads the way back up for a snappy, full-throttle finish.