In Tuesday’s (11/3) Guardian (London), Tom Service writes, “In a line-up of mostly hyper-romantic pictorialism, melodies that tell a story are the winners in this poll by Classic FM to find the classical music most popular with children. Tunes from Peter and the Wolf are placed twice, and Tchaikovsky’s the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy and Dukas’s Sorcerer’s Apprentice are in the top 10 too—proof that Disney’s Fantasia must still be doing good business in children’s rooms up and down the country. Topping the chart is music from Harry Potter. Personally, I don’t think that John Williams’s astonishingly annoying earworm, the melodic soundtrack to Harry Potter’s wizardry, is anywhere near the class of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet. And does a film theme really count as classical music? Harry Potter’s victory shows that children love lavishly orchestrated music, and that they understand that you can create worlds of magic and mystery with a symphony orchestra.” Also making the list were Howard Blake’s Walking on Air, Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance Op. 39, No. 4, Pachelbel’s Canon, Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet, and Rimsky-Korsakov’s Flight of the Bumblebee.
Posted November 3, 2009
