Welcome back to Tuesday Tunes! This week’s feature is a special request by Bee-Bopping Beetle expert Ted MacRae: Flight of the Bumblebee.
Composed by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov as a transitional piece for his opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan, The Flight of the Bumblebee is one of the most recognized pieces of music in the western world. Used in everything from cartoons to Kill Bill, there are a hive’s worth of artists performing this selection!
We start with Ted’s favourite, a face-melting, finger-blistering electric guitar solo by Luis Moreno.
That was one hyper bumblebee! Time to slow things down a little, with the most bumbley-bee version I could find. The Canadian Brass is a quintet ensemble known around the world for their crazy skill and light-hearted performances.
A truly eusocial endeavor! That’s it for this week, but I’ve got plenty of entosongs awaiting your auditory organs! Fleacrest, out!
You can purchase a more traditional arrangement from iTunes – The Flight of the Bumble-Bee from The Tale of Tsar Saltan – Rachmaninov Plays Rachmaninov (The Ampico Piano Recordings)