Masterworks 2 November 3, 2018 Paris to Prague

Transcription

1 Masterworks 2 November 3, 2018 Paris to Prague Wes Kenney. Conductor Guest Artist. Michelle Kim. Violin Guest Artist. Clive Greensmith. Cello Program Hector Berlioz ( ) Le Corsaire Overture Johannes Brahms Double Concerto in A minor ( ) I. Allegro II. Andante III. Vivace non troppo Intermission Ms. Kim. Violin Mr. Greensmith. Cello Antonin Dvořák Symphony No. 6 ( ) I. Allegro non tanto II. Adagio III. Scherzo (furiant): Presto IV. Finale: Allegro con spirito Masterworks 2 Sponsors City of Fort Collins Fort Fund Dr. Peter Springberg Guest Artist Sponsors: Joseph & Jan Carroll Guest Artist Sponsors: Ann Yanagi & Scott Johnston Hotel: The Elizabeth Hotel Flowers: Paul Wood Florist Restaurant: Rare Italian Masterworks 2 Guest Artists Michelle Kim Violinist Michelle Kim has been Assistant Concertmaster, The William Petschek Family Chair, of the New York Philharmonic since She has performed as a soloist with orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New Jersey Symphony, and Pacific Symphony. An active chamber musician, Ms. Kim has collaborated with premier artists, including Cho Liang Lin, Christian Tetzlaff, Pinchas Zukerman, Mstislav Rostropovich, Lynn Harrell, Gary Hoffman, Lang Lang, Jean Yves Thibaudet, Alisa Weilerstein and Yefim Bronfman. She has performed at various festivals including the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, La Jolla

2 Chamber Music Festival, Strings in the Mountain, and Bravo! Vail. She has also served as the first violinist of the Rossetti String Quartet. A student of Robert Lipsett and a former Presidential Scholar, Ms. Kim graduated from the University of Southern California s Thornton School of Music as a Starling Foundation scholarship recipient and considers Heiichiro Ohyama and Henry Gronnier her mentors. She has been a member of the faculty at the USC Thornton School of Music, the Colburn School, and the University of California - Santa Barbara. Currently, Ms. Kim teaches at the Mannes College of Music, The New School in New York City. In 2010, she founded Doublestop Foundation, a public charity that provides stringed instruments for musicians who cannot afford to make such an investment on their own. Clive Greensmith Cellist Clive Greensmith has a distinguished career as soloist, chamber musician and teacher. He studied at the Royal Northern College of Music in England with American cellist, Donald McCall, where he was the recipient of the prestigious Julius Isserlis Scholarship. From 1999 until 2013 he was a member of the world-renowned Tokyo String Quartet giving over one hundred performances each year in the most prestigious international and national venues. Deeply committed to the mentoring and development of young musicians, he has enjoyed a distinguished teaching career. In addition to his fifteen-year residency with the Tokyo String Quartet at Yale University, Greensmith served as a member of faculty at the Yehudi Menuhin School and Royal Northern College of Music in England, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Manhattan School of Music, and NYU. He is Co-Director of Chamber Music and Professor of Cello at the Colburn School in Los Angeles and a founding member of the Montrose Trio with pianist Jon Kimura Parker and violinist Martin Beaver. Program Notes by William E. Runyan Hector Berlioz. Le Corsaire, op. 21 Date of Composition: 1844 Duration: 14 minutes Of all of the major composers of the nineteenth century, Hector Berlioz is perhaps the most personally interesting. What a vivacious, unique individual he was, both in his life and in his music. He was intense and impassioned in his pursuit of the composition of music that reflected his literary interests, his interaction with his physical surroundings, and his deeply-felt emotions. He was not a virtuoso per-former (playing the flute and the guitar only passably), his early musical training having been derived largely from the study of harmony books. However, a major informing aspect of his intellect was literature. He read widely and with sophistication from an early age, and later became one of the most important music critics and general authors in music of all time. Over a half dozen or more of his major works derive from some important connection with Shakespeare; he married the most important Shakespearian actress of the time, and composed his Symphonie Fantastique as a response to his hopeless infatuation with her (the marriage didn t work out). Characteristically, he never actually set any of Shakespeare s words to music; they were an inspiration only, just as the local color and the expertly crafted atmospherics in his music were stimulated by nature and culture. His early career was driven to some degree by his frustrating quest to win the prestigious Prix de Rome, which, after four fruitless attempts, he finally won in Characteristically, having

3 won, he dallied and resisted actually moving to Rome for the required residency there, as he loathed Rome and Italian art and music. Of Rome he wrote: Rome is the most stupid and prosaic city I know He did, however, love the Italian countryside, the sunshine, and Italian evocative legends and characters. And it is certain that the richness of these experiences informed much of his later creativity. He returned to Paris in 1832 and enjoyed a great success. It is from this time, for roughly the next decade, that many of his most acclaimed works date: Symphonie Fantastique, Harold en Italie, his requiem mass, and Roméo et Juliette. But by the end of the 1830s, he became bitter at the musical life of Paris, its banality, and the waning of his own success, so he embarked on years of travel around Europe. In 1844, the year of the publication of his great orchestration treatise, he took a trip to Nice where he had spent some time more than a decade earlier during his Prix de Rome sojourn. There, he was surrounded by the sea and the legends of the corsairs: privateers who had attacked the ships of the enemies of the French for centuries. During his stay, he lived in a tower overlooking the sea, so the concert overture that he composed there bore the title, La Tour de Nice (The Tower of Nice). Berlioz greatly admired the works of James Fenimore Cooper, and the overture was soon renamed Le Corsaire Rouge after Cooper s The Red Rover. Eventually, the rouge was dropped, and it became simply, Le Corsaire. Those familiar with the Symphonie Fantastique and his Roman Carnival Overture will recognize many of the signature characteristics of Berlioz style in Le Corsaire. A frenzied, unison string passage followed by a few bars of cluttered, syncopated woodwinds opens the affair in the best Berlioz manner you ll it hear it again, later. An extended, sonorous adagio, featuring the strings, follows. Finally, a timpani roll brings on the sparkling allegro, introduced by the signature passage mentioned above, and we re off to the races. It s not all blood and thunder, though, for, as the tempo continues, we hear a familiar lyrical tune, a pattern that continues: figurative passages alternating with a real tune, and moments of tranquility posed against stentorian, stormy brass. As the end nears, the main theme is heard, thumping along. Finally, the tension builds to almost an unbearable climax, and over a sea of manic string figuration, the brass nails the conclusion. There are those whose imagination hears storms of the Mediterranean Sea and depictions of sea battles of the colorful corsairs in this ripping work. Well enough. But, when compared with so much of Berlioz oeuvre, Le Corsaire is just pure, brilliant Berlioz, without any need of extraneous imagery. Johannes Brahms. Concerto in A minor for Violin, Cello, and Orchestra, Op. 102 ( Double ) Date of Composition: 1887 Duration: 32 minutes This is a chosen one. Robert Schumann so characterized Johannes Brahms in his famous article that introduced the young Brahms to the public. Little did he know! Brahms went on to become the last great successor of the artistic mantle of musical Classicism that led from Joseph Haydn, through Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert. That s taking the rather narrow view, of course, for there were others who followed who revered the classical attributes of restraint, balance, clarity of form, elegance, and general equipoise that came to characterize the collective features known as classical musical style. They stand in clear contrast to the sweeping trends and excesses of music Romanticism that came to dominate European music until the cataclysm of World War I. Roughly, the composers of the nineteenth century after Beethoven tended to divide themselves into two groups. The progressives were true Romantics and were greatly influenced by the extra-musical ideas that were the subjects of contemporary literature, poetry, and painting, among others. They devised new genres, such as the tone poems of Smetana and Liszt, the music dramas of Wagner, and the characteristic piano pieces of Chopin. Much of this music, to use a

4 phrase still common among seekers of meaning in music, was about something, meaning something familiar to human experience. Liszt and Wagner, et al, while respecting the music of the past, saw no future in continuing that tradition. Others, Brahms most significantly, still adhered strongly to the rather musically abstract style of Beethoven. He and other conservatively minded musicians held that the traditional forms of sonata, concerto, and symphony had not nearly exhausted their viability, and that music should continue to speak in an integrated language that referred to itself, alone, and certainly not to extra-musical ideas. So, he and his ilk continued to write pure or abstract music, like sonatas and symphonies (a so-called symphony is just a sonata for orchestra). Today, most of those who compose, perform, and listen to art music see no contradiction at all in valuing both broad aesthetic viewpoints; we enjoy the best of both worlds. Double concertos, primarily those for solo violin and violoncello with orchestra are not uncommon there being more than four dozen by recognized composers over the centuries. Of those, the past decade or so has seen some by significant composers such as Roger Sessions, Ned Rorem, and André Previn. Nevertheless, one stands almost alone in its towering reputation and frequency of performance, and that is Brahms work. Although com-posed in 1887, ten years before his death, it is the composer s last work for orchestra. It is dedicated to his life-long friend and musical collaborator, the violin virtuoso, Joseph Joachim, one of the most celebrated violinists of the century. Joachim s wife was also a close friend of the composer, and after a nasty divorce between the couple, Brahms was estranged from the violinist. Finally, reconciliation came in the form of the Double Concerto, which Brahms had composed as a kind of peace offering to Joachim. The cellist for the premiere was also a longtime friend and collaborator with Brahms, Robert Hausmann. The work was first performed in Cologne in October 1887, and received a mixed reception from the critics. Many considered it a somewhat austere, even overly modern composition, and not a particularly brilliant showpiece for the soloists. Many newcomers, indeed, still encounter it as a somewhat intellectual exercise in compositional virtuosity. Those observations have adherents, but veteran Brahms listeners adore the work. It certainly does not fit the stereotype of the typical romantic concerto, one that emphasizes showy pyrotechnics and warm, lyrical melodies. It does, nevertheless, require two virtuosos in the solo parts, performers who are skilled at close musical communication and mutual expressivity. In addition to simply inventing themes, composers over the years have often looked for clever ways to generate their ideas, and at the same time, limit them to drive the challenge. The motivic material that Brahms chose stems from a familiar idea that he and the violinist, Joachim, had shared years before. Joachim had chosen as a kind of personal motto, Frei aber einsam (free but lonely). The first letters of each word, F A E, provide the musical motif that Brahms had used years earlier in the F-A-E Sonata, that he, along with Schumann and Albert Dietrich, had written for Joachim. In the double concerto, as in Brahms movement in the sonata, the composer slightly rearranged them to provide the motif, A E F, which one will hear transformed and integrated thoroughly throughout the first movement. Listen constantly for the intervals of a fourth and a step. They re everywhere, frontwards, backwards, and upside down, turned in and out. You can t miss it. The process is a tour de force of compositional integrity and unity a milestone on the path from Beethoven to Schoenberg in the eyes of many. The orchestra opens the first move-ment with a powerful, brief statement of just this little motive, but the cello immediately jumps in with an energetic cadenza. It doesn t last long, for the woodwind section then announces the second major idea (unusual this early, for a typical first movement), a gentle, singing idea. That provides an opening for the violin as it starts its own cadenza. It is joined by cello for a joint affair. Here, as in much of the work, Brahms treats the two soloists as a kind of super, solo stringed instrument that takes two people to play, an

5 ingenious approach that eschews a simple alternation between two players. Soon, the full orchestra takes over, the traditional exposition begins, and we clearly hear the themes in the orchestra. When the soloists respond, again the little three-note motive is clearly perceived. When the singing, lyrical second theme inevitably comes, again, the cello an-nounces it first. Both the solo violin and cello together begin the development of these ideas, playing the familiar three-note fourth and a step. Brahms then goes on to work his inimitable wizardry by wringing myriad ideas out of the simple material that we ve heard. When the recap comes, it s easy to spot, for it sounds just like the opening of the movement. The whole movement is eloquent testimony of the composer at the top of his game. After all of the technical compositional complexity of the first movement, the second is warm, lyrical Brahms at his most memorable. The horns, followed by the woodwinds, open with what else?-- the interval of a fourth that played such an important rôle in the first movement. The soloists jump right in with the eloquent, singing theme in octaves, opening with, of course, our old friend, the interval of fourth. After working through the tune a bit, Brahms then introduces contrasting material, led by the woodwinds. Here, the orchestra plays a soft, hymn-like background while the soloists rhapsodize over it alternatively and together. Soon, a return to the sonorous opening material but, of course, slightly varied takes us to the end of this most Brahmsian of lovely slow movements. The last movement, as one may expect, is a galloping rondo, simply a striking idea that returns after a couple of contrasting diversions. In this case, Brahms returns to a style that from time to time had interested him since his early days, the so-called gypsy influence. But it must be said, in this work, it s a rather vague allusion. Nevertheless, the opening, main idea has the élan and vivacity of that tradition. The first diversion is characterized by double stops in both instruments, as they exchange back and forth. After a return to the opening idea, the second main diversion comes: a rather more intense affair that includes the overlapping arpeggios of the soloists in the first movement. After that, the whole first section returns to round things off, pausing only briefly with a moment of lyricism before the dash to the end. There may be dozens of other double concertos over the years, but, in reality, there is only one of this consequence. Although a late work, with all of the gravitas that is associated with Brahms at his most disciplined and accomplished, it is one of great riches for the patient listener. The composer deftly solved the difficulties of balancing two equal, virtuoso soloists with the orchestra and created a marvelously attractive concerto, as well. Antonín Dvořák. Symphony No. 6 in D major, op. 60, B. 112 Date of Composition: 1880 Duration: 41 minutes Dvořák is the preeminent Czech composer of the nineteenth century, and perhaps of all of his successors, as well. This is no small achievement, considering the number of great musicians Mozart, for example who thought of Bohemia as the most musical country in Europe. Even today, one can hardly get on a streetcar in Prague without stepping around a double bass. Today, if Americans think of Czech music at all, other than two works by Smetana, they think of Dvořák s music. They know little of the other composers of the incredible musical wealth of Bohemia including Fibich, Ostrčil, Janáček, Foerster, Hába, and Martinů, just to name a few. Dvořák is merely first among equals in the history of Czech music, and many more of the compositions of the conservatory of Europe need to reach our own concert stages. Dvořák owed his initial recognition to Johannes Brahms, who encountered his music somewhat early in Dvořák s career, and saw to it that he was enabled to spend time in Vienna for further study. While Dvořák s fundamental stylistic orientation is similar to the older composer in its classi-cal restraint and dedication to traditional forms and procedures, his compositions are unmistakably Czech in myriad subtle ways. Turns of harmony, melody, and rhythm firmly establish Dvořák s culture, even within the disciplined tradition of musical composition leading

6 back to, say, Beethoven. Like Brahms, Dvořák wrote stunningly well in the genres of string quartets, sonatas, and symphonies. But unlike Brahms, he also wrote tone poems and was an active and successful opera composer. Sadly, only his Rusalka is widely known in this country. He was interested in almost every genre, and few of his contemporaries composed successfully in as many different ones as did Dvořák. He clearly thought of himself as a champion of Czech music, and he incorporated significant Czech musical, literary, and historical elements into his works. His Slavonic Rhapsodies, tone poems, operas, and songs the list goes on and on all are heavily infused with Czech melodies, linguistic inflections and characteristic rhythms, and national legends and stories. And, it must be admitted that these essential elements of his artistic voice are near the core of his attractiveness to audiences worldwide not just in his homeland. Yet, to focus inordinately on these elements would miss the mark in understanding the most important aspect of the nature of his music. As deeply rooted as he is in the Czech musical tradition, it would be a mistake to consign him primarily to the category of nationalist composers. For Dvořák was a clear adherent of the artistic thinking of those composers of the nineteenth century who were firmly rooted in the tradition of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven (and later, Mendelssohn and Brahms) as a fundamental way of composing. That is, they favored classical forms and designs, integrated development of musical ideas, and in general, a restrained and balanced expression that placed strong emphasis on music as an abstract art. Generally speaking not for them were the stories and programs of folks like Liszt and Wagner, and their followers. In mastery of the resilience of this style, the symphonies of Dvořák, as well as those of Tchaikovsky and Brahms, pretty much have come to dominate the symphonic music from those times that are favored today by concert audiences. Dvořák wrote nine symphonies, but Americans are most familiar with Symphony No. 9 in E Minor, From the New World. His first four symphonies were not published in his lifetime, nor were they generally recognized until the 1950s. The seventh, and eighth symphonies have become standard repertoire. They are beginning to catch up in popularity in this country with the beloved ninth. But, it was the sixth that first brought him international recognition and acclaim as a symphonist. It dates from the time that, while widely recognized and successful in his native land he was, nevertheless, struggling to find strong acceptance in the center of music of the time: Vienna. That city, of course, was the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Czechs had been vassals of the Austrians since Czech culture had been completely dominated by the Austrians during those three centuries, and while the Czechs were an important part of the musical life of the Empire, they were more or less still regarded as Slavic rubes to the snobbish Viennese. At the time, Johannes Brahms was the center of the Viennese musical world, and his recognition of Dvořák s talent, and subsequent support of Dvořák for state financial subsidies, was central to the younger composer s rising success. In 1879, the distinguished conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic, Hans Richter, had programmed Dvořák s Slavonic Rhapsody No. 3 to great acclaim and subsequently requested a new symphony from him. Dvořák s musical style and reputation until then had ridden to a significant degree on his Bohemian nationalism and use of Czech folk elements. Now he sought to turn to a more universal, classical, style that would be seen as in the esteemed line of Viennese immortals: Mozart, Beethoven, and, of course, Brahms. The mavens of Viennese music lovers demanded this, and so, in his sixth symphony, Dvořák set out to create one in this requisite style. Work commenced in late summer of the next year, and in several weeks it was completed. The score was sent to Richter, and the composer awaited a date for the premiere in Vienna. It was not to come. The anti-czech feelings in the orchestra during the rehearsals for the Slavonic Rhapsody now bubbled to the surface, and Richter had to keep postponing the premiere, caught in Austrian politics. So, the work was performed for the first time the next year, 1881, in Prague.

7 It is a commonplace that his genial, warm, optimistic, and tuneful symphony is regarded as modeled in significant ways on Brahms recently composed (1877) second symphony. Key, mood, melodic character, and structure all bear similarities to Brahms great symphony. But, of course, it doesn t matter at all. If he borrowed certain ideas from his champion, Brahms, then as J. S. Bach is famously quoted he more than paid him back with interest. A simple little two-note ascending motive opens the work, and becomes an essential building block for the movement. It s in the best classical tradition, which Dvořák is now cultivating. This unity of approach follows in the succession of ideas that make up the rest of the movement. And yet, the distinctive harmonies the clear, colorful orchestration and the ubiquitous parallelism in the melodies are all familiar elements that go to make up the unmistakable and genial Bohemian style of the composer. Notwithstanding its energy and decisive character, this is a warm and happy affair that somehow or other elicits the pastoral character that defies precise definition. The beginning of the second movement, as well as later passages, is often cited by musical pundits as evoking the Adagio of Beethoven s ninth symph-ony. That is a matter of perception, of course, but it seems somewhat apt. Nevertheless, the overall character is equally Czech and evocative of the peaceful, sylvan beauties of the Bohemian countryside. That observation is equally subjective, too, but, various little stylistic traits point to other compositions of the composer with that reference exactly in mind. Its serenities are familiar from all of Dvořák s oeuvre, with a healthy dose of Brahms, as well. Dvořák s new, classical style runs aground somewhat in the third movement. For it is a furiant, a traditional, exciting Bohemian dance that simply screams Czech ethnic musical traditions. It s in 3/4 time but with frequent shifts to a pair of 2/4 measures. Just as every schoolchild knows, six may be factored into two threes or three twos, and that juxtaposition is the basis of the furiant. So you ll hear the rapid beats often proceed-ing thusly: one-two-three, one-two-three, one-two, one-two, one-two. Exciting and stimulating it is, but unfortunately, this very Czech dance is probably the main basis for the initial Viennese intellectual disdain for the symphony. The contrasting middle section is a delicate, slower affair, again featuring pastoral woodwinds, but soon the sparkling furiant returns to cap it all off. At the premiere this movement was so well received, that the audience demanded and got an encore. It s easy to see why. The murmuring strings that open the last movement remind us again of the parallel point in Brahms second symphony. They soon yield to little motives and a tune here and there, all of which gives the composer ample material to create this model of the best of Viennese tight musical development and structural integrity. It s a cogent example of the mature work of the composer that lay ahead: memorable tunes, economy of means, colorful orchestration, and lucid musical structure, all of this, along with a masterful sense of drama and cohesive direction. A marvelous, scintillating coda sails into the peroration, with the main theme soaring above it all. There s no wonder that this work brought Dvořák the recognition that he so clearly deserved. It is the perfect combination of mainstream Viennese classicism and rich Bohemian musical nationalism. Clearly deserving to take its place with his last three symphonies, it reminds us in this country that there is so much more to appreciate than the few works of Dvořák that we usually focus on. ~ Wm. E. Runyan 2018 William E. Runyan