THE MOLDAU, DON JUAN & BEETHOVEN S THIRD PIANO CONCERTO RICHARD STRAUSS. April 9/10

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1 April 9/10 THE MOLDAU, DON JUAN & BEETHOVEN S THIRD PIANO CONCERTO notesby Dr. Richard E. Rodda 30 SECOND NOTES: Orchestral music, like Janus, is often said to have two faces one facing inward, the other out. The abstract aspect, in which the elements of a composition intend no reference beyond themselves and the feelings they incite, is represented on this concert by Beethoven s Third Piano Concerto, written when he was 33 and still active as a pianist in Vienna. The programmatic possibilities are heard in Strauss evocation of the libertine Don Juan and Smetana s musical portrayal of the history, legends and countryside of his native Bohemia in his cycle of tone poems titled My Fatherland. RICHARD STRAUSS Born in Munich, June 11, 1864; died in Garmisch- Partenkirchen, September 9, 1949 DON JUAN, TONE POEM (AFTER NICOLAUS LENAU), OP. 20 First performed on November 11, 1889 in Weimar, conducted by the composer. First performed by the Des Moines Symphony on February 13, 1971 with Willis Page conducting. Four subsequent performances occurred, most recently on October 2, 2007 with Joseph Giunta conducting. (Duration: c. 17 minutes) For the program of his Don Juan, Strauss turned to the 19th-century Hungarian poet Nicolaus Lenau. Lenau, born in 1802, was possessed by a blazing romantic spirit fueled in part by a hopeless love for the wife of a friend. In a fit of idealism in 1832, he came to America and settled on a homestead in Ohio for a few months. Disappointed with the New World, he returned to Europe, where he produced an epic on the Faust legend in 1836, and then undertook a poetic drama based on Don Juan. Lenau left this latter work unfinished in 1844 when he lost his mind and was admitted to an asylum, where he died six years later. Lenau s Don Juan was not a rakish extrovert but rather a vain, sensual idealist. In the author s words, My Don Juan is no hot-blooded man, eternally pursuing women. It is the longing in him to find a woman who is to him womanhood incarnate, and to enjoy in the one all the women on earth whom he cannot as individuals possess. Because he does not find her, although he reels from one to another, at last Disgust seizes hold of him, and this Disgust is the Devil that fetches him. In Lenau s version, Don Juan meets his death in a sword duel with the father of one of the women he has seduced. Disillusioned and empty, ready for death, he drops his guard and welcomes his fate. Strauss tone poem captures the feverish emotion and charged sensuality of Lenau s

2 drama, but other than three abstruse excerpts from Lenau s poem that appear in the score, the composer never gave a specific program for Don Juan. The body of the work comprises themes associated with the lover and his conquests. The vigorous opening strain and a stentorian melody majestically proclaimed by the horns near the mid-point of the work belong to Don Juan. The music depicting the women in his life is variously coquettish, passionate and ravishing. (Norman Del Mar called the beautiful oboe melody one of the greatest lovesongs in all music ). In the closing pages, an enormous crescendo is suddenly broken off by a long silence. A quivering chill comes over the music. A dissonant note on the trumpets marks the fatal thrust. Quietly, without hope of redemption, the libertine dies. Scored for piccolo, three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, glockenspiel, cymbals, triangle, harp and the usual strings consisting of first violins, second violins, violas, violoncellos and double basses. LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN Born in Bonn, December 16, 1770; died in Vienna, March 26, 1827 PIANO CONCERTO NO. 3 IN C MINOR, OP. 37 First performed on April 4, 1803, with the composer as soloist. First performed by the Des Moines Symphony on May 3, 1964 with Tong Il-Han as soloist and Frank Noyes conducting. Subsequently performed in 1977, 1986, and most recently on January 20 & 21, 2001 with Vladimir Feltsman playing and conducting. (Duration: c. 34 minutes) By 1803, Emanuel Schickaneder, the colorful character who figured prominently in the closing pages of Mozart s life as the librettist and producer of The Magic Flute, had taken over the management of Vienna s Theater-an-der-Wien. His house was locked in a fierce competitive battle with the court-subsidized Kärtnertortheater, run by Baron Peter von Braun. When von Braun hired the distinguished Luigi Cherubini as resident composer, Schickaneder felt obliged to counter with his own music master, and he approached Beethoven with an offer. Beethoven, who had felt the need to write for the stage for some time, accepted gladly especially since the job carried free lodgings in the theater as part of the compensation. He and Schickaneder dutifully plowed through a small library of possibilities for an operatic subject, but none inspired Beethoven until he took up work on Fidelio late in In the meantime, Beethoven took advantage of his theatrical connection to put some of his recent instrumental works on display. Since opera was forbidden in Catholic countries during Lent at that time, the Theater-an-der-Wien was available for concerts in the early spring, so Beethoven scheduled such an event for April 4, 1803 that included the first performances of the Second Symphony, the oratorio Christ on the Mount of Olives and the Third Piano Concerto; for good measure, he tossed in the First Symphony, which had been premiered three years earlier. The Third Concerto s first movement opens with the longest introductory orchestral tutti in Beethoven s concertos, virtually a full symphonic exposition in itself. The strings in unison present the main theme, a group of pregnant figures, assessed the eminent British musicologist Sir Donald Tovey, which nobody but Beethoven could have invented. The lyrical second theme is sung by violins and clarinet in a contrasting major mode. The piano then takes over with its

3 own versions of these exposition materials before they are treated more fully and elaborately in a closely reasoned development section. The recapitulation begins with a forceful restatement of the main theme by the full orchestra. The second movement is a nocturne of tender sentiments and quiet moods. Though analysis reveals its form to be a three-part structure (A B A), it is in spirit simply an extended song a marvelous juxtaposition of hymnal tranquility and sensuous operatic love scene. The traditional, Classical rondo-finale was a form of simple, high spirits meant to send the audience away in a bubbling mood. Mozart, in his incomparable late concertos, had begun to explore the emotional depth possible with the rondo form, and in this Third Concerto Beethoven continued that quest by incorporating elements of sonata design to lend the movement additional expressive weight, even inserting a fugal passage in the second episode. Only in the closing pages is the dark world of C minor abandoned for a vivacious romp through C major to close this wonderful work. Scored for flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets in pairs, timpani and the usual strings. BED RICH SMETANA Born in Leitomischl, Bohemia; March 2, 1824; died in Prague, May 12, 1884 MUSIC FROM MÁ VLAST (MY FATHERLAND) Vyšehrad (The High Castle) premiered on March 14, 1875, The Moldau on April 4, 1876, and Šárka and From Bohemia s Forests and Meadows on December 10, 1876, all in Prague conducted by Adolf Cech. Vyšehrad (The High Castle) and Šárka were first performed by the Des Moines Symphony on September 27, 2004 with Joseph Giunta conducting. The Moldau was first performed by the Des Moines Symphony on November 20, 1971 with Thomas Griswold conducting and subsequently performed in 1994, 2003, and most recently on April 5 & 6, 2014 conducted by Joseph Giunta. From Bohemia s Forests and Meadows was first performed by the Des Moines Symphony on November 19 & 20, 2005 conducted by Joseph Giunta. (Duration: c. 50 minutes) Early in 1874, Smetana began to suffer from severe headaches. This symptom came and went, and he noted no other physical problems until October. One night I listened with great pleasure to Leo Delibes Le Roi l a dit, he reported. When I returned home after the last act, I sat at the piano and improvised for an hour on whatever came into my head. The following morning I was stone deaf. Smetana was terrified. He wrote to his friend J. Finch Thorne that a ceaseless rushing filled his head: It is stronger when my brain is active and less noticeable when I am quiet. When I compose it is always in evidence. He tried many unguents, ointments and treatments during the ensuing months but they brought no relief Smetana did not hear a sound for the last decade of his life. He continued to compose, but withdrew more and more from the world as he realized he could not be cured, eventually losing his reason (in the margin of score of the 1882 D minor Quartet he scrawled, Composed in a state of disordered nerves the outcome of my deafness ) and ending his days in a mental ward. It is one of the great ironies in 19th-century

4 music that Smetana conceived the first melody for Má Vlast (My Fatherland), the splendid cycle of six tone poems inspired by the land and lore of his native Bohemia, at the same time that he lost his hearing. Had he not been able to look to the example of the deaf Beethoven, he might well have abandoned this work, but he pressed on and completed Vyšehrad (The High Castle) by November 1874 and immediately began The Moldau, which was finished in less than three weeks, on December 8th. Šárka and From Bohemia s Forests and Meadows date from the following year; Tábor was finished in 1878 and Blaník in In a letter to the publisher Frantisek Urbánek in May 1879, Smetana described the movements of Má Vlast. He wrote of the opening tone poem, The harps of the bards begin; a bard sings of the events that have taken place on Vyšehrad, of the glory, splendor, tournaments and battles, and finally its downfall and ruin. The composition ends on a elegiac note. Vyšehrad is the name of a sheer rock precipice that stands along the River Moldau as it flows into Prague, and of the ancient fortress that surmounts its pinnacle. According to Czech legend, Vyšehrad was built even before the castle that guarded the city, and was said to be the seat of the earliest Bohemian princes. Smetana chose it as the setting for his patriotic opera Libuše, the story of the ninth-century Queen of Bohemia of that name, daughter of the country s founding family, the P remysl, who is revered in national history as a wise and strong sovereign. (One of her descendents was St. Wenceslaus Good King Wenceslaus. ) The fortress was more impressive as a ruin than as an architectural structure in Smetana s time, being hemmed in by fortifications erected during the reign of Maria Theresa and then serving only as an arsenal, but the romance of its past still evoked unquenchable patriotic fervor among the composer s countrymen. The tone poem takes as its subject a richly harmonized theme in chorale style that is first played by the harps as an evocation of Bohemia s legendary bard, Lumír. A complementary motive, in flowing arpeggiated figures, was borrowed from Libuše. The movement is in three broad chapters: the first is noble and mythic, evoking the glory of Bohemia s early history; the second, a greatly agitated section that incorporates an ingenious permutation of the opening motive and a heroic marching strain, suggests the violence and victory of ancient combat; the third, which serves as a formal recapitulation of the opening section, reflects on bygone days. The Moldau ( Vltava in Czech) is the principal river of Czechoslovakia, rising in the hills in the south and flowing north through Prague to join with the Elbe. Smetana s tone poem seems to trace its inspiration to a country trip he took along the river in 1870, a junket that included an exhilarating boat ride through the churning waters of the St. John Rapids. The Moldau is disposed in several sections intended to convey both the sense of a journey down the river and some of the sights seen along the way, as Smetana noted in his preface to the score: Two springs pour forth in the shade of the Bohemian Forest, one warm and gushing, the other cold and peaceful. The forest brook, hastening on, becomes the river Moldau. Through thick woods it flows, as the gay sounds of the hunt and the notes of the hunter s horn are heard ever nearer. It flows through grassgrown pastures and lowlands where a wedding feast is being celebrated with song and dance. At night, wood and water nymphs revel in its sparkling waves. Reflected on its surface are fortresses and castles witnesses of bygone days of knightly splendor and the vanished glory of fighting times. At the St. John Rapids, the stream races ahead, winding through the

5 cataracts, hewing out a path with its foaming waves through the rocky chasm into the broad river bed finally, flowing on in majestic peace toward Prague and welcomed by the timehonored castle Vyšehrad. [At this point, Smetana recalled the theme from the preceding tone poem.] Then it vanishes far beyond the poet s gaze. Of the third movement of Má Vlast, the composer noted, This poem depicts the story of Šárka. It begins with the enraged Šárka [one of the girls at the court of the P remysl, the founding family of Bohemia, who rebelled at being ruled by men after the death of Queen Libuše] swearing vengeance on the whole male race for the infidelity of her lover. From afar is heard the arrival of armed men led by Ctirad, who has come to punish Šárka and her rebellious maidens. In the distance, Ctirad hears the feigned cries of a girl (Šárka) bound to a tree. On seeing her, he is overcome by her beauty and so inflamed with love that he frees her. By means of a previously prepared potion, she intoxicates Ctirad and his men, who fall asleep. As she sounds her horn (a pre-arranged signal), the rebel maidens, hidden in nearby rocks, rush to commit the bloody dead. The horror of general slaughter and the passion and fury of Šárka s fulfilled revenge form the end of the composition. Šárka, the most graphically detailed movement of Má Vlast, is divided into five continuous, almost cinematic, sequences. The first section (marked with fire in the score) portrays the fury of the avowed manhater. Next comes a swaggering march to accompany the entry of Ctirad and his knights. A solo clarinet intones the duplicitous cry of Šárka, to which Ctirad (solo cello) gives an impassioned response as he loosens her bonds. An episode of warmly lyrical music suggests Ctirad s wooing of the cunning maid before a soft, trilled string chord introduces the scherzo-like fourth section, which depicts the drunken revels of the warriors. Šárka s philter has its effect, and the festive music dies away as the men fall asleep (the low C s on the bassoon suggest their snoring). Šárka sounds her horn and exhorts her followers (another clarinet solo) to undertake the slaughter that fills the last chapter of this dramatic tone poem. Smetana wrote of From Bohemia s Forests and Meadows, This is a general impression of the feelings aroused on seeing the Czech countryside. Here, from all directions, fervently sung songs, some cheerful and others melancholy, resound from the groves and meadows. The woodlands (in solos for the horns), the gay, fertile Elbe lowlands and various other parts besides, are all celebrating. The composer himself provided some of the music s poetic details in a conversation with his friend V.V. Zeleny: The opening resembles the strong impression experienced on going into the countryside; hence the powerful beginning with the emphatic chord of G minor. Then comes G major, as if a naïve country girl were going out. [The following music depicts] the beauty of being in the woods in summer during the middle of the day when the sun is directly overhead. Twilight prevails in the woods, and the sun s bright beams seldom penetrate between the tops of the trees. An ever-present phrase indicates the twittering of birds. [The closing section represents] the harvest, or at least a festival of some kind. Scored for flutes, oboes, clarinets and bassoons in pairs plus piccolo, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, harp and the usual strings.