Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Chamber Music Series Programme Notes Online

Transcription

1 Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Chamber Music Series Programme Notes Online Diotima Quartet Tuesday 7 November pm St George s Hall Concert Room This concert is supported by the Rodewald Concert Society sponsored by Investec KAROL SZYMANOWSKI ( ) String Quartet No.2 Op.56 Moderato, dolce e tranquillo Vivace, scherzando Lento Szymanowski was one of those composers (another is the Czech, Bohuslav Martinů) who drew on an eclectic range of influences yet remained an original and distinctive musical voice. The son of a cultured landowner, he was born in Timoshovka, a part of Poland then annexed to Ukraine. After showing exceptional abilities as a pianist and composer, he undertook studies in Elizavetgrad and Warsaw going on to spend periods in Berlin, Warsaw again and then Vienna, his music undergoing stylistic shifts reflecting German, Russian and eventually French stimuli. During the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 his family estate was destroyed and Szymanowski lost almost all his possessions. In 1920 he eventually settled in Warsaw, by which time he was established as Poland s most important modern composer, not least because he was by then frequently writing in a specifically Polish idiom. Szymanowski s Second String Quartet dates from this final, nationalistic phase of his career, though its first movement in many ways harks back to his earlier French period and also

2 owes a debt to the great Hungarian, Béla Bartók. Over a shimmering accompaniment (it is not a pun to state that Szymanowski s music often shimmers, just a fact), the movement s expansive main theme hauntingly unfolds. In different ways the theme and its accompaniment dominate almost all that follows as the music passes through a spectrum of moods and atmospheres ranging from luxuriousness (some particularly opulent harmonies here), forcefulness and ghostliness. Eventually the theme returns in its pristine form before the energy subsides and, after a short pause, the movement closes in a mood of hushed religiosity. If the influence of Bartók was somewhat in evidence in the opening movement, it is even more the case with the second (though as ever with Szymanowski, it is an influence deftly filtered through his own remarkable musical imagination). Uncompromising, even brutal at times, remnants of Szymanowski s Gallic phase are now less apparent. Yet there are moments of lyricism and relative repose too, as well as great harmonic richness, this being a movement of both demonic energy and subtle colourations. Particularly notable is a series of grotesque, searing glissandi (slides) that features in the movement s central section and quick-fire pizzicato (plucked) patterns. The opening section of the finale is a fugue based on a folk-song from the Tatra region of southern Poland, an area Szymanowski often visited. The movement also incorporates other Tatra melodies that would feature in Szymanowski s one-act ballet Harnasie ( ). Folk-melodies they might be, though ones dressed in modernistic guise, right up to the uncompromising unison of the work s final bars. MAURICE RAVEL ( ) String Quartet in F major Allegro moderato très doux

3 Assez vif très rythmé Très lent Vif et agité Ravel s only string quartet was premiered in Paris in March Ravel had been a student at the Paris Conservatory where, despite suffering opprobrium from influential members of staff for his unconventional compositional ideas, he generally received encouragement from his enlightened teacher and friend Gabriel Fauré. In fact, Ravel dedicated his quartet to Fauré, though the older composer, unusually on this occasion, was distinctly unimpressed he described the last movement in particular as stunted, badly balanced, in fact a failure. This must have been a terrible blow for Ravel who had desperately hoped his quartet would win him the conservatoire s coveted Prix de Rome. It failed to do so. His friend (and later rival) Claude Debussy, however, whose own string quartet (1893) had provided the structural model for Ravel s, was glowing in his praise of the work: In the name of the gods of music and in my own, he wrote to Ravel, do not touch a single note you have written in your quartet. Over time, Debussy s positive judgement has held sway and Ravel himself, despite Fauré s opinion, took Debussy s advice. He remained particularly fond of the work in its original form, treasuring it for its classicism, nostalgia and wistfulness. As late as 1927 he travelled to London where he oversaw the work s first recording (by the International Quartet), typically fastidious in his approach to the process. The quartet remains a staple of the chamber music repertory. Like Debussy s quartet, Ravel s is in the main a delicate affair and also adopts the same movement sequence: animated first and final movements, a scherzo with prominent pizzicato effects stands second, and a slow third movement. The first movement is structured in traditional tri-partite sonata form (exposition of two contrasting themes development of those themes

4 recapitulation of the themes). The opening theme rises and falls in arches, the second is more reflective and evinces that Gallic melancholy so typical of Ravel s music. Though largely a lyrical affair, the central development section builds to a moment of great intensity (some particularly powerful string crossing effects here) before the two main themes are reprised, the second now cast in the quartet s home key of F major rather than the darker D minor of its first manifestation. The tempo slows towards the end and sweetness and light prevail. Ravel s mother was of Basque descent and brought up in Madrid; indeed Ravel himself was born just ten miles from the Spanish border. Ravel s Spanish compositions (among them Boléro and Rapsodie espanole) reflected his heritage and were greatly admired for their colour and authenticity, most notably by the eminent Spanish composer Manuel de Falla. In its own unique way the second movement falls into this category. With busy pizzicatos replicating the sound of a guitar, the opening and closing sections are in the manner of a lively fandango, the time signature constantly oscillating between 6/8 and 3/4. In between is a slower and more reflective section, though it also features a series of scurrying runs. Designated Très lent (very slow), the third movement is an exquisitely crafted creation made up of three sections, the viola being particularly prominent in the first. As well as great lyricism there is much use of tremolando (fast repeated notes) and dramatic string crossings, both of which disturb the otherwise cloudless calm, as do the low rumblings of the cello. The brief finale is essentially a rondo that recalls themes from earlier movements, giving the work as a whole great structural unity. It begins in tempestuous fashion and storminess pervades, though there are brief oases of calm as well. Like the second movement it has great rhythmical energy and irregularity (the time signature now shifting from 5/8 to 5/4 to 3/4). The quartet ends with an invigorating dash to the finish line.

5 FRANZ SCHUBERT ( ) String Quartet No.15 in G major Op.161 Allegro molto moderato Andante un poco moto Scherzo: allegro vivace Allegro assai Composed in the spring of 1826, this, Schubert s final string quartet, was intended to complete a trilogy that already included his quartets in A minor and D minor (the latter designated Death and the Maiden ). In January 1826 a group of Schubert s friends had got together for a private performance of Death and the Maiden in an attempt to hasten its publication, though their efforts somewhat backfired. The veteran violinist Ignaz Schuppanzigh shook his head over the work and advised Schubert to stick to song writing. Nevertheless, an undaunted Schubert smiled to himself as he collected up the music and subsequently set about composing this quartet, a very different work from its predecessors but one that is equally an undoubted masterpiece. In fact, in its technical resource, tonal adventurousness and near-orchestral textures it is nothing less than a summation of Schubert s mature style. As the Schubert scholar John Reed has pointed out, the fact it was not published until 1851 is simply proof of the chasm between its composer s genius and the musical taste of the age. The opening Allegro molto moderato is Schubert s most extensive quartet movement and is largely structured by contrasts between (brighter) major and (darker) minor tonalities. It begins quietly, a sustained chord of G major swelling to a very loud G minor (a gesture more than a theme, this becomes a point of return throughout the movement, returning in reverse before the recapitulation and again just before the end). Then, wispily at first, the clipped (dotted) rhythms of the first subject proper emerge over hushed descending chords (played tremolando).

6 Important though this is, much of the movement s melodic substance derives from the second subject, a syncopated, rather hesitant little theme that hovers between major and minor keys. It is heard in various guises throughout the movement before its final appearance in G major (interweaving with a cello countermelody) towards the close. Introduced by the cello, the main theme of the Andante un poco moto slow movement has a steady pulse that seems to foreshadow the ill-fated tread of the wanderer in Schubert s great Winterreise, a song cycle that was to be composed during the following year. Renditions of the theme are interspersed by contrasting episodes, the first introduced by a repeated figure suggesting a funeral march. Resigned melancholy is the predominant mood. But if a sense of human mortality is very much present (as it so often is in Schubert s music), two further episodes represent something far more violent, even apocalyptic, sudden crescendos, turbulent tremolandos and a ferocious, twonote rising figure creating an almost modernistic sound-world. Finally, however, the coda brings consolation. The Scherzo looks forward to those of Mendelssohn in its infectious energy and sheer fleetness of foot. The central section is an untroubled Ländler (a Waltz-like dance) after which the Scherzo music returns. In the finale the first movement s conflict between major and minor very much resumes. Busy and bustling overall, Schubert varies the texture, dynamics and rhythms ingeniously, surprises occurring round every corner (including some particularly busy and stratospheric first violin writing). Surprises notwithstanding, the music remains gloriously dance-like throughout, right up to its emphatic final chords. Programme notes by Anthony Bateman 2017