SCOTTISH ENSEMBLE ALISON BALSOM, trumpet

Transcription

1 THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESENTS PERFORMANCE HALL LOGAN CENTER HOWARD MAYER BROWN INTERNATIONAL MUSIC SERIES APRIL 19, 2013, 7:30 PM SCOTTISH ENSEMBLE ALISON BALSOM, trumpet Pre- concert lecture with Thomas Christensen, Avalon Foundation Professor of Music and the Humanities, 6:30 PM GEMINIANI Concerto Grosso No. 12 in D Minor La Folia ALBINONI Oboe Concerto in B- flat Major, Opus 7, No. 3 (arr. Balsom) Adagio HANDEL Concerto Grosso in B- flat Major, Opus 6, No. 7 Largo Largo e piano Andante Hornpipe VIVALDI Violin Concerto in D Major, RV 230 (arr. Balsom) Larghetto INTERMISSION HANDEL Overture to Atalanta, HWV 35 Overture Andante [Gavotte] PURCELL Dance of the Furies from Dioclesian

2 PURCELL Selections from King Arthur Fairest Isle Shepherd, Shepherd, leave decoying Warlike Consort PURCELL Chacony in G Minor PURCELL Fantasia on One Note HANDEL Suite for Trumpet and Strings in D Major, HWV 341 Overture Gigue Minuet: Aire March: Bourrée March PROGRAM NOTES Concerto Grosso in D Minor, La Folia FRANCESCO GEMINIANI Born December 5, 1687, Lucca Died September 17, 1762, Dublin Francesco Geminiani was one of the great violinists of the eighteenth century. He learned to play the violin as a boy, then went on to Rome, where he studied with Arcangelo Corelli and Allesandro Scarlatti. He was briefly a member of the Naples opera orchestra before moving to England in 1714 when he was 27. Geminiani quickly established himself in London: within two years of his arrival he performed before King George I, accompanied by Handel at the keyboard. Thereafter, Geminiani made his career in London, with extended periods spent in Dublin and Paris, and late in life he wrote several treatises on the art of playing the violin. Geminiani was also an art collector, and that proved an expensive hobby he occasionally landed in financial difficulties as a result. Geminiani discovered that the music of his teacher Corelli was wildly popular in London, and in the 1720s he arranged a number of Corelli s works for string orchestra. The most famous of these arrangements is of Corelli s Violin Sonata in D Minor, Opus 5, No. 12, which featured a set of variations on an old tune known as La Folia (or La Follia). The La

3 Folia tune was already several hundred years old when Corelli used it for his variations. It appears to have originated in fifteenth- century Portugal, where it was originally a fast dance in triple time, performed so strenuously that the dancers seemed to have gone mad the title folia meant mad or empty- headed (it survives in our usage as folly ). Over time, this dance slowed down and became the famous theme we know today, and its solemn chordal progression and stately melody have made it irresistibly attractive as the basis for variations. Among the many other composers who have surrendered to its charm are Vivaldi, Marais, Bach, Lully, Liszt, Nielsen, and Rachmaninoff. Geminiani s arrangement, which may be understood as an act of homage to his old teacher, has become one of the most popular of his own works. He recasts the sonata as a concerto for three soloists two violins and a cello and accompanies them with string orchestra and continuo. Corelli s variations are concise and sharply- contrasted, and Geminiani s string- orchestra version highlights and intensifies the drama in his teacher s famous music. Oboe Concerto in B- flat Major, Opus 7, No. 3 TOMASO ALBINONI Born June 8, 1671, Venice Died January 17, 1751, Venice By a strange irony, Tomaso Albinoni remains most popular today for a piece he never wrote. His Adagio in G Minor is a reconstruction (actually, an entirely new composition) by the Italian musicologist Remo Giazotto, based on a six- bar fragment found in one of Albinoni s manuscripts. Giazotto s arrangement, published in 1958, helped contribute to the booming interest in baroque music in the years after World War II, and it has become one of the most popular of classical pieces the current catalog lists over 35 different recordings. Albinoni himself was a contemporary of Bach, who admired his music. The son of a wealthy family, Albinoni never had to take a court or church position to support himself as a musician, but he was far from being a dilettante, as he is sometimes characterized: he wrote over fifty operas, forty cantatas, and a vast amount of instrumental music that was widely published, and his name was at the time of his death known throughout Europe. In 1715 Albinoni published as his Opus 7 a set of twelve concertos in Amsterdam.

4 These are sometimes referred to as Concerti a Cinque because the string orchestra consists of five parts two for violin, two for viola, and a bass- line. Opus 7 offers several concertos for strings alone, several for one oboe and orchestra, and several for two oboes and orchestra. The Oboe Concerto in B- flat Major for a single oboe is in the three- movement form that Albinoni helped to establish for concertos, and these movements are in the expected fast- slow- fast sequence. It is heard at this concert in an arrangement for trumpet and orchestra by Alison Balsom. Concerto Grosso in B- flat Major, Opus 6, No. 7 GEORGE FREDERIC HANDEL Born February 23, 1685, Halle Died April 14, 1759, London Handel s set of twelve concerti grossi, Opus 6, has long been regarded as the summit of his purely orchestral writing. All twelve concertos were written at white heat Handel began composing the first on September 29, 1739, and completed the final one on October 30. These concertos have remained popular for their nobility and sweeping grandeur, as well as for Handel s wonderful writing for strings. An accomplished violinist, Handel writes here with great imagination, creating and contrasting quite different kinds of string sonority. Part of the reason Handel was able to write these twelve concertos so quickly was that he borrowed many of his themes from music that had already been composed. Often he borrowed from himself, but in many of these concertos he appropriated themes from other composers; there was nothing wrong with this (such borrowing was a common and accepted practice of that era), and Handel transformed his borrowed themes so subtly that their actual origin was in some cases not discovered until centuries later. The Concerto Grosso in B- flat Major, completed on October 12, 1739, is unusual for its understated use of the solo violins, which are simply integrated into the orchestral texture and allowed only very brief cadential flourishes at the ends of the slow movements. As a result, the concerto feels less like a concerto grosso than a concerto for string orchestra. The noble slow introductory movement leads directly to the fugue, marked simply. This fugue is remarkable for having its subject based on a single note, which is then repeated faster and faster; the energetic development features rapid

5 exchanges between the instrumental sections. The Largo e piano returns to the somber mood of the opening Largo, now intensified by Handel's modulation into G minor. The Andante truly is at a walking tempo, but Handel s pervasive use of dotted rhythms makes the movement seem in constant motion throughout. The concluding movement is a Hornpipe, an old British dance. Handel borrowed its main theme from a set of keyboard pieces by German composer Gottlieb Muffat ( ) and then transformed that theme into this wonderful dance, full of energy and syncopated rhythms. Violin Concerto in D Major, RV 230 (arr. Balsom) ANTONIO VIVALDI Born March 4, 1678, Venice Died July 26/27, 1741, Vienna In the early years of the eighteenth century, Vivaldi held the rather modest position of music director of the Pio Ospedale della Pieta, an orphanage for abandoned or homeless girls in Venice. But his compositions which had been written for the most part for those girls were carrying his name throughout Europe. In 1711 he published a collection of twelve violin concertos under the title L Estro armonico, translated variously as The Spirit of Harmony or Harmonious Inspiration. Significantly, Vivaldi chose to have this set published in Amsterdam, and for two good reasons: printing techniques there were superior to any available in Italy and, perhaps more important, his music was extremely popular in northern Europe. Bach knew this music well, and if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery he paid Vivaldi the immense compliment of transcribing six of these concertos for different instruments: the present Violin Concerto in D Major became Bach s Concerto in D Major for Harpsichord and Strings, BWV927. Many of the twelve concertos of L Estro armonico are for two violins and string orchestra, but several are solo concertos, and the present Violin Concerto in D Major is one of these. This is a very concise concerto: its three movements, in the expected fast- slow- fast sequence, span barely eight minutes. The opens with a firm ritornello full of strength and good spirits, and the soloist takes wing between the reappearances of this opening gesture. Longest of the three movements, the central Larghetto features sustained solo lines over a chordal accompaniment that shifts gracefully between major and minor tonalities. Vivaldi rounds matters off with a brief but athletic.

6 This concerto is difficult enough when played on the violin its fast tempos and brisk passagework make it a challenge for any violinist. It becomes even more difficult when played by the trumpet: the Concerto in D Major is heard at this concert in Alison Balsom s arrangement for trumpet, strings, and continuo. Overture to Atalanta, HWV 35 GEORG FRIDERIC HANDEL In 1736 Frederick, Prince of Wales (son of George II and father of George III) married Augusta, Princess of Saxe- Gotha. To celebrate the royal marriage, Handel composed his opera Atalanta, which also celebrates a royal marriage. First produced at Covent Garden on May 12, 1736, Atalanta was revived for a few performances later that year, and then it vanished for over two centuries the next performance did not take place until Set in ancient Greece, Atalanta tells of Meleagar s pursuit of Atalanta, who prefers the life of the countryside to the court. After much confusion, the two both of royal birth are married, and early productions of the opera ended with great displays of fireworks in honor of the wedding about to take place in London. Atalanta tells a festive tale, and for the opera Handel composed a festive overture. The most striking feature of this overture is that it is a tiny three- movement trumpet concerto. Handel composed some of his organ concertos as entr actes during performances of his operas, but the overture to Atalanta has a dramatic function in this opera it is so brilliant that all by itself it becomes part of the royal celebration. The first movement, titled Overture, is full of ringing fanfares for the solo trumpet, while the central requires some acrobatic playing from the soloist. Handel concludes with a stately Gavotte. Dance of the Furies from Dioclesian HENRY PURCELL Born 1659 Died November 21, 1695, Westminster This section of the concert offers four works by Henry Purcell. Born into a musical family, Henry Purcell had a meteoric career that made him over the span of his brief life the first of England s great composers. He sang in the Chapel Royal as a boy, became composer to the King s violins at age 18, and was named the organist at Westminster

7 Abbey in 1679, a position he held until his death in 1695 at the age of 36. A prolific composer, he wrote church music, coronation and other official anthems, incidental music for London theatrical productions, and a large number of instrumental and keyboard pieces. He is probably best known to American audiences for two works that have been used for other purposes: Benjamin Britten used a Rondeau from Purcell s Abdelazar, or the Moor s Revenge as the basis for his Young Person s Guide to the Orchestra, and Stanley Kubrick employed Purcell s Funeral Music for Queen Mary to eerie effect in A Clockwork Orange. In May 1690 Purcell s Dioclesian was premiered at the Queen s Theatre in London. Dioclesian is a semi- opera : a play- with- music rather than an opera: the principal characters do not sing, but minor characters and a chorus do. Dioclesian tells of the Roman soldier Diocles who becomes emperor, develops a pretentious superiority, and eventually learns humility. While still a soldier, Diocles had promised to marry Drusilla, the sister of the prophetess Delphia, if the prophecy that he would become emperor were to be fulfilled. Once crowned emperor, Diocles turns his back on the plain Drusilla and pursues the beautiful Princess Aurelia. As Diocles prepares to wed Aurelia at the end of Act II, the enraged Delphia calls down a monster to disrupt their ceremony. The vigorous Dance of the Furies is the music that accompanies the arrival of the monster, and in the stage directions Purcell asks that the scene be enlivened with thunder and lightning. Selections from King Arthur Fairest Isle Shepherd, Shepherd, leave decoying Warlike Consort About 1690 the poet John Dryden adapted his play King Arthur, or The British Worthy (originally written in 1684) for a production with music by Henry Purcell. Dryden s King Arthur tells quite an unexpected account of that legendary king his play is built on the struggle between the Christian King Arthur and the pagan Saxon Prince Oswald. Their struggle for control of England is further intensified by their mutual pursuit of the blind Princess Emmeline, and at the end Arthur triumphs, drives away the foreign invaders, and unifies England. The play is full of magic, sorcery, the appearance of gods, dangerous mists, battles with Saxons, and separated lovers. The result of the Dryden-

8 Purcell collaboration was a semi- opera, a work that interpolates singing and dancing within the action of a stage play, and for Dryden s play Purcell composed six scenes. This collaborative version of King Arthur, first performed in the spring of 1691, has remained one of the most popular stage- works from that era and has been recorded a number of times. Purcell s music for King Arthur has been heard in many arrangements, and conductors are free to arrange suites of music drawn from the opera. This concert offers three excerpts from King Arthur, heard here in arrangements: the lovely (and justly- famous) Fairest Isle, sung by Venus in Act V; the sprightly Shepherd, Shepherd, cease decoying, sung by two shepherdesses in Act II as all await news of the battle between the English and the Saxons; and the Warlike Consort (sometimes known as Trumpet Tune ), performed as Merlin reveals the Order of the Garter. Chaconne in G Minor Purcell s Chaconne in G Minor (sometimes spelled Chacony) dates from the 1680s, or roughly from the same time as Bach s birth. Originally published as the sixth of Purcell s Ten Sonatas in Four Parts, this music is not a sonata in the classical sense: during this period, sonata meant sounded and could refer to any purely instrumental composition (the four parts here are first and second violins, viola, and a bass line that might consist of harpsichord, cello, and double bass). This brief and impassioned work is in fact a strict chaconne, built on a set of variations over a repeating eight- bar ground bass; recent scholarship suggests that Purcell derived this bass line from the song Scocca Pur by his friend, the Italian composer Giovanni Battista Draghi. This ground bass is announced firmly at the beginning and repeats throughout. Above this chordal progression, Purcell gives the higher string voices a sequence of variations remarkable for their invention and their emotional power this is quite intense music. Purcell also stretches the harmonic language, so that while the Chaconne stays in G minor, it often implies G major, with a great deal of resulting harmonic ambiguity. Fantasia on One Note In 1680, when he was only 21, Purcell wrote a series of fantasias for strings. In many ways, this music was looking backward even as it was composed. Purcell wrote

9 these fantasias for a consort of viols, a combination of instruments that was already becoming obsolete, and he looked to the past as well for the polyphonic structure of these brief pieces. His fantasias are based on the Elizabethan fancy, a form in which a tune is introduced by one instrument and then the other voices enter in close imitation. The glory of this music lies in its polyphonic development, and Purcell takes his sturdy melodies, already powerful and expressive to begin with, through some intense, learned, and at times dissonant extension even today this music can sound bracing harmonically. These fantasias are sectional in structure: after developing a first tune, Purcell will introduce and develop a second, and he usually concludes with a lively dance. The Fantasia in F Major is sometimes known as the Fantasia on One note. It is scored for five instruments (two violin parts, two viola parts, and a bass line), and throughout the fifty- measure span of this piece the second viola plays the same note middle C even as the other instruments range through different tonalities and tempos. Suite for Trumpet and Strings in D Major, HWV 341 GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL This little suite for trumpet and strings has delighted audiences for centuries, but it is not entirely the work of Handel. It appeared in London in 1733, but it was published by a rival house rather than Handel s own publisher. It contains a large measure of Handel s music, but apparently someone else intent on cashing in on that master s fame gathered a selection of his music and arranged it for trumpet and strings. Because several of the movements here were drawn from Handel s Water Music, this suite is sometimes titled Water Piece in D Major. In any case, that anonymous arranger produced a splendid little piece, full of bright spirits and the ringing sound of trumpet. The Overture, with its festive fanfares, is drawn from the overture to Handel s Water Music Suite No. 2, and the energetic Gigue was originally the second movement of the same suite. The sources of the Minuet and Bourrée are unknown, and it may be that the arranger composed them himself in the manner of Handel. The concluding March is from Handel s opera Partenope, first produced three years earlier in London. Program notes by Eric Bromberger