Kansas City Symphony 2012-2013 Classical Series February 22, 23 and 24, 2013 Michael Stern, Conductor Christine Brewer, Soprano GLINKA STRAUSS Russlan and Ludmilla Overture Four Last Songs for Soprano and Orchestra Frühling September Beim Schlafengehn Im Abendrot INTERMISSION TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No. 2 in C minor, Op. 17, Little Russian Andante sostenuto Allegro vivo Andantino marziale quasi moderato Scherzo: Allegro molto vivace Finale: Moderato assai Allegro vivo
Feb. 22-24, 2013, page 1 Notes on the Program by DR. RICHARD E. RODDA Richard Strauss (1864-1949) Four Last Songs for Soprano and Orchestra (1948) Two piccolos, three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, three bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, celesta, harp and strings. SIDEBAR BULLET POINTS: Strauss composed the Four Last Songs while living in Switzerland after World War II The work s musical style looks back to the Late Romanticism of Strauss compositions of fifty years earlier The Songs treat metaphorically the approach of death through images of rebirth in spring, autumn, rest and sunset Strauss largely withdrew from public life after 1935 to his villa at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in the lovely Bavarian Alps. He lived there throughout World War II, spared the physical ravages of the conflict, but deeply wounded by the loss of many friends and by the bombing of Dresden, Munich and Vienna. In October 1945, under the threat of being called before the Denazification Board, he moved to Switzerland, where he lived for the next four years. He was cleared by the Board in June 1948, but chose to stay in Switzerland for medical treatment that winter, returning to Garmisch in May 1949. At the end of 1946, Strauss read Eichendorff s poem Im Abendrot, in which an aged couple, having moved together through the world for a lifetime, look at the setting sun and ask, Is that perhaps death? The words matched precisely Strauss feelings of those years, and he determined to set the poem for soprano and orchestra. The first sketches for the song appeared early in 1947, and the piece was completed by May 1948. During that time, a friend sent Strauss a volume of poems by Hermann Hesse, and from this collection he chose four verses to form a five-song cycle with the Eichendorff setting. The Hesse pieces were composed between July and September 1948, making them the final works that Strauss completed. (He never finished the last of the Hesse songs.) He died quietly at his Garmisch home exactly one year later. Each of the magnificent Four Last Songs treats metaphorically the approach of death through images of rebirth in spring, autumn, rest and sunset by returning one final time to the soprano voice, for which Strauss had written so much glorious music throughout his career. In these moving compositions, Strauss left what British musicologist Neville Cardus described as the most consciously and most beautifully delivered Abschied [ farewell ] in all music. Frühling ( Spring ) In dämmrigen Grüften Träumte ich lang Von deinen Bäumen und blauen Lüften, Von deinem Duft und Vogelgesang. Nun liegst du erschlossen In Gleiss und Zier Von Licht übergossen In darkling caves I dreamed long of your trees and azure breezes, of your scents and birdsong. Now you lie revealed in glitter and array, bathed in light
Feb. 22-24, 2013, page 2 Wie ein Wunder vor mir. Du kennst mich wieder, Du lockest mich zart, Es zittert durch all meine Glieder Deine selige Gegenwart. like a miracle before me. You know me again, you invite me tenderly. There quivers through all my limbs your blessed presence. September Der Garten trauert, Kühl sinkt in die Blumen der Regen. Der Sommer schauert Still seinem Ende entgegen. Golden tropft Blatt um Blatt Nieder vom hohen Akazienbaum. Sommer lächelt erstaunt und matt In den sterbenden Gartentraum. Lange noch bei den Rosen Bleibt er stehen, sehnt sich nach Ruh. Langsam tut er die (grossen), Müdegewordenen Augen zu. The garden is mourning, the rain sinks coolly on the flowers, summertime shudders quietly to its close. Leaf upon golden leaf is dropping down from the tall acacia tree. Summer smiles amazed and exhausted, on the dying dream that was this garden. Long by the roses, it tarries, yearns for rest, slowly closes its (great) weary eyes. Beim Schlaffengehen ( Going to Sleep ) Nun der Tag mich müd gemacht, Soll mein sehnliches Verlangen Freundlich die gestirnte Nacht Wie ein müdes Kind empfangen. Hände lasst von allem Tun, Stirn vergiss du alles Denken, Alle meine Sinne nun Wollen sich in Schlummer senken. Und die Seele unbewacht Will in freien Flügen schweben, Um im Zauberkreis der Nacht Tief und tausendfach zu leben. Now the day has wearied me. And my ardent longing shall the stormy night in friendship enfold like a tired child. Hands, leave all work, brow, forget all thought. Now all my senses long to sink themselves in slumber. And the spirit unguarded longs to soar on free wings, so that, in the magic circle of night, it may live deeply, and a thousandfold. Im Abendrot ( In the Twilight ) Text: Eichendorff Wir sind durch Not und Freude gegangen Hand in Hand, vom Wandern ruhn wir (beide) nun überm stillen Land. Rings sich die Täler neigen, es dunkelt schon die Luft, zwei Lerchen nur noch steigen nachträumend in den Duft. Through want and joy we have walked hand in hand, we are both resting from our travels now, in the quiet countryside. Around us the valleys fold up, already the air grows dark, only two larks still soar wistfully into the balmy sky.
Feb. 22-24, 2013, page 3 Tritt her und lass sie schwirren, bald ist es Schlafenszeit, dass wir uns nicht verirren in dieser Einsamkeit. Come here, and let them fly about, soon it is time to sleep. We must not go astray in this solitude. O weiter, stille Friede! O spacious, tranquil peace, So tief im Abendrot. so profound in the gloaming Wie sind wir wandermüde How tired are we of traveling ist dies etwa der Tod? is this perchance death? Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) Symphony No. 2 in C minor, Op. 17, Little Russian (1872-1873) Woodwinds in pairs plus piccolo, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion and strings. SIDEBAR BULLET POINTS: The Second Symphony s title refers to the Ukrainian region from which Tchaikovsky borrowed some of his themes, known in Tsarist days as Little Russia Tchaikovsky heard much peasant music during a visit to his sister s home in Ukraine in June 1872 The Symphony No. 2 is one of Tchaikovsky s most nationalistic works Looking back through the mists of over a century to the closing decades of Imperial Russia, it might at first seem that an unwavering unanimity joined together the music from Glinka through Borodin, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky to Scriabin and Rachmaninoff. Upon closer examination of the lives and philosophies of these men, however, bitter enmities are revealed. The group of musical nationalists known in the West as The Five Cui, Borodin, Mussorgsky, Balakirev and Rimsky-Korsakov were all originally amateur musicians determined to establish a distinctly Russian school of composition based upon native folk and church music, history and lore. In this, they followed the lead of Mikhail Glinka, revered as the father of Russian concert music. They belligerently defended their untutored status on the basis that their lack of formal training freed them from German musical hegemony, and allowed them to penetrate more directly into the heart of the Russian ethos. They looked upon the Russian graduates of the leading conservatories almost as traitors to the nationalistic cause they espoused, and Tchaikovsky was among their especially favored targets. For his part, the well-trained Tchaikovsky could hardly help but look down on the rough-hewn music of The Five. He once castigated Mussorgsky s work in a letter to his brother Modeste as the lowest, commonest parody of music; it may go to the devil for all I care. Still, there was inevitably frequent contact between these two factions, and eventually a laissez-faire understanding was achieved. Rimsky-Korsakov decided to forsake the ranks of the uneducated, and he taught himself the techniques of music well enough to eventually become Russia s most respected pedagogue, numbering Stravinsky and Respighi among his students. Tchaikovsky, though critical of their lack of professionalism, always respected the raw talent of the little group of nationalists, and he even agreed with their ideal of fostering Russian music. Like them, he felt drawn to the native traditions of his homeland, and once wrote to his benefactress, Mme. von Meck, As regards the Russian element in general in my music (i.e., the instances of melody and harmony originating in folksong), I grew up in the backwoods, saturating myself from earliest childhood with the inexplicable beauty of the characteristic traits of Russian folksong. Unlike The Five, however, who felt that a free fantasia form could
Feb. 22-24, 2013, page 4 best express their ideas, Tchaikovsky believed that the Russian influence should be channeled into the traditional, Classical form of the symphony. It is not hard to understand, therefore, why Tchaikovsky was the first Russian composer widely appreciated in the Western world, whose tastes had so long been dominated by German music. Despite their underlying differences, there were at least two significant instances in Tchaikovsky s early life when he was musically drawn to The Five. One was when Balakirev suggested the topic and even the structure for his 1869 tone poem, Romeo and Juliet. Another was in this Second Symphony. After an exhausting year of teaching, composing and writing music criticism in Moscow, Tchaikovsky visited his beloved sister, Alexandra, in Kamenka in Ukraine in June 1872. He was refreshed during the summer months not only by the time spent with his family, but also by the chance to return to the country and its people. Among the things that he enjoyed most was hearing the peasants sing, and it may have been this rustic music that inspired the Second Symphony, just as it did many of the works of The Five. It was Tchaikovsky s use in this Symphony of three folk tunes that he may have heard in Kamenka that caused the work to be nicknamed Little Russian by the critic Nikolai Kashkin in 1896. The diminutive referred not to any characteristic of the work but rather to the Ukrainian region from which Tchaikovsky borrowed his themes, known in Tsarist days as Little Russia. The Symphony s first movement is prefaced by a slow introduction based on a variant of the traditional Russian song Down by Mother Volga. The body of the movement s sonata form begins with a quickening of the tempo and the presentation of the main theme, a vigorous, stormy strain; the lyrical second theme is presented by the clarinet. In the energetic development section these two melodies are intertwined with the folk tune from the introduction. A massive climax ends the development and leads into the recapitulation of the stormy main theme and the yearning complementary melody. The closing pages contain a quiet reminder of Down by Mother Volga from the horn and bassoon. The second movement was taken whole from Undine, Tchaikovsky s unsuccessful opera of 1869. In the opera, this music was used as a wedding march, and in the Symphony it takes the place of the slow movement. The center of this three-part movement (A B A) is a treatment of Spin, My Spinner, one of the Fifty Russian Folksongs Tchaikovsky arranged for publication in 1868-1869. The third movement is a quicksilver Scherzo, whose central trio shifts rhythmic gears into a jaunty duple meter. The finale, a dazzling display of orchestral color and rhythmic exuberance, is a set of variations on the Ukrainian tune The Crane. A slow introduction for full orchestra presents the basic shape of the melody before the variations are begun by the strings. The tiny tune is presented over and over, each time appearing in a different orchestral vestment so that the variations are based as much on changing tone color as on melodic manipulation. As a foil to the movement s propulsive rhythmic energy, Tchaikovsky added a lyrical melody, first heard in the violins and then repeated by the flutes. Joyous festivity, however, is at the heart of this music, and it is not kept long at bay by tender sentiment. 2012 Dr. Richard E. Rodda