Presenting the world’s finest classical artists since 1919 Benjamin Ealovega

Jonathan Biss Christian Steiner photo PIANO Brentano Quartet MARK STEINBERG, Violin || SERENA CANIN, Violin MISHA AMORY, Viola || NINA LEE, Cello

MONDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2016, 8PM Lobero Theatre, Santa Barbara

COMMUNITY ARTS MUSIC ASSOCIATION BIOGRAPHY Sara Langdon

OPUS 3 ARTISTS PRESENTS Jonathan Biss PIANO Brentano Quartet MARK STEINBERG, Violin || SERENA CANIN, Violin MISHA AMORY, Viola || NINA LEE, Cello

MONDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2016, 8PM Lobero Theatre, Santa Barbara

“THE LATE STYLE” (1770-1827) Sonata in G Major for Violin and Piano, Op.96 Allegro moderato Adagio espressivo The Brentano Quartet Scherzo: Allegro—Trio MARK STEINBERG, Violin || SERENA CANIN, Violin MISHA AMORY, Viola || NINA LEE, Cello Poco Allegretto Mark Steinberg, Violin Jonathan Biss, Piano Since its inception in 1992, the Hall in New York; the Library of Congress INTERMISSION I: 10 minutes Brentano has appeared in Washington; the Concertgebouw in throughout the world to popular and Amsterdam; the Konzerthaus in Vienna; Sonata in C minor for Piano, Op.111 critical acclaim. “Passionate, uninhibited Suntory Hall in Tokyo; and the Sydney Maestoso—Allegro con brio ed appassionato and spellbinding,” raves the London Opera House. The Quartet had its first Arietta: Adagio molto semplice e cantabile Independent; the New York Times European tour in 1997, and was honored Jonathan Biss, Piano extols its “luxuriously warm sound [and] in the U.K. with the Royal Philharmonic

yearning lyricism.” Award for Most Outstanding Debut. INTERMISSION II: 15 minutes Since 2014, the Brentano Quartet has The Brentano Quartet is known String Quartet in F Major, Op.135 served as Artists in Residence at Yale for especially imaginative projects Allegretto University. The Quartet also currently combining old and new music. Among Vivace serves as the collaborative ensemble the Quartet’s latest collaborations with Lento assai, cantante e tranquillo for the Van Cliburn International Piano contemporary composers is a new work Grave, ma non troppo tratto—Allegro—Grave—Allegro Competition. Formerly, they were by Steven Mackey, “One Red Rose,” The Brentano Quartet Artists in Residence at Princeton commemorating the 50th anniversary Programs and artists subject to change University for many years. of the assassination of President John The Quartet has performed in F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. CAMA gratefully acknowledges our sponsors the world’s most prestigious venues, Other recent commissions include a for this evening’s performance… including and Alice Tully piano quintet by Vijay Iyer, a work Masterseries Season Sponsor: Esperia Foundation Concert Partner: Robert & Christine Emmons 2 3 by Eric Moe (with Christine Brandes, the 36-year-old American has spent ten soprano), and a new viola quintet by summers at the Marlboro Music Festival Felipe Lara (performed with violist and has written extensively about his Hsin-Yun Huang). In 2012, the Quartet relationships with the composers with provided the central music (Beethoven whom he shares a stage. A member of Benjamin Ealovega Opus 131) for the critically-acclaimed the faculty of his alma mater the Curtis independent film A Late Quartet. Institute of Music since 2010, Biss led The quartet has worked closely the first massive open online course with other important composers of (MOOC) offered by a classical music our time, among them Elliot Carter, conservatory, Exploring Beethoven’s , Chou Wen-chung, Piano Sonatas, which has reached more , and György Kurtág. The than 150,000 people in 185 countries. Quartet has also been privileged to This season Biss continues his latest collaborate with such artists as soprano Beethoven project, Beethoven/5, for Jessye Norman and pianists Richard which the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra Goode, Jonathan Biss, and Mitsuko is co-commissioning five composers summer music festivals as part of his gives masterclasses at Carnegie Hall in

Uchida. to write new piano concertos, each ongoing concert cycles to perform all connection with the idea of late styleLisa Marie Mazzucco The Quartet is named for Antonie inspired by one of Beethoven’s. The five- the Beethoven sonatas. and publishes a Kindle Single on the Brentano, whom many scholars consider year plan began last season, with Biss In 2016-2017 he begins examining, topic in January. to be Beethoven’s “Immortal Beloved”, premiering ’s “The Blind both in performance and academically, Biss has embarked on a nine-year, the intended recipient of his famous Banister,” which was a finalist for the the concept of a composer’s “late nine-disc recording cycle of Beethoven’s love confession. n Pulitzer Prize in Music, and which Biss style,” and has put together programs complete piano sonatas, and in early plays with the of Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Britten, 2017 he releases the sixth volume, in the spring of 2017. This season he Elgar, Gesualdo, Kurtág, Mozart, which includes the monumental Jonathan Biss premieres ’s concerto, Schubert, and Schumann’s later works, “Hammerklavier” sonata. Upon the Pianist paired with Beethoven’s Piano Concerto both for solo piano and in collaboration release of the fourth volume, BBC Music No.1, with the Saint Paul Chamber with the Brentano Quartet and Mark Magazine said, “Jonathan Biss will surely Jonathan Biss is a world-renowned Orchestra, before performing it with Padmore, which he will play at Carnegie take his place among the greats if he pianist who shares his deep musical the Royal Scottish National Orchestra Hall, San Francisco Performances, continues on this exalted plane.” His curiosity with classical music lovers in in Dundee, Edinburgh, and Glasgow. In the Chamber Music bestselling eBook, Beethoven’s Shadow, the concert hall and beyond. Over nearly the next three years Biss will premiere Society, London’s Barbican Centre, published by RosettaBooks in 2011, two decades on the concert stage, he concertos by Salvatore Sciarrino, and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw. was the first Kindle Single written by a has forged relationships with the New , and . A previous Biss initiative, Schumann: classical musician, and he will continue York Philharmonic; the Philadelphia, In addition to his involvement at Under the Influence, was a 30-concert to add lectures to his extraordinarily Cleveland, and Philharmonia orchestras; Marlboro, Biss spends the summer of exploration of the composer’s role popular online course, Exploring the Boston, Chicago, and Swedish 2016 as the Artist-in-Residence at the in musical history, for which he also Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas, until he Radio symphony orchestras; and the Caramoor Center, where he performs recorded Schumann and Dvořák covers all of them. Nicolas Brodard Leipzig Gewandhaus, Budapest Festival, chamber music, a solo recital, and the Piano Quintets with the Elias String Throughout his career, Biss has been and Royal Concertgebouw orchestras, Andres and Beethoven concerto pair Quartet and wrote an an advocate for new music. Prior to the among many others. In addition to with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. He also Single on Schumann, A Pianist Under Beethoven/5 project, he commissioned performing a full schedule of concerts, gives recitals at the Aspen and Ravinia the Influence. This season Biss also are Lunaire Variations by David Ludwig,

4 5 Interlude II by , Wonderer by at the 92nd Street Y’s Tisch Center for Beethoven’s vision. Pierre Rode (1774- , and Three Pieces for Piano the Arts and his New York Philharmonic 1830) for whom Beethoven wrote his and a concerto by , which debut under . last sonata, was a different player who he premiered with the Boston Symphony Biss has been recognized with called forth different music. Rode is Orchestra. He has also premiered a piano numerous honors, including the Leonard known today for etudes that violin quintet by . Bernstein Award presented at the 2005 students still practice, but his playing Biss represents the third generation Schleswig-Holstein Festival, Wolf Trap’s was more elegant than forceful, and in a family of professional musicians Shouse Debut Artist Award, the Andrew by December 1812, when he came to that includes his grandmother Raya Wolf Memorial Chamber Music Award, Vienna, he may have been suffering Garbousova, one of the first well- Lincoln Center’s Martin E. Segal Award, from a medical condition that weakened known female cellists (for whom Samuel an Avery Fisher Career Grant, the 2003 his bowing arm. Barber composed his Cello Concerto), Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award, and the Beethoven accommodated Rode’s and his parents, violinist Miriam Fried 2002 Gilmore Young Artist Award. His taste, or technical limitations, to and violist/violinist Paul Biss. Growing recent albums for EMI won Diapason a surprising degree. He wrote to the up surrounded by music, Biss began d’Or de l’année and Edison awards. He twenty-four-year-old Archduke Rudolph, his last piano sonata in 1821, he was his piano studies at age six, and his was an artist-in-residence on American his student, patron and friend (and the completely deaf, and years removed first musical collaborations were with Public Media’s Performance Today Austrian Emperor’s baby brother), “I have from his career as a pianist. He would his mother and father. He studied at and was the first American chosen to not hurried unduly to compose the last write a few more piano pieces after 1822, Indiana University with Evelyne Brancart participate in the BBC’s New Generation movement merely for the sake of being but this sonata marks the last time one and at the Curtis Institute of Music in Artist program. punctual, the more so as in view of Rode’s of his piano works would be a landmark. Philadelphia with . At age For more information, please visit playing I have had to give more thought There is no mistaking its importance 20, Biss made his New York recital debut www.jonathanbiss.com to the composition of this movement. In from the very first notes of its slow our Finales we like to have fairly noisy introduction, a loud, menacing passages, but R does not like them—and drop of a seventh. In opera, such a this hampered me somewhat.” gesture would portend a dramatic, The sonata requires no fast bowing or and probably catastrophic, turn of the NOTES ON THE PROGRAM (except for a few vigorous chords in the plot, and indeed it presages a titanic by Howard Posner last movement) vigorous bowing. Where struggle of an allegro, propelled by a the Kreutzer Sonata was a volcanic theme of powerful leaps and driving eruption, the Sonata in G is more of running figures. Beethoven originally his concert comprises Ludwig van Eight of Beethoven’s ten sonatas walk in the park. For all intents and conceived the movement as a fugue, Beethoven’s final violin sonata, were written before he turned thirty- purposes it has two slow movements: and though he abandoned that form for Tfinal piano sonata and final string two, and the ninth, the titanic “Kreutzer” in the theme-and-variation finale, the a sonata structure, its origins show: it quartet. It is usually a mistake to find Sonata, followed within a year. It would fifth variation is an extended adagio that is essentially monothematic and full of much significance in this kind of finality, be another nine years before he wrote lasts considerably longer than the entire dizzying counterpoint. which is usually entirely accidental. When another. scherzo third movement. The Adagio is every bit as titanic Beethoven composed his last violin Like the “Kreutzer,” the Sonata in Beethoven’s deteriorating hearing as the first movement, but as serene sonata fifteen years before his death, he G Major, Op.96 was written for a had ended his own career as a public and elysian as the first movement is was turning forty-two, and could scarcely visiting violinist. The Kreutzer sonata performer, so on the December 29, 1812 furious. It is a simple song of a theme have thought about whether he would reflects George Augustus Pohlgreen premiere performance was played by with variations that become increasingly write another one. But he did think his last Bridgetower’s virtuosity, bravura, Rode and Archduke Rudolph. syncopated and rhythmically complex stringCOMMUNITY quartet would ARTS indeed MUSIC beASSOCIATION his last. OFintensity, SANTA BARBARA, and rare INCability • CAMASB.ORGto comprehend By the time Beethoven composed — the third variation sounding like a

6 7 precursor of jazz — until the fourth the page, as if Beethoven is trying his best did not invent this sort of movement: of the Op.130 quartet after having not variation turns into a free fantasy. to scare away those amateurs. In some Haydn’s quartets are full of minuets that subscribed to the concert in which it Though the sonata is not short by variations, there are more beats in the would break a dancer’s ankles, but like was first played, Beethoven said no. Karl any measure, clocking in at about 25 measure than the time signature allows. everything he took from Haydn, he went Holz, Beethoven’s secretary (and second minutes, its absence of a third movement In an 1855 book titled “Beethoven and his much further with it. The four parts tug violinist in Schuppanzigh’s quartet), told worried Adolf Schlesinger, Beethoven’s Three Styles,” a French critic wrote, “When at each other in four different rhythms, Dembscher that if he wanted to use the publisher in Berlin, who had not published one is Beethoven it is possible to do or get together to run up and down manuscript he would have to pay the Beethoven’s first twenty-nine piano anything, but still two and two must make and stop for no good reason. In mid- subscription price of the concert he had sonatas and may not have known that four.” In actually playing the music, the movement, the first violin gets lost in a missed. Dembscher asked, probably with five of them had only two movements. bad arithmetic is not a major problem, but series of syncopated leaps while the three a smile, “Must it be?” As the story goes, He wrote to ask “most submissively” when we read contemporary accounts lower parts repeat the same five-note when Holz told Beethoven about the whether Beethoven intended to write that describe Beethoven as capricious sequence forty-eight times. conversation, Beethoven immediately only the two movements, “or if perhaps or crazy, we should remember things The ridiculous gives way to the wrote a canon for four male voices (WoO the Allegro were accidentally forgotten like this. sublime in a placid, seamless slow 196) to the words, “It must be! Yes, yes, by the copyist,” which was a diplomatic Beethoven’s last quartet, as forward- movement consisting of three variations yes, yes, take out your wallet!” using the way of asking whether the notoriously looking as it is, owes much to the past. on a softly rolling theme. „Es muss sein!“ theme of the Op.135 absent-minded Beethoven might have It begins, like his First Symphony, on a Before the finale — a brief slow finale. mislaid a third movement somewhere. “wrong” chord, starting on what amounts introduction followed by an energetic But why did Beethoven base the last Anton Schindler, Beethoven’s assistant to the dominant of the dominant before allegro — Beethoven wrote „Der schwer movement of his last quartet on an at the time, later wrote in his legendarily finally establishing the home key of F. gefasste Entschluss“ (which can be inside joke? When Beethoven sent the inaccurate (but nonetheless influential) The first movement blends Bachian translated as, “the decision reached with manuscript of the quartet to his publisher, Beethoven biography that when he complexity with Haydnesque congeniality difficulty” or “the difficult resolution”). Moritz Schlesinger (son of Adolf) in Paris, asked the same question, Beethoven and wit, betraying nothing of the difficult Beneath it, he wrote the three-note motif he said in an accompanying letter: answered that he hadn’t had time to circumstances in which it was written. of the slow introduction with the words Here, my dear friend, is my last quartet. write a third movement, which was just Beethoven composed it in October 1826 „Muss es sein?“ (“Must it be?”), followed It will be the last; and indeed it has given the sort of answer Schindler deserved. at his brother’s country estate while by the two three note-motifs that me much trouble. For I could not bring Modern listeners, knowing the Arietta he and his nephew Karl were taking make up the allegro’s principal theme, myself to compose the last movement. is the last movement of Beethoven’s last refuge after Karl’s attempted suicide, underlaid with the words „Es muss sein! But as your letters were reminding me of sonata, are inclined to hear a valedictory which was probably more a expression of Es muss sein!“ (“It must be! It must it, in the end I decided to compose it. And quality in the last movement that frustration at life with his uncle (who had be!”). These inscriptions cry out for an that is the reason why I have written the Beethoven could scarcely have intended. wrested custody of the youth from his explanation. There are two. motto ‘The decision taken with difficulty— What struck 19th-century critics, whose mother years earlier) than a real attempt Ignaz Dembscher, a wealthy imperial Must it be? —It must be, it must be! —’ constituency was the large pool of to end his own life. But suicide was still a court official and musical amateur, For Beethoven, composition was amateur players who made up the market crime, and it was necessary to get Karl attended nearly every concert by the a series of agonizing decisions about for published music, was that Beethoven’s out of sight while a fairly minor bullet , which premiered which version of a theme to use or notation was bizarre. He used small note wound to his head healed. Beethoven’s later quartets, and also put which direction to take it, and it must values as the beat unit — for example, The scherzo shows Beethoven’s pie- on chamber music concerts in his own sometimes have been an act of extreme writing a variation in 12/32 time instead in-the-face sense of humor. It is written house. Beethoven usually let Dembscher will to make his choices and finish a of 3/8. Since smaller notes have more entirely in 3/4 time, but is rife with rhythmic use manuscripts of his new music movement. „Es muss sein!“ may mean, “At flags and beams, the music takes on a jokes likely to convince players that they for Dembscher’s house concerts, but last, I know how it must sound.” fearsomely complex look and blackens (or the composer) can’t count. Beethoven when Dembscher asked for the score ©2016, Howard Posner

8 9 in the first violin, playful and yet tense and It is a movement that overflows with expectant. Then an extraordinary eruption forgiveness and love, but is also full of occurs, a fortissimo section where the great sadness. lower instruments are stuck in an infinite The final movement bears a strange whirling loop while the first violin, berserk, inscription: „Der schwer gefasste goes off on an impossible tangent. This Entschluss“, or “The Difficult Resolution.” eventually spirals down to a quiet unison, The slow introduction, which features a where, for a brief instant one hears the rising minor-key question in the lower

Muss es sein - Motto at the beginning of the Finale of Beethoven’s last string quartet, Op.135 four simple pitches that the movement instruments, is marked „Muss es sein?“ is based on. Finally the opening section — “must it be?” Here we have the returns in all its bumptiousness. Beethoven who poses difficult questions, The third movement: a dark hymn, literally. This brief introduction reaches A note on Beethoven’s String Quartet in F Major, Op.135 a whispered prayer. In early sketches, an anguished climax before subsiding. By Misha Amory, violist of the Brentano Quartet Beethoven designated it „Süsser Then follows the main Allegro section, Ruhegesang oder Friedengesang“, joyful and affirmative, marked „Es muss a sweet song of calm or peace. It is sein!“ — “it must be!” Two-thirds of The String Quartet in F, opus 135, was the cello; the first violin answers with a one of the half-dozen slow movements this movement then unroll with barely last complete work Beethoven composed, giggling echo. Right away the composer that stand at the pinnacle of his late- a cloud on the horizon. All is happiness, only a few months before his death in is signaling that here he will have nothing period achievement, and it serves as hijinks, carefree melody, playfulness. It is March 1827. It is traditionally grouped to do with the old, earnest questions the expressive center of gravity for all the more shocking when the minor-key together with his other late quartets, of existence or fate; this is to be put this quartet. In fact it is a theme with introductory question — „muss es sein?“ opp.127, 130, 131, 132 and the ; but aside, at least for the time being. What four variations, but they unfold in such — returns gigantically, terrifyingly, and it’s hard not to wonder what Beethoven ensues is a genial, often Haydn-esque a continuous fashion that this is not almost without warning. It is one final would have thought of that grouping. Allegretto in 2/4 time, which ambles along, immediately obvious. Set in D-flat Major, struggle; and this time, it appears, the Certainly opus 135 is the black sheep four friends sharing a melody or two it feels a universe away from the sunny F beast is tamed, the doubts laid to rest. of this bunch. Where the other quartets between them, breaking it into fragments Major key of the rest of the quartet; we The music dances away through the coda, are monumental in scale, sprawling in so that everybody gets a piece. The have been pulled out of the public eye teasing, pianissimo, and is crowned by their expressive reach and scope, and movement is a typical sonata form, with and find ourselves hearing an intimate one final boisterous affirmation. often searching for a new formal basis for all the responsible sections of exposition, confession. The theme is in the lowest There has been endless debate about the quartet genre altogether, opus 135 development and recapitulation; but it register for all four instruments, husky just what this “difficult resolution” was, stands apart: tightly reasoned, having feels more like an airy distillation of that and sorrowing. The first variation lifts us and many theories have been advanced. an airy and transparent texture, playful form, with its spareness, its fragmentation, higher up, visiting some painful harmonic Is it about facing and accepting death? Is and teasing in so many places, it is the and its economy of means. It is music moments, but maintaining much of it another weighty philosophical question? work of a composer who seems to have that speaks to us about the process of the tone of the original. In the second Is it the laundry bill that has to be paid? suddenly attained some new, simple truth creating, a blueprint where we see all the variation, we are taken to the minor key; Beethoven’s note to his publisher hints after miles of struggle. It is more similar parts laid out before our eyes, and are the flowing rhythms of the earlier music that it might simply be the necessity of in length and structure to his early opus given a glimpse inside Beethoven’s mind are lost, and replaced with stony, halting finishing the composition, and bidding 18 quartets than to the later ones, and as he fits them together. steps. This is one possible answer to farewell to a favorite genre: “Here, my yet it could not be mistaken for an opus The second movement is a quicksilver the prayer, an unthinkable rejection, a dear friend, is my last quartet. It will be 18 quartet: it is a greater and deeper scherzo. The parts at the beginning bereft state. Some measure of relief the last; and indeed it has given me much achievement than those quartets, yet stage a rhythmic comic act, ill-fitting and comes in the final two variations, as trouble. For I could not bring myself to somehow less ambitious, less reaching, at awkward, everyone sitting on the wrong we return to the Major, and the cello compose the last movement. But as your the same time. beat, then suddenly falling heavily onto reassuringly takes the melody. The last letters were reminding me of it, in the end The first movement is as spare in a unison E-flat that is also off the beat, variation is the most extraordinary part I decided to compose it. And that is the texture as any quartet movement stuck in the wrong meter for a while of the movement: the first violin, winged, reason why I have written the motto: “The Beethoven ever wrote. It begins with a before righting itself (sort of). This section hints at the theme in gentle, gasping difficult resolution—Must it be?—It must four-note question in the viola, colored is abruptly succeeded by a more brilliant rhythms, while the other instruments be, it must be!” with a mock-serious minor note in the one featuring a set of rapid upward scales describe simple upward arpeggios. © Note by Misha Amory

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NOVEMBER 7, 2016, 8PM WARSAW PHILHARMONIC FEBRUARY 7, 2017, 8PM BRUCKNER ORCHESTRA LINZ MARCH 14, 2017, 8PM ST PETERSBURG PHILHARMONIC MARCH 28, 2017, 8PM DANISH NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA MAY 7, 2017, 4PM LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC

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OCTOBER 17, 2016, 8PM JONATHAN BISS PIANO BRENTANO QUARTET NOVEMBER 22, 2016, 8PM AUGUSTIN HADELICH VIOLIN • JOYCE YANG PIANO MARCH 8, 2017, 8PM TAFELMUSIK BAROQUE ORCHESTRA APRIL 6, 2017, 8PM SUSAN GRAHAM MEZZO-SOPRANO

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