Advance Program Notes Summer Chamber Music Series June 20-23, 2018
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Advance Program Notes Summer Chamber Music Series June 20-23, 2018 These Advance Program Notes are provided online for our patrons who like to read about performances ahead of time. Printed programs will be provided to patrons at the performances. Programs are subject to change. Summer Chamber Music Series June 20-23, 2018 All performances are free and will be held in the Street and Davis Performance Hall’s Anne and Ellen Fife Theatre in the Moss Arts Center. Wednesday, June 20, 2018, 7:30 PM SPECIAL GEMS Shmuel Ashkenasi and David Ehrlich (violin), Katharina Kang and Michael Klotz (viola), Coleman Itzkoff (cello), and Kwan Yi (piano) Thursday, June 21, 2018, 7:30 PM BRILLIANT AND POWERFUL Jeffrey Dyrda and David Ehrlich (violin), Michael Klotz (viola), Dmitry Kouzov (cello), and Kwan Yi (piano) Friday, June 22, 2018, 7:30 PM LOVE IN MUSIC Shmuel Ashkenasi, Jeffrey Dyrda, and David Ehrlich (violin); Katharina Kang and Michael Klotz (viola); and Dmitry Kouzov and Coleman Itzkoff (cello) Saturday, June 23, 2018, 3 PM STUDENT ENSEMBLES PERFORMANCE Our 2018 summer chamber music explorations include a diverse and beautiful range of free public concerts, listed above, and an intensive two-week training session with young artists June 13-23, 2018. Additional short pieces by Jean Sibelius for violin and piano to be announced from the stage and performed by Shmuel Ashkenasi, violin and Teresa Ehrlich, piano: Berceuse, op. 79, no. 6 Romance, op. 78, no. 2 Nocturn, op. 51, no. 3 Rondino, op. 81, no. 2 Walzer, op. 81, no. 3 Special Gems Wednesday, June 20, 2018, 7:30 PM String Quintet in G Minor, K. 516 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Shmuel Ashkenasi and David Ehrlich, violin; Katharina Kang and Michael Klotz, viola; and Coleman Itzkoff, cello INTERMISSION Piano Quartet in E Flat Major, op. 87 Antonín Dvořák Shmuel Ashkenasi, violin; Katharina Kang, viola; Coleman Itzkoff, cello; and Kwan Yi, piano Program Notes MOZART STRING QUINTET IN G MINOR, K. 516 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s String Quintet in G Minor, K. 516 (1787) is one of a pair of string quintets which offer an intriguing contrast. The quintet K. 515 in C Major (also 1877) is as sunny and bright as this one is brooding and dark. (This puts one in mind of Mozart’s last two symphonies, numbers 40 and 41 in G Minor and C Major, K. 550 and 551, written in the following year.) The firstAllegro movement of K. 516, all in G Minor, is elegant and deft but thoroughly sad. The second movement, Menuetto: Allegretto, has been called a minuet in name only, as its grim G Minor theme with very heavy chords on the third beat, seems anything but danceable. The central trio, a bright G Major, brings temporary relief. The third movement, Adagio ma non troppo, though in Eb Major, is the saddest yet. That master of sorrowful music, Tschaikovsky, said, “No one has ever known as well how to interpret so exquisitely in music the sense of resigned and inconsolable sorrow.” One almost wonders how we can continue to follow Mozart in this direst of moods as the fourth movement begins in Adagio, but the mood seems to shift and all of a sudden we are launched into a most cheerful G Major Allegro in 6/8, as sunny as one can imagine, with plenty of repeats just so we can catch the last lovely bit yet again. DVOŘÁK PIANO QUARTET IN E FLAT MAJOR, OP. 87 Antonín Dvorák’s Piano Quartet in E Flat Major, op. 87, had its premiere in November 1890, just before the creative beginnings of the great “Dumky” trio, op. 90. The quartet, however, while not devoid of folk influences, falls on the pan-European side of the duality that pervaded and animated Dvořák’s work. Its outer movements are expansive, quite Brahmsian essays in sonata form, with characteristic touches in the instrumental writing such as the rapid exchange of tremolos between violin and viola at the end of the first movement. The second movement, marked Lento, is one of Dvořák’s most purely lyrical, with a sequence of five themes shifting in mood. The third movement, the most folkloristic of the four, consists of two contrasting dances; its central section deploys the piano in such a way that it sounds, perhaps, like a hammer dulcimer or other Eastern European folk instrument. The work is an unjustly neglected masterpiece of the chamber music repertoire, an unfailing crowd-pleaser but possessed of an originality that makes it worthy to stand beside the more complex corners of Brahms’ chamber output. Brilliant and Powerful Thursday, June 21, 2018, 7:30 PM Piano Trio in A Minor, op. 32 Anton Arensky Jeffrey Dyrda, violin; Dmitry Kouzov, cello; and Kwan Yi, piano INTERMISSION Piano Quintet in F Minor, op. 34 Johannes Brahms David Ehrlich and Jeffrey Dyrda, violin; Michael Klotz, viola; Dmitry Kouzov, cello; and Kwan Yi, piano Program Notes ARENSKY PIANO TRIO IN A MINOR, OP. 32 The Piano Trio no. 1 in D Minor (op. 32) was composed in 1894. The work is dedicated to the memory of cellist Karl Davidov, the director of the St. Petersburg Conservatory during Anton Arensky’s studies as well as a friend of both the composer and Tchaikovsky. Perhaps the occasional prominence of the cello is due to the celebration of the late Davidov’s memory. The Allegro moderato opens with an expansive and sweeping subject in the violin over a passionate triplet figuration in the piano. Instantly captivating and overwhelming, the powerful first theme gives way to a straightforward theme in the cello. Some writers have commented that there is a trace of Mendelssohn’s wit and playfulness in this work. The charming and capricious figure that opens the Scherzo: Allegro molto sets the tone for this mercurial section. The skittish “fairy dance” abates for the contrasting trio section, an almost reflective waltz which is a characteristic style found in many Arensky works. A soulful, muted cello introduces the Elegie: Adagio. Violin and cello carry on in a sentimental dialog, and the piano steps forward with its dotted motive and tender singing melody. The music abruptly awakens with a heroic Finale: Allegro non troppo as elements of the prior movement, as well as the opening, return for reflection and transformation. BRAHMS PIANO QUINTET IN F MINOR, OP. 34 The great piano quintet, op. 34, evolved through several changes of instrument combinations until it reached this successful final version. Johannes Brahms began work on the quintet during 1862, the year in which he decided to leave his hometown of Hamburg, Germany, where he was frustrated by the slow advances in his professional life, to settle in Vienna, Austria. Originally the piece was cast for string quintet with two cellos, Program Notes, continued the same scoring as Schubert’s incomparable C Major Quintet. Brahms mailed it to the great violinist Joseph Joachim and his close friend, Clara Schumann. They both responded enthusiastically at first, but expressed reservations about the piece during the following months. Sadly, Brahms destroyed that version. In 1863 Brahms decided to revise the work for two pianos. “Please, remodel it once more!” wrote Clara Schumann. During the summer of 1864, Brahms revised the score, this time as a quintet for piano and string quartet. “The quintet is beautiful beyond words,” wrote Levi, the musician who suggested to Brahms to use this combination. “You have turned a monotonous work for two pianos into a thing of great beauty, a masterpiece of chamber music.” The quintet’s opening movement is tempestuous and tragic in mood. The dramatic main theme is stated immediately in unison by violin, cello, and piano, and then repeated with greater force by the entire ensemble. The development section treats the main and second themes and ushers in the recapitulation on a great wave of sound. The slow second movement is very tender and warm and the Scherzo is one of Brahms’ most electrifying movements. The Finale opens with a pensive slow introduction fueled by deeply felt chromatic harmonies. Despite the buoyant, Gypsy flavor of the movement’s main body, the tragic tenor of this great quintet is maintained until its closing page. Love in Music Friday, June 22, 2018, 7:30 PM Langsamer Satz Anton Webern David Ehrlich and Jeffrey Dyrda, violin; Katharina Kang, viola; and Coleman Itzkoff, cello Program and musicians to be announced from the stage INTERMISSION String Sextet in G Major, op. 36, Agathe Johannes Brahms Shmuel Ashkenasi and Jeffrey Dyrda, violin; Michael Klotz and Katharina Kang, viola; and Dmitry Kouzov and Coleman Itzkoff, cello Program Notes WEBERN LANGSAMER SATZ Anton Webern composed this work for string quartet in June 1905; it originated during a hiking trip in Lower Austria that he took with his cousin, Wilhelmine Mörtl. Webern was completely in love and offered this as his marriage proposal. Mörtl strongly recommended he concentrate on his music studies (he was 21 years old) but later accepted and became his wife. It took almost 60 years for the piece to receive its first performance in Seattle, Washington. The title translates to Slow Movement. Webern was very inspired by his teacher, Arnold Schoenberg’s Transfigure Night, a very romantic work based on a poem by Richard Dehmel. Webern wrote in his diary, ”To walk forever like this among the flowers, with my dearest one beside me, to feel oneself so entirely at one with the Universe, without care, free as the lark in the sky above—oh, what splendor...when night fell (after the rain) the sky shed bitter tears, but I wandered with her along a road, a coat protected the two of us.