BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

Seiji Ozawa, Music Director One Hundred and Thirteenth Season, 1993-94

SUPPER CONCERT DC

Tuesday, April 26, at 6 Saturday, April 30, at 6

IKUKO MIZUNO, violin JEROME PATTERSON, cello KAYO TATEBE, piano

HANDEL Passacaglia from the Harpsichord Suite in G minor, HWV 432, arranged for violin and cello by Johan Halvorsen

BRAHMS Trio in B for violin, cello, and piano, Opus 8 Allegro con brio Scherzo: Allegro molto Adagio Allegro

Baldwin piano

Please exit to your left for supper following the concert.

Week 25 George Friderick Handel Passacaglia (arranged by Johan Halvorsen)

Following decades of inattention and oblivion, Baroque music was rediscovered by the mid-nineteenth-century romantics, who relished its energy and drive, the irregularity of the phrase structures, and the passionate spirit of so much of the music. It was, of course, at precisely this time that the music of Bach began to be published in the first scholarly complete edition known to European music history. One way of spreading the word about this music was for musicians to make arrangements for their own instruments of music they particularly admired, often romanticizing the work in the process. Probably the best-known example of this approach is the so-called "Air on the G-string," created from the Aria in Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 3. Handel's music, too, underwent this kind of transformation. The Passacaglia to be heard here is an arrangement by Johan Halvorsen, a contemporary of Grieg's, of the finale from a Handel keyboard suite in G minor. (The suite now bears the number 432 in the recently published thematic catalogue of Handel's works, which has its *HWV* numbers—for "Handel Werke Verzeichnis" or "Handel Works Index*—by analogy with the BVW numbers for Bach.) Halvorsen arranged this movement for violin with the accompaniment of either viola or cello; earlier in this century it was a favorite piece of , who recorded it. In more recent years, the rise of concern for "historically correct" performance has denied us the chance of hearing these romantic tributes to an older "romantic" music which brought that long-lost music to light again with deep affection.

Johannes Brahms in B, Opus 8

Brahms was a notoriously private composer. Intensely aware of the attention being paid to Beethoven's sketches by the first generation of musical scholars investigating Beethoven's artistic development, he was determined to prevent that kind of second-guessing with his own music. He more or less systematically destroyed sketches after he had finished a piece and destroyed entire compositions that did not meet his very high standards.

There is however, one fascinating and unusual example of a work written early in Brahms's life that he reworked and substantially altered at a very late stage. That work, the B major piano trio, provides a fascinating glimpse into Brahms's private workshop, as well as an opportunity for a direct comparison between the young Brahms and his mature counterpart. Brahms composed the piece originally in 1854, when he was twenty-one, then revised it thirty-five years later for its publication in 1891. Contrary to his usual practice, however, he did not suppress the earlier version, but actually suggested to his publisher that both versions be kept in print.

Today the final version is almost always played (as it will be here), but the early version allows us to catch a glimpse of the young composer stretching his wings to soar in luxuriant flight. By comparison the later composer has reined in his fancy to produce a much tauter web of ideas. The most striking illustration of the difference between the two versions comes immediately upon considering the comparative lengths of the individual movements. Except for the scherzo, which is substantially identical in both versions, the movements of the earlier version are about half again as long as those of the later version, despite the fact that they share the same thematic material. In effect, Brahms has taken his themes and composed two quite different works. The first movement grows out of a long-breathed lyrical melody gradually enlivened by a syncopated accompaniment figure, to which is added later a neighbor-note motive worked out in the development. The scherzo is a whirlwind in B minor, relaxing slightly into the major mode for the genial Trio, rich with parallel thirds and sixths. The Adagio grows from a chorale-like theme in the piano, later treated with delicate elaboration. The final movement begins, surprisingly, in B minor, while the secondary theme in D is an expansive melody rocketing over a wide range. The interplay of these two ideas yields a powerful conclusion to this mature work grown out of a youthful one. Brahms's mastery is evident throughout, and though we still call the B minor piano trio "Opus 8," there was a real point in the composer's sly suggestion to his publisher that the revised edition be called "Opus 108."

—Notes by Steven Ledbetter

Violinist Ikuko Mizuno entered the Toho-Gakuen School of Music as a young child in her native Tokyo and later won first prize in a national violin competition for high school students. She came to the United States as a winner of the Spaulding Award, which enabled her to study with Roman Totenberg at Boston University, where she received her master's degree and was named a member of the honorary society Pi Kappa Lambda. She also studied at the Tanglewood Music Center, at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, Italy, with Franco Gulli, and at the Geneva Conservatory with Henryk Szeryng. Ms. Mizuno joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1969 as the first woman ever chosen to be a member of the BSO's violin section. She made her New York recital debut at Carnegie Recital Hall in 1972, and continues to appear frequently in recital and with orchestra. Ms. Mizuno continues to perform frequently in Tokyo in recital and with orchestra, and has been a member of the Saito Kinen Orchestra since its inaugural concert in 1985.

Born in New York City, cellist Jerome Patterson studied at the Juilliard School of Music and at Hartt College of Music; his teachers were Luigi Silva, Aldo Parisot, and BSO principal cellist Jules Eskin. In 1963 he was a Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center, where he was awarded the Piatigorsky Prize. Before joining the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1967, Mr. Patterson played with the symphony orchestras of New Haven, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and Puerto Rico. Locally, in addition to his activities at Symphony Hall, he has performed with the Brockton Symphony, the Worcester Symphony under Joseph Silverstein, the Newton Symphony under Ronald Knudsen, the Wellesley Symphony, and the Framingham Symphony under Alfred Schneider.

Born in Sendai, Japan, Kayo Tatebe went to , Germany, after graduating from and teaching at the Toho-Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo. In Berlin she studied solo and chamber music at the Berlin Music Conservatory. Currently a resident of Sharon, Massachusetts, Ms. Tatebe performs and teaches in Japan, Germany, and the United States. Her own teachers included Takahiro Sonoda, Haruchika Noguchi, Gerhard Puchelt, Gerhard Taschner, and Sergiu Celibidache. 1