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ITALIAN INSPIRATIONS s Variation XVIII [0.30] d Variation XIX [0.23] f Variation XX [0.50] Concerto in D minor after Alessando Marcello, BWV 974 g Coda [1.44] Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) Quaderno musicale di Annalibera 1 I. Andante Spiccato [2.27] Luigi Dallapiccola (1904-1975) 2 II. Adagio [3.34] h I. Simbolo [2.36] 3 III. Presto [3.49] j II. Accenti [0.30] Variations on a Theme of Corelli, Op. 42 k III. Contrapunctus primus [1.08] Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943) l IV. Linee [0.47] 4 Theme [0.54] ; V. Contrapunctus secondus [0.19] 5 Variation I [0.44] VI. Fregi [1.23] 6 Variation II [0.35] z VII. Andantino amoroso e contrapunctus tertius [1.22] 7 Variation III [0.32] x VIII. Ritmi [1.10] 8 Variations IV & V [1.13] c IX. Colore [1.11] 9 Variation VI [0.19] v X. Ombre [1.47] 0 Variation VII [0.23] b XI. Quartina [1.34] q Variation VIII [0.58] n St. François d’Assise: La prédication aux oiseaux, S. 175 No. 1 [8.50] w Variation IX [0.55] Franz Liszt (1811-1886) e Variation X [0.32] r Variation XI [0.22] m Après une Lecture du Dante: Fantasia quasi sonata, S. 161 No. 7 [14.59] t Variation XII [0.35] Franz Liszt y Variation XIII [0.28] u Intermezzo [1.13] Total timings: [64.33] i Variation XIV [1.00] o Variation XV [1.30] p Variation XVI [0.31] a Variation XVII [0.53] ALESSIO BAX PIANO www.signumrecords.com Artist’s Note Johann Sebastian Bach E minor, Op. 1, No. 2; and the Concerto in (Born March 21, 1685, Eisenach; D minor after Alessandro Marcello’s Oboe As a pianist, one has to be very creative when works connected to Italy by the subject matter died July 28, 1750, Leipzig) Concerto (frequently misattributed to Benedetto). thinking of an Italian program. There is almost that inspired them: St. François d’Assise: La Concerto in D minor, BWV 974 (1713–14), a total dearth of Romantic piano music from prédication aux oiseaux is at once stunning after Oboe Concerto, S D935, While presumably drawn to the expressive Italy, most likely because of the prominence of and elusive, while – in only around 15 minutes by Alessandro Marcello character of his Italian counterparts’ music opera during that period. – Après une Lecture du Dante: Fantasia (one surmises that the Brandenburg Concerti, quasi Sonata takes both listener and pianist The influence of JS Bach’s contemporaries on in their dramatic power and instrumental However, Italy has always had great music and on a multi-legged journey through hell, purgatory his compositional output is in ample evidence panache, owe a debt to L’estro armonico), Bach’s has always inspired people. I open my program and heaven, with so much beauty and drama throughout his vast oeuvre. The composer’s keyboard arrangements are more than mere with a transcription – by none other than along the way. It’s always a thrilling ride! son, Carl Philipp Emanuel, lists a number of homage. The consummate keyboard virtuoso, Johann Sebastian Bach – of an oboe concerto these in his correspondence with Johann Bach demonstrates in these transcriptions by the Venetian composer Alessandro Marcello, Alessio Bax Nikolaus Forkel, Sebastian’s biographer, in 1775: great imagination and originality in writing which not only showcases this wonderful music Caldara, Fux, Handel, Hasse, Telemann, Zelenka, for his instrument. From the Marcello Oboe but also reveals deep insight into Bach’s among many others. Concerto’s Andante e spiccato first movement, mind. I follow it with Rachmaninov’s last Bach unlocks a kaleidoscopic variety of solo piano piece, a set of amazing variations Strangely missing from CPE Bach’s list are keyboard textures, from razor-sharp two-part on Corelli’s La Folia. This very simple theme Antonio Vivaldi and both Marcellos, the counterpoint to the dense fusillade of seven- (originally of Portuguese origins) becomes brothers Alessandro and Benedetto: Italian and eight-voice chords that precedes its the vehicle for an incredible exploration of the masters in whose music Bach undoubtedly final cadence. Marcello’s luxuriously mournful piano’s dramatic potential. As Rachmaninov’s took keen interest. Yet Bach (the elder) himself Adagio is transfigured into an introspective last solo work, it is perhaps his most eloquent, made explicit his penchant for the music of soliloquy; notably, where Marcello provides introspective and personal. The Dallapiccola these composers through his arrangements melodic scaffolding for the oboist’s is a beautifully crafted work. While strictly of their concerti for solo keyboard: a set of ornamentation, Bach notates his trills, turns, abiding to the rules of dodecaphonism, it sixteen concertos (BWV 972-987) composed and flourishes, offering a lens into his art as a manages to create a stunning sound world, between 1713 and 1714 exclusively comprises keyboard player. The Concerto’s Presto finale made of subtle gestures, pauses, colors and arrangements of other composers’ work, blazes with the Italianate fire that so entranced highly expressive harmonies which draw in including six by Vivaldi; one, in C Minor, Bach: an element exquisitely translated in his the listener. I complete my program with two after Benedetto Marcello’s Violin Concerto in Bach’s version. - 4 - - 5 - Sergei Rachmaninov twenty-first century finds Rachmaninov’s image his essentially neo-Romantic language, their The music remains in stern D minor almost (Born March 20/April 1, 1873, Oneg; rehabilitated, and, indeed, his artistic legacy textural clarity, piquant rhythmic character, and exclusively. One of the work’s most remarkable died March 28, 1943, Beverly Hills, CA) more compelling than ever before. While the chromatic harmonies are strikingly modern. moments comes with the cadenza-like Variations on a Theme of Corelli, Op. 42 (1931) pop-star sheen of his performing career has long (In these respects, and also in their unforgiving Intermezzo between Variations 13 and 14 – since faded, Rachmaninov endures as one of virtuosic demands, the Variations prefigure after which a gentle chorale, piano, cantabile In the years following his death, with manifold the repertoire’s most cherished, and most the famous Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, (Variation 14) and a dolcissimo lullaby strains of modernism animating an increasingly performed, composers. His catalogue of solo Op. 43, for piano and orchestra, composed (Variation 15) appear in D-flat major. Following contentious musical landscape, the unabashed works for his own instrument rests at the three years later.) the unrelenting D-minor severity of the previous Romanticism of Rachmaninov’s compositional center of that legacy, and likewise occupies thirteen variations, these feel like a warm embrace. language did his legacy no favors. Writing in a place of distinction in the piano literature, Witness the first variation: immediately after the 1954 edition of Grove’s Dictionary of Music representing a benchmark of pianistic technique presenting the theme, simply, ruminatively, piano Variation 16 (Allegro vivace) marks a jarring and Musicians, Eric Blom infamously asserted and virtuosity. e cantabile, Rachmaninov sets it against a reentry into D minor, and the work remains in that Rachmaninov, belying the celebrity he rumble of sixteenth notes, unsettled by that wintry key through the increasingly achieved in his lifetime as composer, pianist, In his Variations on a Theme of Corelli, syncopated accents in the bass. Variation adrenalized subsequent variations culminating and conductor, “did not have the individuality Op. 42 – which would be his final work for 3, ostensibly a minuet, likewise features in the twentieth variation’s thunderous cannon of Taneyev or Medtner.” Blom went on to predict, solo piano, despite being completed in 1931, offbeat accents and rhythmic chicanery. fire. The set ends with an introspective Andante “The enormous popular success some few of twelve years before the composer’s death – coda, colored by evocative harmonies en route Rakhmaninov’s works had in his lifetime is Rachmaninov seems indeed to eschew the Crystalline textures reflect Rachmaninov’s to a haunting, pianissimo conclusion. not likely to last, and musicians never regarded it early twentieth century’s modernist impulses, incisive understanding of his instrument, with much favour.” drawing from historical material. The whether in the dreamlike haze of the Andante Luigi Dallapiccola variations are not actually based on an original fourth variation and the Adagio misterioso (Born February 3, 1904, Pisino d’Istria; Hindsight half a century hence has reinforced Corelli theme, but on La folia, a traditional eighth variation; in quick marcato, staccato died February 19, 1975, Florence) the music critic Harold C Schonberg’s acute tune adopted by Corelli in his Sonata, Op. 5, passagework, as in Variations 5, 6, and 12; Quaderno musicale di Annalibera (1952) dismissal of Blom’s assessment as “one of No. 12, as well as by numerous other composers or in the lithe Mendelssohnian runs of Variation the most outrageously snobbish and even stupid throughout history (including Vivaldi; Brahms, 10 Allegro scherzando. More than two centuries after Johann Sebastian statements in a work that is supposed to be in his Sextet in B-flat Major, Op. 18; et al.). Bach based his 16 Concertos, BWV 972-987, an objective reference.” (Schonberg did Indeed, it is primarily via textural, rather on his Italian contemporaries Vivaldi, Torelli, acknowledge that Blom was only articulating Yet Rachmaninov’s Variations nevertheless than harmonic, contrast that Rachmaninov and Alessandro and Benedetto Marcello, a leading the day’s prevailing critical thought.) The early are distinctly of their time. While reflecting achieves variety of character throughout. voice in Italian music would return the salute. - 6 - - 7 - In 1952, Luigi Dallapiccola, Italy’s leading secondus, Contrapunctus tertius (the last in Liszt’s extensive oeuvre of piano music second volume of his Années de pèlerinage proponent of twelve-note serialism, composed of these a canon cancrizans, in which the main utterly transformed composers’ approach to (Years of Pilgrimage).