Boston Symphony Orchestra Concert Programs, Summer, 1988
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Tanglewpd Music Center 1988-1989 Theodore Antoniou Season Music Director September 24 KUCYNA INTERNATIONAL COMPOSITION COMPETITION < FINALISTS CONCERT 7 PM J. Bennett III, United States, K. Bokas, Greece, P. Borradori, Italy, E. Cory, United States, S. Hodkinson, Canada, D. Minakakis, Greece, K. Olson, United States, W. Susman, United States, H. Vogt, Federal Republic of Germany, C. Wang, People's < Republic of China November 10 (American Music Week - Nov. 7-13) "THOSE WONDERFUL AMERICANS" 8:30 PM Brown, Cohen, Danielpour, Druckman, Lewis Hall, Perle, Welcher. 7:15 PM Meet the experimentalists: Cage, Headrick/Rogers December 2 "ALEA'S ONGOING PARADE" 8:30 PM Phyllis Curtin, Joan Heller, Raphael Hillyer, Mark Kroll, Dana Mazurkevich, Yuri Mazurkevich, Roman Totenberg, Maria Clodes-Jaguaribe February 10 COMPOSER'S WORKSHOP CONCERT 7PM Bresnick, Carl, Koblitz, Korde, Kyr, Nelson, Saunway March 23 "ONGOING PANORAMA OF 20TH CENTURY MUSIC" 8:30 PM David, Constantinides, Gerhard, Yun, Balassa, Christodoulidis 7:15 Meet the experimentalists: Musgrave, Reidel April 26 & 27 AN EVENING OF CONTEMPORARY OPERA 8:30 PM A. Rogers, T.O. Lee, J. Legg BOSTON UNIVERSITY CONCERT HALL 855 Commonwealth Avenue For concert details call (617) 353-3340 1988 FESTIVAL OF CONTEMPORARY MUSIC Oliver Knussen and Leon Fleisher, Festival Coordinators sponsored by the Tanglew(©d TANGLEWOOD MUSIC CENTER Music Leon Fleisher, Artistic Director Center Gilbert Kalish, Chairman of the Faculty Hans Werner Henze, Composer-in-Residence Oliver Knussen, Coordinator of Contemporary Music Activities Richard Ortner, Administrator James E. Whitaker, Chief Coordinator Harry Shapiro, Orchestra Manager Works presented at this year's Festival were prepared under the guidance of the following Tanglewood Music Center Faculty: Terry Dec i ma Gilbert Kalish Peter Serkin Frank Epstein Oliver Knussen Fenwick Smith Margo Garrett Donald MacCourt Pascal Verrot Dennis Helmrich Gustav Meier Roger Voisin Philip Highfill John Oliver Yehudi Wyner Max Hobart Carl St. Clair 1988 Visiting Composer/Teachers Elliott Carter Peter Lieberson The Tanglewood Music Center is maintained for advanced study in music and sponsored by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Seiji Ozawa, Music Director Kenneth Haas, Managing Director Daniel R. Gustin, Manager of Tanglewood The 1988 Festival of Contemporary Music is sponsored in part by a grant from the PepsiCo Foundation. Contemporary Music at Tanglewood Celebrating a Silver Anniversary: Twenty-five Years of the Festival of Contemporary Music In 1964, the scattered new-music ac- at Tanglewood tivities of the Center were combined for the first time into a single week of intense New music has been an important part concert activity, designed (in Schuller's of the Tanglewood Music Center since the words) as "a forum for new ideas and direc- early years. The very constitution of the tions in music." Most of the concerts were school, with young composers taking part given by the Fellows of the Music Center, as much as instrumentalists, singers, and in varying combinations of small chamber conductors, encouraged interaction be- ensembles, large chamber ensembles (or tween creators and performers. But in the small orchestra), and full orchestra. There mid-1950s a large step was taken to pro- were, in addition, one or two programs mote that interaction in a more focused each year given by established profes- way. The late Paul Fromm, an immigrant sional musicians, whether drawn from the from Germany who made his living as a faculty of the Music Center or brought in wine importer, but who became one of the from the outside. most significant patrons of music in our Officially named the Festival of Contem- century, established a formal connection porary Music (FCM), the event was quickly between the Fromm Music Foundation and dubbed "Fromm week" in tribute to the the Berkshire Music Center (as it was then animating spirit and generous financial called). Beginning in 1957, the Fromm support of the Fromm Music Foundation. Foundation provided several fellowships Every year the Festival included recent each year specifically for performers who compositions of the most varied kinds, would play new music and who would "classic" modern works that had been par- work with the composers-in-residence on ticularly influential in the development of the preparation of new works. From ten musical language in the twentieth-century, fellowships in 1957, the number increased and brand new works, newly commis- to as many as forty by the early '70s. sioned by the Fromm Music Foundation Meanwhile an important change had and premiered at Tanglewood. Some com- taken place. When Erich Lei nsdorf became missions went to established composers, music director of the Boston Symphony of course, but many of them went to young Orchestra, he took an active role in the artists who had begun to make a name for program of the Music Center, beginning themselves. Very quickly the cachet of a with the season of 1 964. Rather than bring- "premiere at Tanglewood" became one of ing certain Fellows to Tanglewood as spe- the important lines in a composer's re- cialists in new music, every participant sume, and Tanglewood during "Fromm played in concerts of contemporary music, week" came to be widely regarded as one often with the composer present to coach, of the capitals of the new-music world. discuss, and explain. Gunther Schuller To be sure, some leveled criticisms at explained the logic behind the change: the notion of a "new-music ghetto," plac- "Creation (composition) and re-creation ing all (or most) of the contemporary activ- (performance) are inevitably linked; the ity into a single week, rather than scattering one cannot survive without the other. it throughout the entire season. And while It therefore becomes the obligation of the ideal of a comfortable mixture of old every performing musician to keep the life- and new music on the programs of the stream of music—composition—going and Music Center (and, indeed, of the Boston moving forward." Symphony Orchestra or any other major performing organization) is without ques- centrated week of activity largely or- tion the healthiest way of organizing one's ganized by a composer of broad taste and overall musical life, the very concentration enthusiasm. Leon Kirchner, as the com- of the FCM helped attract wide attention poser-in-residence for 1985, played the and made it possible for those who really major role in that year's Festival. Since wanted to hear what was happening in the 1986, the FCM has been organized by musical world of the day to find out in a British composer Oliver Knussen, himself concentrated dose offered within a conve- a former Tanglewood student of Schuller's, nient time-frame. whose broad musical tastes and generous The Festival had an important effect on spirit he shares. Under his direction, recent the music-making of the participants over festivals have developed in several ways: the years. Those Fellows who had already they have emphasized first U.S. hearings taken an active part in the musical life of of younger European composers; a new their time before coming to Tanglewood program of Paul Jacobs Memorial Commis- had the opportunity to broaden their in- sions has been started, funded by the estate terests, to meet composers whose music of the late pianist; the Festival now in- they were playing, and to confirm their cludes a series of "electro-acoustic pre- dedication to the artistic life of the present ludes" of music on tape, a significant cate- day. And each year there are some students gory that had been underrepresented ear- in the program who have never before lier; and perhaps most important, the Festi- played a work by a living composer, cer- val seeks out and presents the work of the tainly not one by a composer who was youngest composers, the generation under present for the rehearsals and the perform- thirty, often providing their first hearings in ance. The opportunity to experience this a major forum. special thrill of developing a performance This year the Festival of Contemporary of something new, often with the collabora- Music celebrates its twenty-fifth anniver- tion of the artist who had created the piece, sary not only with a glance at the achieve- cannot help but be a memorable and ments of the past, but with great hope for stimulating experience. the future. With the same commitment and For twenty years the planning and energy that has been shown in the past, the scheduling of the Festival of Contemporary Festival of Contemporary Music will enter Music was carried out largely by Gunther its second quarter-century next year with Schuller, a man of catholic taste and wide- renewed dedication to the proposition ex- ranging enthusiasms. And for a number of pressed so well by Gunther Schuller at the years, after Schuller took over the director- beginning: that performers have an obliga- ship of the Music Center, Theodore Antoniou tion to the composers of their time, and served as Assistant Director for Contempo- that only by fulfilling their responsibility rary Music Activities and contributed to can the performers do their part to assure the planning of the Festival. that musical creativity has a future. Schuller resigned his Tanglewood ac- —Steven Led better tivities after the 1984 season, and Fromm Musicologist & Program Annotator, turned his Foundation's support in other Boston Symphony Orchestra directions. But the Boston Symphony Or- chestra, parent organization of the Music Center, determined that the Festival should continue much as it had before, as a con- The works of Hans Werner Henze are published exclusively by SCHOTT MAINZ • LONDON • NEW YORK • TOKYO Sole U.S. Agent: European American Music Distributors Corporation Post Office Box 850 Valley Forge, Pennsylvania 19482 Contemporary Music at Tanglewood This year's Festival programs grew from been possible to include this guest perform- three self-imposed "givens": the presence ance in our Festival.