NATIONAL FESTIVAL CHAMBER ORCHESTRA

SATURDAY, JUNE 6, 2015 . 8PM ELSIE & MARVIN DEKELBOUM CONCERT HALL

PROGRAM

Baljinder Sekhon Sun

Dmitri Shostakovich/ Chamber Symphony, Op. 83a Allegro Andantino Allegretto – Allegretto

- intermission -

Frank Martin Concerto for Seven Wind Instruments, , Percussion and Allegro Adagietto: Misterioso ed elegante Allegro vivace

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Symphony No. 35 in D Major, K. 385 (“Haffner”) Allegro con spirito Andante Minuetto – Trio Finale: Presto

9 Sun array of instruments; that is, each The idea of using orchestral strings BALJINDER SEKHON player has a keyboard instrument (a to perform string quartets is hardly a marimba, a xylophone, a vibraphone), novelty. created string Born August 1, 1980, Fairfax, Virginia ‘skin’ (containing a drumhead), orchestra versions of Beethoven’s F Now living in Tampa, Florida wood and metal. In addition, the Minor Quartet (Op. 95) and Schubert’s three performers share a single large D Minor. Dimitri Mitropoulos gave This work for percussion trio was that is central to the staging. us a similar treatment of Beethoven’s composed in 2010–2011 under a At times the three percussion parts C-sharp Minor, Op. 131. Wilhelm commission from the Volta Trio, which are treated as one large instrument Furtwängler and Arturo Toscanini introduced it in a concert at Georgetown with three performers working toward performed and recorded individual University in Washington DC on a single musical character. Thus the movements from other Beethoven November 4, 2011. The score calls for orchestration and interaction alternate quartets. Toscanini also gave us a string- marimba, xylophone, vibraphone, large with each performer executing his/ orchestra version of Mendelssohn’s cymbal and “indeterminate skins, metals her own layers of sound to create a string octet — and Mendelssohn and woods.” Duration, 12 minutes. heterophonic texture, the percussionists himself created a stunningly brilliant using a multitude of techniques to full-orchestral treatment of the scherzo Baljinder Sekhon received his MA and create a palette of nuanced sounds. from that work, originally to serve PhD at the University of Rochester’s In addition to common performance as replacement for the minuet in Eastman School of Music, and now is practice, they are called upon to use his Symphony No. 1. Tchaikovsky an assistant professor of composition their hands, fingers, knuckles, arms and himself was the first to produce a at the University of South Florida’s fingernails to muffle, modify and create version of the slow movement of his School of Music. His works, in a broad diversity of characteristics.” First Quartet in an arrangement for various formats, have been performed orchestral strings; Sir Malcolm Sargent throughout Europe and Asia as well undertook a similar treatment of the as at Carnegie Hall and numerous Chamber Symphony, Op. 83a corresponding movement of Borodin’s other venues in our own country. Second Quartet. What is different His saxophone concerto called The Born September 25, 1906, St. Petersburg about the present work is that (a) Offering had its premiere in Thailand Died August 8, 1976, Moscow in July 2011. Among other recent Rudolf Barshai obtained Shostakovich’s approval for orchestrating his quartets, works are Ancient Dust, for orchestra, Orchestrated by Rudolf Barshai (1924– introduced at the Cabrillo Festival, and (b) in some of them, including this 2010), from the String Quartet No. 4 in one, he did not limit himself to the and Lou, for cello and percussion D Major, Op. 83 quartet, which the McCormick orchestra’s strings. Percussion Group recorded on Ravello Barshai was one of the most Records. Among his numerous The fourth of Shostakovich’s 15 string significant of the numerous prizes and awards are three Howard quartets was among the several works outstanding musicians in during Hanson Orchestral Prizes, the Wayne composed between 1948 and Stalin’s the Soviet years. As a young violist Brewster Barlow Prize, New Music death five years later which the composer at the , he was USA’s Composer Assistance Grant, a put away during that period to wait for a member of a student quartet, and Boehmler Foundation Commission, a a more propitious time for presentation he wrote to Shostakovich to invite Met Life Creative Connections Grant, to the public. It was given its first him to the group’s rehearsal of his the Morton Gould Young Composer performance on December 3, 1953, in first Quartet. The composer eagerly Award and various others from ASCAP. Moscow, by the Beethoven Quartet, the attended that rehearsal, and began He has also taken part as a percussionist ensemble most closely identified with a lifelong friendship with Barshai, in festivals and concerts such as the Shostakovich at the time. Rudolf Barshai whose student foursome became the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Green created his orchestral version some two famous . In 1955 Umbrella Series, the Festival Spazio dozen years after the composer’s death; Barshai left the quartet to create in Cagliari and the Bang on a Can he conducted it for the first time on July the , Marathon in New York. 20, 1990, in a broadcast recording with which he conducted at home and The composer has provided a note the BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra on tour, and with which he made of his own on the work that opens this in Cardiff, and conducted the Hallé some splendid recordings, until 1977, evening’s concert: Orchestra in Manchester in the first when he gave up on his contentious public performance on January 10 of relationship with the Communist “Sun explores a variety of musical the following year. Barshai subsequently regime and settled for a time in energies. From tired phrases to recorded this work, together with his Israel. Eventually he set up a base in extended climactic passages to short- similar version of the Quartet No. 3, Switzerland and began conducting lived bursts of sound, many segments with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe full-sized orchestras. He had productive of music are intertwined and overlaid for Deutsche Grammophon. relationships with orchestras in the in a way that creates a singular event Barshai’s score calls for flute, , UK and on the Continent, and from (the piece itself) with various ‘flares’ of English horn, in A, bass clarinet, 1985 to 1988 served as music director sound on its surface. These segments , 2 horns, , whip, field of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra are frequently separated by silent drum, 4 tom toms, tam-tam, xylophone, in Canada. He left us some insightful moments, each of which, because of its marimbaphone, and strings. recordings of the symphonies of particular context, expresses a different Duration, 25 minutes. Shostakovich, Prokofiev and Mahler, type of energy. Each of the individual and produced his own performing percussionists is assigned a very similar version of the Mahler Tenth. Shortly 10 before his death, at his Swiss home is fairly unescapable, and Barshai may Martin was one of the most open- at the age of 86, he completed an be said to have intensified it in his minded, inquisitive and energetic of ambitious orchestral setting of Bach’s instrumentation, particularly in his musical creators. He eagerly exposed Art of the Fugue. use of the clarinet and other wind himself to every style, every influence In undertaking orchestral settings of instruments. In general, an overall and “school,” and sifted out what Shostakovich quartets, Barshai obtained character of deep suffering and might be of interest and use to him not only the composer’s permission but lamentation permeates and defines in developing a truly personal creative also his imprimatur in granting him the work, and the penultimate of its approach — an approach characterized the use of the original opus number four movements has been described by great intellectual vigor and, among of each of the expanded quartets, with as nothing short of an impression of other factors, a productive fascination the addition of the letter “a.” Barshai a pogrom, though the concluding with unusual combinations of completed expanded versions of five of Allegretto, in the form of a theme and instruments (as well as a distinctive use the quartets as “chamber symphonies”: variations, seems to carry within its of individual instruments). He composed No. 8, Op. 110, was the first one he general mood of resignation a stubborn thoroughly contemporary works for undertook to expand, as Op. 110a, hope for eventual peace, if nothing harpsichord and clavichord (both of for string orchestra. The Quartet No. more than that. which he played himself), at a time when, 10, Op. 118, became the Chamber even in performing music of Bach and Symphony Op. 118a. Quartet No. 1 Concerto for Seven Wind his contemporaries, those instruments became “Eine kleine Symphonie,” Op. Instruments, Timpani, were by no means as widely used as 49a; Nos. 3 and 4 became, respectively, they are now. Some of his works reflect Opp. 73a and 83a. Percussion and String an interest in jazz, or in Asian music, or As already noted, the Fourth String Orchestra Bulgarian folk music. He found what we Quartet was one of the compositions FRANK MARTIN came to call “neo-classicism” a generally that Shostakovich put away during Born September 15, 1890, Geneva comfortable mold, and at the same time the period 1948–1953 to wait for Died November 21, 1974, Naarden, developed his own kind of “twelve-tone” a more propitious — which is to the Netherlands procedure that rejected both the rigor say, a safer — time to be heard. The of Schoenberg’s dodecaphonic system composer’s reaction to those darkening and, as he put it, “above all, his principle postwar years, following the official This concerto, one of Martin’s most of atonality. I have always sought after denunciation of himself, Prokofiev frequently performed works, was the sense of tonality and the functional and other prominent composers by composed in 1948 and ’49, and had its relation of the notes among themselves; Stalin’s spokesman Andrei Zhdanov, premiere in Bern on October 25 of the however, the general effect of my music and by a new strain of anti-Semitism, latter year. The seven solo instruments has always been strongly chromatic.” among other distressing signs, made are flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, Composition was never a facile him wary of introducing any of his trumpet and ; the orchestral procedure for Martin. He could not works other than those “made to complement comprises timpani, side simply toss off a piece of music or, as order” to accommodate the official drum, , bass drum and strings. Saint-Saëns said of himself, “produce guidelines — such obvious gestures as Duration, 21 minutes. music as an apple tree produces apples.” The Song of the Forests, a choral work Each undertaking, whether large or glorifying Stalin, and the scores for Despite the English/American small in scale, was a matter of intense patently propagandistic films. Among appearance of his name on the printed absorption and application and self- the honest and downright urgent page, Frank Martin was French Swiss, criticism. Martin was remarkably musical declarations Shostakovich and this has to be remembered when the prolific, but he worked hard, and the put away until the death of Stalin (on name is spoken. His family originated in effort was apparently self-renewing. March 5, 1953, the same day Prokofiev France and, as Huguenots, took refuge He wrote concerted works of one sort died), were the Violin Concerto No. in Geneva a century and a half before of another — some called concertos, 1 (eventually given the dual opus he was born there — the youngest of some “ballades” — for virtually every number 77/99 to signify its delayed the ten children of a Calvinist minister, instrument, and at least one of these, presentation to the public) and the and the first in his family to become the Petite Symphonie concertante for song cycle as a musician. He began his studies early, harpsichord, harp, piano and double well as the Fourth Quartet. and produced his first compositions at string orchestra, has come close to Like the song cycle, the Fourth age eight. In his thirties, after living in establishing itself as one of those single Quartet itself contains a pronounced Paris for a few years, he became a close works on which a composer’s entire Jewish character. This was by no means associate of Émile Jaques-Dalcroze and reputation might rest. incidental to the overall character taught at his institute in Geneva. After Martin, however, composed steadily of this work, or to the others of its World War II Martin took up residence in almost every form — opera, oratorio, period that reflect a similar influence. in Naarden, a Dutch coastal town a little songs, piano pieces and chamber music As so many commentaries on these to the east of Amsterdam. In the 1950s as well as a great deal for orchestra — “delayed release” works remind us, he taught composition at the Cologne to the very end of his long life. (In his Shostakovich is on record as declaring, Conservatory. If the public was too little last years he was also busily engaged in “Jews became a symbol for me: all acquainted with his works, his fellow recording many of his works himself, as of man’s defenselessness seemed to musicians did not fail to acknowledge conductor, with orchestras in Lausanne be concentrated in them.” There are him: he was showered with honors and Luxembourg.) The present work, no concrete citations of actual folk and awards, and toured actively as a which followed the Petite Symphonie tunes in this work, but the character conductor and pianist. concertante by four years, might have 11 borne a similar title, or might even be Mozart had been living in Vienna original function, the athletic first regarded as a “concerto for orchestra,” for more than a year when he received theme commanding the stage almost since so many instruments are given his father’s request for the new Haffner without interruption. It can hardly prominence. It is, in any event, another work, in early July 1782; the ceremony go unnoticed that the added piece that ought to have established itself was to take place in Salzburg on the when the serenade was turned into a as a “classic” by now. 29th of that month. Although he was symphony make a particularly effective The Concerto is in three concise engulfed in other commissions and contribution to this movement’s color movements, headed Allegro, Adagietto and was preparing the premiere of his and excitement. Allegro vivace. The color opportunities first opera for Vienna, Die Entführung The slow movement, warmhearted provided by the seven solo wind aus dem Serail (which took place on but not effusive, is typical of similar instruments, and the foregoing the Burgtheater on the 16th), and andantes in Mozart’s big orchestral comments on Martin’s broad-minded was about to be married, he did his serenades — except that its remarkably but focused approach, may give the best to fulfill the request, writing at appealing themes are far from “typical,” listener an idea of what to expect, in a feverish speed and sending the score even for him. While the sturdy minuet, very general sense, but the music itself, to his father one movement at a time. with its endearing trio, might have wonderfully transparent in its textures, is He did not manage to complete the been one of his beloved Teutsche (as full of happy surprises and illustrations of work until August 7, nine days after the he called his German dances), it is the Martin’s further rejection of formula — event for which it had been ordered spirit of Osmin, in Die Entführung aus and of novelty for its own sake. — and three days after his wedding to dem Serail, that informs the vivacious Constanze Weber. Presto finale. As already mentioned, Symphony No. 35 in D Major, There were six movements in that the premiere of that work took place K. 385 (“Haffner”) serenade, including an introductory only a few days before he received his march and two minuets; the father’s request for the Haffner music, WOLFGANG AMADEUS orchestration included , , and must have been in his mind as MOZART horns, and timpani as well he responded. Osmin’s aria “O, wie Born January 27, 1756, Salzburg as strings, but at that point neither will ich triumphieren” is strongly Died December 5, 1791, Vienna flutes nor clarinets. The following recalled, though not directly echoed, February, when Mozart retrieved the in this movement’s theme, and Mozart score for his own use, he wrote to his directed that it be played “as fast as Mozart composed this symphony father, “My new Haffner Symphony possible.” in February 1783 — or rather, he has positively amazed me, for I had assembled it then, from material he forgotten every note of it. It must Notes by Richard Freed © 2015 had composed for a larger work six surely produce a good effect.” months earlier — and conducted the first To turn the serenade into a performance on March 23 of that year, symphony, he withdrew the march in a concert of his new works, in Vienna. (codified now as K. 408, No. 2, or, The score calls for flutes, oboes, clarinets, in the latest edition of the Köchel bassoons, horns and trumpets in pairs, Catalogue, K. 385a) and the first with timpani and strings. Duration, 18 minuet (which originally preceded the minutes. slow movement and now is presumed lost), and added flutes and clarinets in Two of Mozart’s happiest and most the two outer movements. In the first lovable large-scale orchestral works performance of the symphony as it came out of the cordial relations now stands, the first three movements his family enjoyed with the family opened the program and the finale of Siegmund Haffner, a prominent closed it; among the intervening works Salzburg banker and merchant who were two piano concertos, two sets of served for a time as the city’s mayor. keyboard variations, the concertante His children and Wolfgang were movements of the Posthorn Serenade childhood friends, and it was for them (No. 9 in D Major, K. 320) and four that he composed his “Haffner” music. arias for soprano. That procedure — In 1776, for the wedding of Haffner’s breaking up a symphony to serve as daughter Elisabeth to Franz Xaver the frame for an entire concert — was Späth, Mozart composed an elaborate not at all uncommon at the time: some eight-movement serenade (No. 7 in D of Haydn’s London symphonies were Major, K. 250), with a little march (K. introduced that way a decade later, and 249) to precede it. Six years later, at the in the earlier part of the 18th century time of his own wedding in Vienna, he Georg Philipp Telemann composed composed a second “Haffner Serenade” orchestral suites that were performed in celebration of the elevation of the same way. Haffner’s son, also named Siegmund, to The Haffner Symphony definitely the nobility. It is from the latter work produced the brilliant effect Mozart that he subsequently arranged the had predicted. He directed that the well-beloved symphony that closes this first movement be played “with great evening’s concert. fire”: it exudes the festive air of its 12