LAUNCESTON 1 1 & MATINEE ART IS HOW WE THURSDAY SATURDAY DECORATE SPACE. 26 FEBRUARY 7.30PM 28 FEBRUARY 2.30PM PRINCESS THEATRE FEDERATION CONCERT HALL MUSIC IS HOW WE DECORATE Marko Letonja conductor INTERVAL Sue-Ellen Paulsen cello TIME. Duration 20 mins RAVEL Le tombeau de Couperin KAY Prélude Moonlight Ridge Forlane Duration 9 mins Menuet Rigaudon GRIEG Duration 18 mins Symphonic Dances Allegro moderato e marcato TCHAIKOVSKY Allegretto grazioso Variations on a Rococo Theme Allegro giocoso Introduction (Moderato quasi andante) Andante – Allegro risoluto Theme (Moderato semplice) Duration 30 mins Variation I (Tempo della thema) Variation II (Tempo della thema) The Launceston concert will end at Variation III (Andante sostenuto) approximately 9.30pm; the Hobart Variation IV (Andante grazioso) concert at approximately 4.30pm. Variation V (Allegro moderato) Variation VI (Andante) Variation VII and Coda (Allegro vivo) Duration 20 mins LAUNCESTON SEASON utas.edu.au/125 SPONSORED BY MAJOR MEDIA PARTNER Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra concerts are broadcast and streamed throughout Australia and around the world by ABC Classic FM. We would appreciate your cooperation in keeping coughing to a minimum. Please ensure that your mobile phone is switched off. 3 CRICOS Provider Code: 00586B Quote by just-shower-thoughts UTMC14622rj UTMC14622_125 year TSO partnership_A5_V4_CC.indd 1 22/01/15 1:03 PM MAURICE RAVEL (1875-1937) Le tombeau de Couperin the muted gracefulness of the music Prélude suggests serenity, even resignation, rather than melancholy. Forlane Menuet Pianist Marguerite Long gave the first performance in 1919 and, shortly after, Rigaudon MARKO LETONJA SUE-ELLEN PAULSEN Ravel orchestrated four of the movements In Le tombeau de Couperin Ravel takes us – Prélude, Forlane, Menuet and Rigaudon back to the 18th century. The music isn’t a – omitting the Fugue and the pianistic Marko Letonja is Chief Conductor Sue-Ellen Paulsen studied at the pastiche but, rather, an anachronistic tribute Toccata that had concluded the original that proclaims Ravel’s affinity with the suite. The scoring is light – pairs of winds and Artistic Director of the Tasmanian Queensland Conservatorium of Music French baroque masters in his conception (including piccolo and cor anglais), Symphony Orchestra, and Music Director where she had lessons with Richard of music as diversion, his taste for “artifice”, two horns, trumpet, harp and strings – of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Dedecius. As an undergraduate she and his preference for emotionally preserving the translucence, simplicity and Strasbourg. Born in Slovenia, he studied at appeared as soloist with the Queensland disengaged dance forms. restrained mood of the original. the Academy of Music in Ljubljana and the Symphony Orchestra, Queensland Ravel began work on Le tombeau de Ravel makes much of the contrast between woodwinds and strings, often passing Vienna Academy of Music. He was Music Conservatorium Orchestra and Queensland Couperin – which was originally written for the melodies between the two sections, Director of the Slovenian Philharmonic piano – towards the end of 1914 but set it Youth Orchestra. In 1980 she won the but the winds are given prominence from Orchestra from 1991 to 2003 and Music aside as World War I intensified. It was not ABC Concerto Competition (now the until 1917 that he brought it to completion. the very beginning, with a breathless Director and Chief Conductor of both the Young Performers Award) and was Ravel’s last work for solo piano, each succession of rapidly articulated notes for the oboe. The orchestration takes Symphony Orchestra and the Opera in awarded a scholarship enabling her to movements is dedicated to the memory of Basel from 2003 to 2006. He was Principal a friend who had died in the war. The work’s advantage, too, of the enhanced pursue postgraduate study in Vienna capabilities of Erard’s double-action harp, Guest Conductor of Orchestra Victoria in musical tribute is cast more broadly: “…not with André Navarra. Her professional so much,” said Ravel, “to Couperin himself and the feeling of perpetual motion in the 2008 and made his debut with the TSO career began in Armidale with the New [i.e. François Couperin (1668–1733)] as to Prélude is brought to a close with ravishing the following year. He took up the post trills swept up in a harp glissando. The England String Quartet. She assumed 18th-century French music in general.” of Chief Conductor and Artistic Director trumpet (reserved for subtle effect in her current position with the Tasmanian Ravel prepared for the composition of of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra Ravel’s orchestration) adds brilliance to the Symphony Orchestra in 1986. Since then Le tombeau by transcribing a forlane from exuberant opening of the final movement at the start of 2012. Marko Letonja has Couperin’s Concerts royaux. The buoyant she has been guest principal with the (a vigorous Provençal Rigaudon), balancing worked with many orchestras in Europe rhythms and refrain structure of Ravel’s the prominence of woodwind and strings Sydney Symphony, Adelaide Symphony including the Munich Philharmonic, Vienna Forlane, the second movement, reveal in the preceding movements. Thus and Australian Chamber Orchestra. An their origins in the vigorous 16th-century Symphony and the Orchestra Filarmonica transformed, Le tombeau de Couperin experienced soloist, she has performed Italian dance as heard through 18th-century has been claimed by many to surpass the della Scala, Milan; and in many renowned French ears. But the melody and acid concertos by Shostakovich, Walton, Mills original in its ingenuity and variety – a opera houses, such as the Vienna State harmonies are all Ravel’s. Similarly, the tribute also to its composer’s infallible ear and Ligeti among many others and is Opera, Berlin State Opera, La Scala, Milan, following movement, Menuet, is more like for instrumental colour. featured as soloist on several of the TSO’s Ravel’s own Menuet antique (1895) than and the Semper Oper, Dresden. He has Abridged from a note by Yvonne Frindle Australian Composer Series CDs. A strong any by Couperin, for all the antique mood also conducted at the Arena di Verona. His established by its modal harmonies and ©1999/2012 engagements in Australia have included advocate for contemporary music, she has classically balanced phrases. the West Australian Symphony Orchestra commissioned and premièred many new The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra first It was the concept of the French Baroque performed this work with conductor Kenneth and productions for Opera Australia Australian works including one written suite – each dance with its specified Murison Bourn in Hobart on 22 August 1961 and, especially for her by Andrew Ford. She has character and set tempo – rather than its most recently, with Sebastian Lang-Lessing in and the West Australian Opera. Future Hobart and Sydney on 11 and 14 October 2010. engagements include the Grand Théâtre de recently recorded the Schumann piano musical style that emerged in Le tombeau. And the apparent contradiction of a suite of Genève, Mozarteum Orchestra, Salzburg, trios with the Kingfisher Trio (ABC Classics). dances dedicated to the memory of fallen Berlin Radio Orchestra and a return She is lecturer in cello at the Tasmanian comrades is perfectly resolved, although appearance at the Vienna State Opera. Conservatorium of Music. 4 5 PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893) DON KAY (BORN 1933) Variations on a Rococo Theme, Op 33 But by the time Jurgenson came to publish Moonlight Ridge Introduction (Moderato quasi andante) the Rococo Variations in orchestral form, Born in the northwest Tasmanian town of Theme (Moderato semplice) the Fitzenhagen ‘edition’ had entered Smithton, Don Kay studied music at the the repertoire. When Fitzenhagen’s pupil, Variation I (Tempo della thema) University of Melbourne and subsequently Anatoly Brandukov, asked Tchaikovsky what took private lessons in London with Variation II (Tempo della thema) he was going to do about Jurgenson’s expatriate Australian composer Malcolm Variation III (Andante sostenuto) publication of the Fitzenhagen version, the Williamson. He returned to Tasmania in Variation IV (Andante grazioso) composer replied, ‘The devil take it! Let it 1964 where he has remained ever since, stand as it is!’ lecturing at the Conservatorium of Music Variation V (Allegro moderato) at the University of Tasmania. The theme, which determines the character Variation VI (Andante) of the variations, is Tchaikovsky’s own. It Tasmania has been a potent force in Variation VII and Coda (Allegro vivo) has an orchestral postlude, with a final his music, as revealed in the titles of a question from the cello. This, increasingly number of his works, such as Hastings A nostalgia for the world of the 18th varied, rounds off most of the variations. Bay (1986), Tasmania Symphony – The DON KAY century, thought of as refined, elegant and The first two of these are fairly closely Legend of Moinee (1988) and The Edge gently civilised, is never far from the surface based on the theme. These are followed by of Remoteness (1996). Among his other in the highly Romantic art of Tchaikovsky, a leisurely slow waltz, the expressive heart works are six piano sonatas, a sonata for As a prizewinner at an international and it was Mozart who symbolised for of the variations. In Variation IV Tchaikovsky violin and piano, and a full-length opera, composers’ competition in Louisiana in him the best of the former century. gives the theme a different rhythm and The Bushranger’s Lover (libretto by 1997, it was performed by the Louisiana Whatever the term ‘rococo’ may mean, to incorporates some bravura flourishes. In John Honey), which was given a concert Sinfonietta in September of that year. As Tchaikovsky it meant Mozart. This set of the fifth variation the flute has the theme, performance in Hobart in November 2014. a token of thanks for that performance, I variations is his finest tribute to his idol’s but the cello solo has its most substantial Don Kay was appointed a Member of the composed another work for strings, Bush art.