Program

ONE HuNdrEd TwENTy-FirST SEASON Chicago Symphony riccardo muti Music director Helen regenstein Conductor Emeritus Yo-Yo ma Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant Global Sponsor of the CSO

Thursday, November 10, 2011, at 8:00 Friday, November 11, 2011, at 1:30 Saturday, November 12, 2011, at 8:00 Tuesday, November 15, 2011, at 7:30 Stéphane Denève conductor Leonidas Kavakos Prokofiev Suite from The Love for Three Oranges, Op. 33a The Eccentrics The Magician Tchélio and Fata Morgana Play Cards March Scherzo The Prince and the Princess The Flight Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 63 Allegro moderato Andante assai Allegro, ben marcato LEONidAS KAVAKOS

IntermISSIon roussel The Spider’s Feast, Op. 17 ravel Suite No. 2 from Daphnis and Chloe dawn— Pantomime— General dance

CSO Tuesday series concerts are sponsored by United Airlines. This program is partially supported by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts. CommentS by PHiLLiP HuSCHEr

Sergei Prokofiev Born April 23, 1891, Sontsovka, Ukraine. Died March 5, 1953, Moscow, Russia.

Suite from The Love for Three Oranges, op. 33a

n the summer of 1917, of his scores to Chicago Symphony IChicago businessman Cyrus music director Frederick Stock. McCormick, Jr., the farm machine McCormick wrote to Stock at magnate, met the twenty-six-year- once, saying that Prokofiev “would old composer be glad to come to Chicago and while on a business trip to Russia. bring some of his symphonies if his Prokofiev was unknown to expenses were paid. But not know- McCormick, but the composer ing myself the value of his music, I recognized the distinguished did not feel justified in taking the American’s name immediately, risk of bringing him here.” After because the estate his father had Stock received Prokofiev’s scores, he managed owned several impressive replied to McCormick: “There is no International Harvester machines. question in my mind as to the talent McCormick expressed an inter- of young Serge.” Although Stock est in the composer’s new music, at first doubted that it was feasible and he eventually agreed to pay to bring the Russian composer to for the printing of his unpublished the U.S. right away, Prokofiev (or Scythian Suite. He also encouraged Prokofieff, as the U.S. press spelled Prokofiev to come to the United his name at the time) made his States, and asked him to send some debut with the Chicago Symphony

ComPoSeD moSt reCent InStrumentatIon 1919 CSo PerFormanCeS two and piccolo, two October 4, 1975, and english horn, two FIrSt PerFormanCe Orchestra Hall. Erich and bass , Opera: december 30, 1921, Leinsdorf three and contra- Auditorium Theatre, Chicago , four horns, three July 1, 2000, ravinia Festival. , three Suite: November 1926, william Eddins conducting boston and , , tubular aPProxImate bells, , , FIrSt CSo PerFormanCe tIme tam-tam, triangle, bass PerFormanCe oF 15 minutes drum, side drum, tambou- ComPLete SuIte rine, two harps, strings November 18, 1965, Orchestra Hall. Jean Martinon conducting

2 the following season, playing his that he had, but that the score for First Concerto under Stock’s was sitting on the baton, and conducting the orchestra shelf of the back himself in the American premiere in Russia and would be difficult of his Scythian Suite in Orchestra to obtain, Campanini hit on the Hall in December 1918. idea of commissioning him to “The appearance here of the write a new opera for the Chicago young Russian, Sergei Prokofieff, at company. That January, Prokofiev the Chicago Symphony Orchestra signed a contract to produce an concert was the most startling and, operatic version of The Love for in a sense, important musical event Three Oranges, based on the Russian that has happened in this town adaptation of Venetian playwright for a long time,” wrote Henriette Carlo Gozzi’s commedia dell’arte Weber in the Herald and Examiner. fairy tale, to be premiered in “Personally he is middle-sized Chicago. By March, citrus grow- and blond, somewhat gangling ers in Florida and California were about the arms and shoulders, and fighting over promotion rights. entirely business-like in demeanor,” Prokofiev prepared the libretto reported the Journal. “His business himself; he had read the story on the is his music, while he is on the ocean liner on his way to the U.S., stage, and he would seem to resent and even began to sketch a plan even the time that it takes to bow.” while crossing the Pacific. “The play, The music itself caused quite a stir. with its mixture of fairy tale, humor, “Russian Genius Displays Weird and satire, had a strong appeal for Harmonies” was the headline in me,” he later said. Prokofiev wrote the American. “The music was of the opera in nine months—he often such savagery, so brutally barbaric,” worked quickly when inspired—and Henriette Weber wrote, “that it turned in the completed orchestral seemed almost grotesque to see score by October 1, as his Chicago civilized men, in modern dress with contract demanded. That December, modern instruments performing Campanini died suddenly and the it. By the same token it was big, company postponed the premiere sincere, true.” The public loved till the following season. Prokofiev it. “Every man and woman there fought back, demanding compensa- reacted to it,” Weber continued, tion for the year-long delay, and, “and Prokofieff was given a thun- as a result, the new opera was dering ovation that at least in a postponed again. Finally, a new slight degree expressed the tumul- executive director, the famous tuous emotions he inspired.” soprano Mary Garden (she was In Chicago, McCormick intro- Debussy’s original Melisande) gave duced Prokofiev to Cleofonte Prokofiev everything he wanted—a Campanini, the director of the lavish production (it reportedly cost Chicago Opera, who asked the $100,000), as many rehearsals as he composer if he had written an needed, and a firm premiere date: opera. When Prokofiev explained January 30, 1921.

3 The Auditorium was full that 1930s—and many others, around night and Prokofiev later called it a the world, since (Lyric Opera of big success. “The Chicagoans were Chicago staged the opera in 1976 both proud and embarrassed to be and 1979). presenting a ‘modernist premiere,’ ” A few years after the Chicago he later wrote. “The music, I fear,” premiere, Prokofiev made a Edward Moore reported in the six-movement symphonic suite Tribune, “is too much for this of excerpts from the opera that generation.” The sets, designed by has greatly extended the work’s Boris Anisfeld, who had worked popularity. The story of The Love for with Diaghilev in (and then Three Oranges is an absurd, highly settled in Chicago, teaching at the convoluted fantasy: the central tale School of the Art Institute), fared involves a prince, who is put under better: “Never was paint applied a curse by the witch Fata Morgana to scene cloth any more lavishly or that makes him fall in love with gorgeously,” Moore wrote. In the three giant oranges, each of which end, Garden did not stand by her contains a princess, one of whom high- is destined to be his love. The suite profile opens with The Eccentrics, drawn com- from the opera’s prologue. The mission; next excerpt accompanies a card several game between the sorcerer Tchélio years (he loses) and Fata Morgana, who later, plays a critical role in the rest of when she the action. The popular, grotesque was told March is essentially the entr’acte that the connecting the first scenes of act 2. scenery (It was once famous as the theme A publicity shot of Prokofiev taken was of the radio program The FBI in in a Chicago hotel room, 1918 falling Peace and War.) The scherzo is the apart, original entr’acte between the first she said scenes of act 3. The Prince and the it should be destroyed because no Princess uses music drawn from one would want to see the opera the desert scene in act 3, where again anyway. That, of course, the princesses emerge from the has not been the case. There were oranges; only one survives, and she highly successful Soviet produc- then begins a love duet with the tions in Leningrad in 1926 and in prince. The Flight is taken from Moscow the following year—they the opera’s last scene, when Fata helped convince Prokofiev to Morgana’s trap door vividly swal- return to his homeland in the lows a number of victims.

4 Sergei Prokofiev

Violin Concerto no. 2 in g minor, op. 63

rokofiev wrote his first violin written in his homeland. And in Pconcerto shortly before he left 1933 he couldn’t foresee the harm Russia in 1918; the second concerto that would ultimately come to was composed seventeen years later, him under Joseph Stalin, who, in as he was preparing to return home. a stroke of fate no work of fiction Why Prokofiev decided to go back would dare, died on the same day as has been variously attributed to Prokofiev in 1953. patriotism, opportunism, nostalgia, Most of Prokofiev’s celebrated and political naïveté. In the United Soviet contemporaries had States, he had found limited popu- either emigrated permanently, larity and financial difficulty as a like Stravinsky and Nabokov, or wandering and composer; stayed put, like Shostakovich and in Paris he was more successful and Pasternak. Prokofiev tried for more comfortable, but he increas- the best of both worlds, although ingly longed “to see real winters when he left Russia in May 1918, again, and spring that bursts into he expected to be back in a few being from one moment to the months. But he found life outside next.” In 1933, he concluded that his homeland too promising. “the air of foreign lands does not Prokofiev received his first official inspire me because I am Russian, invitation to return to Russia in and there is nothing more harmful 1923. He declined the offer, and to a man than to live in exile, to be the next year’s as well. When he did in a spiritual climate incompatible return in 1927, for a three-month with his race.” Nearly all the music tour, he was greeted as a celebrity. Prokofiev is remembered for was The next years were a time of

ComPoSeD moSt reCent aPProxImate 1935 CSo PerFormanCe PerFormanCe tIme February 25, 2007, Orchestra 26 minutes FIrSt PerFormanCe Hall. rachel Lee, violin; december 1, 1935, Semyon bychkov conducting CSo reCorDIngS Madrid, 1983. Shlomo Mintz, violin; InStrumentatIon Claudio Abbado conducting. FIrSt CSo solo violin, two flutes, two deutsche Grammophon PerFormanCe oboes, two clarinets, two 1993. itzhak Perlman, April 1, 1943, Orchestra Hall. bassoons, two horns, two violin; Patricia Travers, violin; Hans trumpets, , snare conducting. Erato Lange conducting drum, triangle, cymbals, castanets, strings

5 increasing frustration—Prokofiev Prokofiev worked on the con- recognized the urgent need to settle certo at the same time as the ballet on both a compatible musical style Romeo and Juliet during the summer and a home base. He decided to of 1935; the two have much in resume Soviet citizenship as early as common, particularly an ardent and 1932. (He didn’t close up his Paris voluptuous lyricism. The concerto apartment until 1936, however.) In was begun in Paris, continued 1934, he paved the way for his move in a number of hotel rooms, and by publicly addressing the ques- completed in Russia, a reflection of tion of “what kind of music should Prokofiev’s “nomadic concert-tour be written at the present time” in existence,” as he put it, but also a the Soviet Union. For Prokofiev, reminder of how he straddled two the solution rested on the abiding worlds at the time. strength of melody—“simple and The concerto begins with the comprehensible, without being solo violin playing an unac- repetitive and trivial . . . . We must companied G minor melody, as seek a new simplicity.” It was a if Prokofiev wished to establish shrewd battle cry—both politi- from the outset the preeminence cally correct and consistent with of melody and a new simplicity Prokofiev’s genuine beliefs. of language. The first movement, The Second Violin Concerto was based on classical sonata form, Prokofiev’s last non-Soviet commis- is almost relentlessly lyrical; the sion; it was written for the French- essential drama of contrast comes Belgian violinist Robert Soetens. only from the switch of key and Prokofiev recalled: mode to B major for the second theme. The second movement, In 1935 a group of admirers [of in E-flat major, combines a light Soetens] asked me to write a accompaniment, like the ticking of violin concerto for him, giving a clock, with a sweet and soaring him exclusive rights to perform melody in the violin. The mood is it for one year. I readily agreed, serene, disturbed only from time to since I had been intending to time by more urgent and searching write something for violin at music. These roles are reversed at that time and had accumulated the very end, as the violin plays some material. As in the case pizzicato triplets to the main of the preceding concertos, tune, now low in the orchestra. I began by searching for an In complete contrast, the finale is original title for the piece, brash and athletic, with a rustic such as “Concert Sonata for main theme that suggests peas- Violin and Orchestra,” but I ants dancing and the unexpected finally returned to the simplest use of castanets—a touch of local solution: Concerto no. 2. color that seems to predict that the Nevertheless, I wanted it to be world premiere would be given, on altogether different from no. 1 another of Prokofiev’s whirlwind in both content and style. tours, in Madrid.

6 Born April 5, 1869, Tourcoing, . Died August 23, 1937, Royan, France. The Spider’s Feast, Symphonic Fragments, op. 17 Performed as part of the CSO’s one-hundred year retrospective

lbert Roussel came to compos- to study a harmony textbook and Aing relatively late in life. Like eventually started to compose in his Rimsky-Korsakov, he first enjoyed spare time. (In Cherbourg, he tried the naval career that his family out one of his pieces with friends, assumed was his natural destiny— only to realize that, in his inexperi- as a child, Roussel devoured Jules ence, he had written the part Verne’s maritime adventures, in the wrong clef.) delighted in his family’s seaside At one point, Roussel discov- vacations, and decorated his room ered among his shipmates Ensign to look like that of a ship’s captain. Adolphe Calvet, who happened He enjoyed playing the piano for to be the younger brother of the his family in the parlor at home famous opera soprano Emma and excelled in his lessons from Calvé. Calvet asked if he might the local cathedral organist, but he send one of Roussel’s compositions never thought of music as a serious to the distinguished conductor pursuit. Roussel placed sixteenth Edouard Colonne. A few weeks among six hundred Naval School later, Calvet reported that Colonne candidates, and, at eighteen, he was so impressed that he advised took a berth on the training ship Roussel to leave the service and Borda. Occasionally he played the devote himself to composition. In piano at officers’ dances, and, when June 1894, Roussel resigned from he was stationed in Cherbourg, he the navy and moved to Paris to joined in performances of chamber begin formal training. His progress music. Roussel privately began was slow, but, in 1897, when the

ComPoSeD moSt reCent aPProxImate 1912 CSo PerFormanCe PerFormanCe tIme October 15, 1965, 17 minutes FIrSt PerFormanCe Orchestra Hall. Jean April 3, 1913, Paris Martinon conducting

FIrSt CSo InStrumentatIon PerFormanCe two flutes and piccolo, two March 26, 1926, oboes and english horn, two Orchestra Hall. Frederick clarinets, two bassoons, Stock conducting two horns, two trumpets, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, , harp, strings

7 two madrigals he submitted, each The first of Roussel’s three ballets, under a different pseudonym, to Le festin de l’araignée, or The Spider’s a major competition were jointly Feast, comes from the composer’s awarded first prize, he knew that self-proclaimed early phase. The he had made the right career move. spell of Debussy is still evident, but Only many years later did he learn so is Roussel’s own strong personal- that Calvet had never sent his ity and distinctive style, despite manuscript to Colonne. what he later claimed. The music is In 1933, Roussel suggested light and refined, but also sensuous that his mature career could be and vividly illustrative—Roussel is a divided into three phases, begin- master of the highly suggestive use ning with his “early” work, written of color and rhythmic gesture. For around 1910, when he was already the concert hall, Roussel prepared forty. These pieces show “some the concise set of “symphonic frag- slight influence of Debussy along ments” from the full score per- with certain personal accents.” In formed this week. The ballet, based his middle, transitional works, on a libretto by Gilbert de Voisins, “the style changes, the harmony is set in a country garden. The becomes bolder, and the influence main characters include a butterfly, of Debussy disappears altogether.” dung beetles, ants, and the spider Writing in the third person, he of the title. After various insects adds, “Roussel’s new manner are trapped in the spider’s web, the becomes the target of criticism as spider prepares to enjoy her feast, well as the object of enthusiastic only to be eaten herself by a praying approbation.” In his third period, mantis. The ballet ends with the Roussel “found his true voice.” funeral procession of the mayfly.

8 Born March 7, 1875, Ciboure, France. Died December 28, 1937, Paris, France.

Suite no. 2 from Daphnis and Chloe Performed as part of the CSO’s one-hundred year retrospective

aurice Ravel wrote home from of the program, and a fanfare from Mhis first tour of America in the orchestra he conducted. (The 1928: “I am seeing magnificent second performance, the follow- cities, enchanting country, but the ing night, started a good half hour triumphs are fatiguing. Besides, I late because Ravel, a famously am dying of hunger.” Although he impeccable dresser, discovered found the food alarming (Ravel that he had left his evening shoes traveled with his own favorite wines in a trunk at the train station and and cigarettes) and the pace relent- would not go onstage until they had less, in city after city Ravel was been retrieved—by his Sheherazade reminded of the extent of his celeb- soloist Lisa Roma, no less.) The rity. At the matinee concert of the Chicago program included, as its Chicago Symphony on January 20, centerpiece, the second suite from 1928, Ravel accepted enthusiastic the ballet Daphnis and Chloe, which applause throughout the afternoon, Ravel later called his most impor- a standing ovation at the conclusion tant score.

ComPoSeD InStrumentatIon CSo reCorDIngS 1909–1912 two piccolos, two flutes and 1964. Jean Martinon alto , two oboes and conducting. rCA FIrSt PerFormanCe english horn, two clarinets, 1991. daniel barenboim ballet: June 8, 1912, Paris E-flat clarinet and bass conducting. Erato Suite No. 2: April 30, 1914, clarinet, three bassoons Paris and , four 2007, complete ballet. with horns, four trumpets, Chicago Symphony Chorus, FIrSt CSo three trombones and tuba, bernard Haitink conducting. PerFormanCe timpani, bass drum, snare CSO resound November 2, 1923, drums, cymbals, triangle, A 1958 performance with Orchestra Hall. Frederick , castanets, Carlo Maria Giulini conduct- Stock conducting celesta, , two ing was released on From the harps, strings, optional Archives, vol. 9. CSo PerFormanCeS wordless chorus (omitted at ConDuCteD BY raVeL these performances) A 1987 performance with January 20 & 21, 1928, Sir conducting Orchestra Hall aPProxImate was released on Chicago PerFormanCe tIme Symphony Orchestra: The moSt reCent 18 minutes First 100 Years. CSo PerFormanCe November 10, 2007, Orchestra Hall. with Chicago Symphony Chorus, bernard Haitink conducting

9 Ravel wrote Daphnis and Chloe The principal players in the for and the Ballets creation of Daphnis and Chloe Russes. It was begun in 1909, before were a distinguished group: Diaghilev’s troupe had set Paris Sergei Diaghilev, the impresario; ablaze with a series of new ballets Michel Fokine, the choreogra- pher; Léon Bakst, the designer; Pierre Monteux, the conductor; and Vaslav Nijinsky and Tamara Karsavina, the leading dancers. Ravel worked tirelessly with Fokine to translate the most famous of the Greek prose pastorals into a sce- nario for ballet—the collaboration partly hampered, as the composer admitted, because “Fokine doesn’t know a word of French, and I know only how to swear in Russian.” At first, there was also a serious difference of opinion about the style of the piece. “My intention in writing [Daphnis and Chloe],” Ravel later said, “was to compose a vast musical fresco in which I was less concerned with archaism than with reproducing faithfully the of my dreams, which is very similar to that imagined by French Designs by Léon Bakst for Daphnis and Chloe— artists at the end of the eighteenth Daphnis; Chloe; costumes for shepherds century.” But Fokine had in mind the “ancient dancing depicted in unlike anything the worlds of music red and black on Attic vases.” The or dance had known, starting with result has something of the classical Stravinsky’s Firebird in 1910 and austerity of Jacques-Louis David’s climaxing with the scandalous pre- canvases as well as the stunning miere of The Rite of Spring in May clarity of Greek pottery. But it is 1913. Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe both more sumptuous and subtle wasn’t introduced until June 8, than either. 1912, due to the composer’s diffi- In rehearsal, Fokine and Nijinsky culty in finishing the score, com- fought endlessly over the choreog- pounded by backstage squabbling raphy, and Diaghilev grew so tired once rehearsals began. Although of serving as intermediary that he Daphnis and Chloe wasn’t well finally threatened to cancel the received, that date isn’t engraved in project. As it was, he was forced music history, for this isn’t music to to postpone the premiere twice, provoke fistfights or catcalls. largely because Ravel was having

10 trouble completing the final dance, the first part of the ballet, Daphnis on which, by the first rehearsals, earns Chloe’s kiss; pirates land and he had labored for a full year. (And abduct Chloe. In part 2, Pan and then, when the music was delivered his warriors rescue Chloe; part 3 at last, Diaghilev’s dancers were reunites the lovers. Ravel arranged stymied by the finale’s asymmetri- two sets of symphonic fragments cal 5/4 meter—Ravel suggested from the ballet for the concert hall. chanting “Ser-gei-Dia-ghi-lev” to The second suite—the one the each measure to help them keep Chicago Symphony played under their place.) Ultimately, the rancor Ravel’s baton in 1928—includes and tension of the Daphnis rehears- the music of part 3 of the ballet. It als led to a rift between Diaghilev opens with the sounds of daybreak, and Fokine, who left the company one of the most magical depictions at the end of the season. of the gradual awakening of nature Daphnis and Chloe is the largest in all music. The birds (three solo orchestral work Ravel wrote; he and piccolo) sing and the called it a “choreographic symphony shepherds stir, and the music is in three parts,” and in its scale and slowly warmed by the brightening developmental detail it’s as close as rays of the sun. Daphnis wakens he ever came to tackling symphonic and joins Chloe. It is now full day. form. “The work is constructed In a gentle pantomime, Daphnis symphonically,” Ravel said at the and Chloe recreate the old story of time, “out of a small number of Pan wooing the nymph Syrinx— themes, the development of which the very event that Pan recalled ensures the work’s homogeneity.” and which moved him to intervene Daphnis and Chloe is perhaps the with the pirates and return Chloe greatest example of Ravel’s remark- to Daphnis. Pan’s seductive flute able ear for orchestral sounds, solo is one of the most famous in and of the subtlety with which he music. Daphnis and Chloe eventu- shades and colors his canvas. Few ally forget their roles and fall into passages in music are as justifiably each other’s arms, declaring their famous as the opening of this suite, love. All that’s left is celebration, when the rising sun gently bathes accomplished in an extraordinary the music in warmth and light. final dance that took Ravel, perhaps The story is adapted from a tale the greatest perfectionist among by the fifth-century Greek author composers, a year to polish and Longus. Daphnis and Chloe, fine tune. abandoned as children and raised by shepherds, have fallen in love (Daphnis charmed Chloe by play- Phillip Huscher is the program annota- ing for her on his pan-pipes). In tor for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Symphony Orchestra © 2011 Chicago

11