UNIVERSITY MUSICAL SOCIETY in association with Ervin Industries and KMS CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA One Hundred First Season DANIEL BARENBOIM Music Director and Conductor SIR GEORG SOLTI, Music Director Laureate Monday Evening, March 30, 1992, at 8:00 Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor, Michigan The Music of Richard Strauss Don Juan, Op. 20 Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, Op. 28 Intermission Ein Heldenleben, Op. 40 Ruben Gonzalez, Violinist The University Musical Society expresses gratitude to Ervin Industries and KMS for their generous grants in support of tonight's concert. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra recognizes with appreciation support for this tour from the State of Illinois and the City of Chicago. The pre-concert carillon recital was performed by Ray McLellan, a student of Margo Halsted, University Carillonneur. The University Musical Society wishes to thank Ms. Nancy Malitz, Music Writer, The Detroit News, for tonight's Philips Pre-concert Presentation. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is represented by Columbia Artists Management Inc., New York City. Activities of the Musical Society are supported by the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs and the National Endowment for the Arts. The box office in the outer lobby is open during intermission for tickets to upcoming Musical Society concerts. Thirty-fifth Concert of the 113th Season 113th Annual Choral Union Series Program Notes MUSIC OF RICHARD STRAUSS Bom June 11, 1864, Munich; died Septembers, 1949, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria. hortly after Theodore Thomas set­ Strauss conducted Mozart's Don Giowmni in tled in Chicago in 1891 as the first Munich shortly before he began this, his first music director of the Chicago Sym­ important work. Yet, as a fair measure of the phony Orchestra, he began to play young composer's success, this Don Juan is the new music of Richard Strauss. neither Lenau's despite words to the con­ UnderS Thomas's baton, the Chicago orches­ trary on the title page nor Mozart's, but a tra gave the American premieres of most of character entirely and unforgettably his own. the great tone poems, beginning with Till Indeed, it is now difficult to imagine Don Eulenspiegel on November 15, 1895, only ten Juan without the ardent horn theme that, in days after the world premiere in Cologne Strauss's hands, becomes his calling card. (under Franz Wiillner) and arriving at Bin Strauss was always a master of the Heldenleben on March 10, 1900, one year and memorable first line who could forget seven days after Strauss himself led the first those beckoning Rosenlcaualier horns or the performance in Frankfurt. glorious daybreak of Also sprach Zarathustra? In 1904, Thomas invited Strauss to but in all music, few openings take our Chicago as the Orchestra's first guest conduc­ breath away like the rapid unfurling with tor. Strauss's program included Also sprach which Don Juan leaps before us. Before the Zarathustra, Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, dust settles, we are.greeted by an important and Tod und Verkldrung, along with a number theme that is itself a composite of several of songs for his wife Pauline to sing. At the smaller ideas, each to be isolated, developed, end of his first rehearsal in Chicago, Strauss and contemplated later. turned to the musicians and said: "I came What follows is a series of incidents here in the pleasant expectation of finding a including at least one flirtation, two torrid superior orchestra, but you have far surpassed affairs, and a duel to the death that form, my expectation, and I can say to you that I piece by piece, an uncanny personality study. am delighted to know you as an orchestra of The analyst will readily uncover evidence of artists in whom beauty of tone, technical sonata form, but the beauty of Don Juan is in perfection, and discipline are found in the the novelty and freshness of its application highest degree." and the way classical form is used to reveal Scarcely a season since has passed with­ character. There are many remarkable indi­ out the Orchestra playing one of the tone vidual moments: the deeply felt love scene at poems it introduced to the United States. the heart of the piece, exquisitely launched Each of the Orchestra's nine music directors by the oboe; the brazen new signature horn has conducted Til! Eulenspiegel during his time theme that follows; Don Juan's precipitous with the Chicago Symphony confirming fall from grace, when, over low rumblings, time and time again that, in Chicago, Strauss his three most recent conquests go flying by. found the ideal orchestra for his music. And then, amid the glory of remembering a recapitulation of sorts Don Juan suddenly Don Juan, Op. 20 and shockingly realizes the empty sound of In listening to Don Juan it is wise to victory and falls on his adversary's sword. consider that Strauss's two favorite operas With one piercing stab from the trumpets, he were Tristan und Isolde and Cosi fan tutte. drops, shivering, to the ground. And as Certainly Strauss's conception of history's swiftly as one life is over, Strauss's brilliant great erotic hero reflects both the Wagnerian career was launched. idea of undying love as well as Mozart's sense of passion as a fragile and mercurial human Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, Op. 28 condition. Had Strauss's first opera, Guntram, suc­ Strauss credits his idea of the legendary ceeded as he hoped, he surely would have Don Juan figure to Nikolaus Lenau, who left gone ahead with his plan to make Till Eu­ a verse play on the subject unfinished at his lenspiegel his second opera. But Guntram was death; it is also worth remembering that a major disappointment, and Strauss recon- sidered. We will nevet know what sort of opera Til! Eulenspiegel might have been the unfinished libretto is not promising but as a tone poem it is close to perfection. It was Ferruccio Busoni who first com­ mented that, in Till Euknspiegel, Strauss had reached a mastery of lightness and humor unrivaled in German music since Haydn. The humor was not surprising although some listeners had found the deep seriousness of Tod und Verklarung an ominous sign but to achieve such ineffable lightness with an orchestra of unparalleled size seemed miracu­ lous. At first Strauss resisted fitting a narra­ tive to his music. Later, he admitted a few points of reference. He begins by beckoning us to gather round, setting a warm "Once- upon-a-time" mood into which jumps the horn with one of the most famous themes in all music the daring, teasing, cartwheeling tune that characterizes this roguish hero bet­ ter than any well-chosen words. The portrait is rounded off by the nose-thumbing pranks of the clarinet. Richard Stratus (1905) From there the music simply explodes, the orchestra responding to Till's every move. Ein Heldenleben, Op. 40 When he dons the frock of a priest, the music In 1898, after lending music of lasting turns mock-serious; when he escapes, down a brilliance to heroes of Shakespeare, handy violin glissando, in search of love, Nietzsche, and Cervantes, and to two great Strauss supplies sumptuous string harmonies characters of legend, Don Juan and Till Don Juan would envy. Rejected in love, Till Eulenspiegel, Richard Strauss could think of takes on academia, but his cavalier remarks no other subject more appealing than himself. and the professors' ponderous deliberations At the top of his last great tone poem he voiced by four bassoons and bass clarinet wrote Ein Heldenleben (A hero's life), leaving are fatally mismatched. Till departs with a little doubt of the hero's identity. As Strauss Grosse Grimasse, in Strauss's words, that rat­ told Romain Rolland, "I do not see why I tles the entire orchestra, and then slips out should not compose a symphony about my­ the back way, whistling as he goes. self; I find myself quite as interesting as After a quick review of recent esca­ Napoleon or Alexander." The mention of pades a recapitulation of sorts Till is Napoleon was no coincidence, for Ein brought before the jury (the pounding of the Heldenleben was Strauss's response to the gavel provided by the /// roll of the side Eroica, Beethoven's Napoleon-inspired sym­ drum). The judge's repeated pronouncements phony "admittedly without a funeral do not quiet Till's insolent remarks. But the march, but yet in E-flat, with lots of horns, death sentence announced by the brass, which are always a yardstick of heroism." dropping the interval of a major seventh, the Those who knew Strauss thought him widest possible drop, short of an octave an unlikely hero. There was nothing about silences him for good. It is over in a flash. him, outside of his own dazzling music, to Then Strauss turns the page, draws us compare with the bold and fearless character round him once again, and reminds us that who throws open the first page of this score this is only a tone poem. And, with a smile, and then holds our unblinking attention he closes the book. for 116 bars of music. A moment's silence is broken by the squabbling of the woodwinds Strauss's portrait of his critics, rendered with such hatred that one would think he had never received a good review in his life. (In dart around the big tune is particularly bold.) fact, aside from Guntram, Strauss had proba­ At the climax, the horns let cry with the bly read more glowing reviews of his music great, vaulting theme from Don Juan, prompt­ than any important composer of the day.) ing other themes from Don Juan and Also We next meet Strauss's wife, Pauline sprach Zarathustra before the music gradually Strauss de Ahna, an accomplished soprano fades.