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SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA A JACOBS MASTERWORKS CONCERT Fabien Gabel, conductor May 4 and 6, 2018 LEONARD BERNSTEIN Three Dance Variations from Fancy Free Galop Waltz Danzon LEONARD BERNSTEIN Serenade (After Plato’s “Symposium”) Phaedrus—Pausanias: Lento – Allegro Aristophanes: Allegretto Erixymachus: Presto Agathon: Adagio Socrates—Alcibiades: Molto tenuto – Allegro molto Simone Lamsma, violin INTERMISSION RICHARD STRAUSS Suite from Der Rosenkavalier, Op. 59 JACQUES OFFENBACH Selections from Gaîté parisienne Arr. Manuel Rosenthal Ouverture No. 1: Allegro brillante No. 2: Polka No. 6: Allegro No. 8: Valse Lente No. 10: Valse Moderato No. 13: Allegro molto No. 15: Allegro No. 16: Cancan No. 22: Vivo Three Dance Variations from Fancy Free LEONARD BERNSTEIN Born August 25, 1918, Lawrence, MA Died October 14, 1990, New York City Some musical geography is necessary here, because the situation can be confusing. In the fall of 1943, the 25-year-old Leonard Bernstein became an overnight sensation when he replaced an ailing Bruno Walter and led a nationally-broadcast concert by the New York Philharmonic. At exactly the same moment, choreographer Jerome Robbins approached Bernstein and proposed that he write a ballet about three sailors on leave in New York City. This became Fancy Free, Bernstein’s first ballet, and it was premiered at the Metropolitan Opera on April 18, 1944. That summer, Bernstein’s friend, the lyricist Adolph Green, suggested to the young composer that the situation of the ballet – three sailors on leave in New York City – could be made into a musical. Bernstein quickly composed the music, and On the Town opened on Broadway in December 1944 and ran for 463 performances. But while the situation of the ballet and the musical comedy are exactly the same, the music is not. Bernstein was adamant that “not one note” of Fancy Free appeared in On the Town – he composed the musical absolutely fresh. Fancy Free was the first ballet by both Robbins and Bernstein, and it was an instant success: The New York Times reviewer called it “a smash hit.” The plot of Fancy Free is quite simple. Three sailors have a 24-hour pass in wartime New York City. They go into a bar in search of companionship and eventually interest two young women. But three sailors and two women make an awkward combination. Someone will be left out, so the sailors devise a solution: each will dance, the women will choose the “loser” among the three dances, and he will have to leave. Each sailor performs his dance, but the women are unable to choose. At this point the sailors get into a terrific fistfight, and the horrified women vanish. The sailors pick themselves up, regroup, and set off in pursuit of the next attractive woman who passes by. Bernstein pulled a suite of movements out of Fancy Free and led the premiere with the Pittsburgh Symphony on January 14, 1945. The present concert offers three movements from Fancy Free that are often performed by themselves under the title “Three Dance Variations.” These are the dances the individual sailors dance in their competition for the women: a spirited Galop, a slinky Waltz and a jazzy Danzon. Serenade (After Plato’s “Symposium”) LEONARD BERNSTEIN Born August 25, 1918, Lawrence, MA Died October 14, 1990, New York City Three unrelated events in the early 1950s led Leonard Bernstein to compose his Serenade. In June 1951 Bernstein’s mentor Serge Koussevitzky died, and the Koussevitzky Music Foundation commissioned an orchestral work from the young composer-conductor in his memory. Second, violinist Isaac Stern asked Bernstein to write a violin concerto for him. And finally, while staying at an inn in Cuernevaca, Mexico, in the fall of 1953, Bernstein discovered in his room a copy of Plato’s Symposium, a work he had read while a student at Harvard. The Symposium tells of a dinner party for the friends of Socrates in Athens at which they discuss the nature of love. Bernstein, who was on his honeymoon at that time, was particularly struck by their examination of the meaning of love. He decided to make that dinner-party-with-discussion the basis of his violin concerto for Stern, a work that also satisfied the commission from the Koussevitzky Music Foundation. He began the new piece, which he called a “serenade” rather than a “concerto,” later that the fall and finished it while on vacation at Martha’s Vineyard during the summer of 1954. Stern was soloist and Bernstein the conductor at the premiere in Venice on September 12, 1954. Plato’s Symposium, an account told by Apollodorus, takes place during a dinner at the home of Agathon in Athens. The literal meaning of “symposium” is “drinking party,” but at such a gathering the point was to allow each guest not only to drink but to participate fully in the discussion of the topic of the evening. At this symposium each of the guests – Pausanias, Erixymachus, Alcibiades and the rest – contributes his own views on love. While each section of Bernstein’s Serenade bears the name of one of these speakers, listeners need not know Plato’s Symposium to understand or enjoy this music. In fact, it might be simplest to take Bernstein’s movement titles only as a general guide and listen to the Serenade as a virtuoso work for violin and orchestra; though this may not be called a “Violin Concerto,” Isaac Stern clearly got his wish for a concerto. Bernstein chose his title carefully–a “serenade” is a love-song – and he described his Serenade as “a series of related statements in praise of love.” Formally, the Serenade might be thought of as a sequence of progressive variations: it is in five movements, and each of these grows out of material presented in the previous movement. Bernstein used the Symposium only as a general guide for his piece – he re-arranged the order of the speakers and eliminated several of them. He also recognized that few listeners would be familiar with Plato, so he prepared a general program note “for the benefit of those interested in literary allusion.” That note is worth quoting at length: I. Phaedrus; Pausanias (Lento; Allegro). Phaedrus opens the symposium with a lyrical oration in praise of Eros, the god of love (Fugato, begun by the solo violin). Pausanias continues by describing the duality of lover and beloved. This is expressed in a classical sonata-allegro, based on the material of the opening fugato. II. Aristophanes (Allegretto). Aristophanes does not play the role of clown in this dialogue, but instead that of the bedtime storyteller, invoking the fairy-tale mythology of love. III. Erixymachus (Presto). The physician speaks of bodily harmony as a scientific model for the workings of love-patterns. This is an extremely short fugato scherzo, born of a blend of mystery and humor. IV. Agathon (Adagio). Perhaps the most moving speech of the dialogue. Agathon’s panegyric embraces all aspects of love’s powers, charms and functions. This movement is a simple three-part song. V. Socrates; Alcibiades (Molto tenuto; Allegro molto vivace). Socrates describes his visit to the seer Diotima, quoting her speech on the demonology of love. This is a slow introduction of greater weight than any of the preceding movements, and serves as a highly developed reprise of the middle section of the Agathon movement, thus suggesting a hidden sonata-form. The famous interruption by Alcibiades and his band of drunken revelers ushers in the Allegro, which is an extended rondo ranging in spirit from agitation through jig-like dance music to joyful celebration. If there is a hint of jazz in the celebration, I hope it will not be taken as anachronistic Greek party-music, but rather the natural expression of a contemporary American composer imbued with the spirit of that timeless dinner-party. Bernstein conceived this music with Isaac Stern’s talents specifically in mind, and there is some spectacular writing for violin here – it is by turn lyric, brilliant, reflective, animated. If one hears traces of jazz and Stravinsky in this music, Bernstein makes those influences fully his own, and the range of sounds he gets from his string-and-percussion orchestra is striking. There may have been many influences on the creation of the Serenade, but the result was one of Bernstein’s most successful works for the concert hall. Suite from Der Rosenkavalier, Op. 59 RICHARD STRAUSS Born June 11, 1864, Munich Died September 8, 1949, Garmisch-Partenkirchen Richard Strauss achieved international notoriety with a pair of shocking operas in the first decade of the twentieth century. Salome (1907), based on the Oscar Wilde play and essentially a study in sexual pathology, included the infamous Dance of the Seven Veils and the appearance on stage of the decapitated head of John the Baptist. Electra (1909), the story of the murder of Agamemnon and the revenge of his children, went even further in its lurid details and harmonic dislocation. Both operas were huge successes (and both made the composer a great deal of money), but he himself felt that he had gone too far with them, and now he wanted to pull back from the brink and write something sparkling, light and fun. That new direction came quickly. In February 1909, only a month after the premiere of Electra, Strauss’ librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal wrote him a letter, suggesting a new project: “I have spent three quiet afternoons here drafting the full and entirely original scenario for an opera, full of burlesque situations and characters, with lively action, pellucid almost like a pantomime. There are opportunities in it for lyrical passages, for fun and humor…Period: the old Vienna under Empress Maria Theresa.” That sketch would become, with considerable modification, Der Rosenkavalier, which Strauss composed in 1909-10.

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