BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

James Levine, Music Director Designate >S" Bernard Haitink, Principal Guest Conductor Seiji Ozawa, Music Director Laureate 123rd Season, 2003-2004 I

CHAMBER MUSIC TEA I Friday, October 31, at 2:30

COMMUNITY CONCERT I Sunday, November 2, at 3, at the Fuller Art Museum, Brockton

This concert is made available free to the public through the generosity of State Street Corporation.

KEISUKE WAKAO, oboe THOMAS MARTIN, clarinet RICHARD RANTI, bassoon HUGH HINTON, piano

PREVIN Trio for Oboe, Bassoon, and Piano

Lively Slow Jaunty

TANSMAN Suite for Wind Trio Dialogue Scherzino Aria Finale

BEETHOVEN Trio in B-flat for clarinet, cello, and piano, Opus 11 (performed here with oboe, bassoon, and piano)

Allegro con brio Adagio Tetna: Pria ch'io Vimpegno. Allegretto

Week 4 Andre Previn (b.1930) Trio for Oboe, Bassoon, and Piano

Versatile is the word for Andre Previn. With his cumulative experience as conductor, composer, and pianist in the realms of orchestral music, chamber music, and jazz, his range of activities easily matches or exceeds that of any musician before the public today. Previn himself has observed that he has composed more concert music in the past decade—including his acclaimed opera A Streetcar Named Desire, based on the Tennessee Williams play, and his Violin Concerto (commissioned by the BSO, composed for Anne-Sophie Mutter, premiered here in March 2002, and newly issued on CD)—than in the twenty years before that. But this has been neither coincidence nor accident: it has followed naturally from his work as conductor and pianist with some of today's most important orchestras, singers, and instrumentalists. In recent years Previn has composed new voice-and-piano works for soprano Renee Fleming (TTze Giraffes Go To Hamburg and Three Songs of Emily Dickinson, both available on compact disc) and a cello sonata for Yo-Yo Ma. He is currently at work on a second opera, based on the novel Silk by Alessandro Baricco. Other current projects include a new song cycle for tenor Anthony Dean Griffey and a sonata for BSO clarinetist Thomas Martin. As a conductor he is a frequent guest with the BSO, and he often joins its members as pianist in chamber music settings at Symphony Hall and at Tanglewood. Currently in his second season as music director of the Oslo Philharmonic, he also maintains a busy schedule as guest conductor of the world's leading ensembles. In 1991, Doubleday published his memoir, No Minor Chords: My Early Days in Hollywood, chronicling his years as composer, arranger, and orchestrator at the MGM studios. In 1996 he was awarded a Knighthood (KBE) by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth n. —Marc Mandel

The following program note was written originally for the world premiere performance of Previn's Trio for Oboe, Bassoon, and Piano:

The Trio for Piano, Oboe, and Bassoon was commissioned by the Orchestra of St. Luke's, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Mary Flagler Cary Charita- ble Trust. Mr. Previn completed his Trio in Bedford Hills, New York, in 1994, and has dedicated the work to Dr. Jeffrey Gold. The world premiere performance was

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ity tour of the orchestra's home, Symphony Hall. Since the BSO web site is updated on a regular basis, we invite you to check in frequently. Taylor, oboe, and Dennis Godburn, gave the first American given by the composer as pianist with Stephen performances of his 1954 Concerto for Orchestra.) His style 31, 1996. in the 1920s and '30s of his bassoon, at Alice Tully Hall in New York City, on January shared much with that progressive contemporaries, The combination of piano, oboe, and bassoon summons up a sound especially being a harmonically adventurous neoclassicism touched by his love of Chopin for these forces by Francis and the music of his specific to 20th-century France, thanks to the trio written home country, also fashionably borrowing now and then from is extensive; there jazz. His Jewish Poulenc. It is curious that the repertoire for this ensemble not background figures in some works, including a Hebraic Overture. the two principal double-reed instruments into He wrote prolifically in all genres, including seven operas, nine is a pervasive logic to combining symphonies, and much chamber and choral music, and in 1948 wrote a a chamber grouping with piano. book on Stravinsky. In 1983 he The first movement of Mr. Previn's new Trio ("Lively") initially pits the oboe won the Polish Medal of Cultural Merit. He died in Paris on November 15, 1986. and bassoon as a team "versus" the piano in a section whose opening motif bristles Tansman's Suite for Wind Trio (oboe, clarinet, and bassoon) dates from 1949, fol- lowing his with a rocket of sixteenth-notes; but soon the bassoon introduces a more lyrical return to Paris from the United States. It is a masterfully crafted little melody, rather Mozartean in its contours. The material of both sections is developed work in four movements (slow-fast-slow-fast), using chromatically colored modality along the lines of Stravinsky in some detail, requiring perpetual shifts of meter throughout the movement. The or Milhaud. Tansman's smooth melodic and contra- piano opens the second movement ("Slow") with a lament of far-reaching contours. puntal writing in the slow, lyrical movements lacks the affectedness that French When the oboe enters, it does so with the instruction "lonely," as the composer neoclassicism often deliberately courted, and the fast passages have a bounce and makes use of the more doleful propensities of the instrument's tone. The subdued verve traceable, perhaps, to his Polish heritage. The first (Dialogue) and third mood maintains throughout, with the winds only once allowing their sorrow to (Aria) movements are both mournful and bittersweet, with fine balance among the break forth to fortissimo—and then withdrawing to let the piano pursue its pensive three instruments. In the somewhat more chromatic Aria, a middle section, set off thoughts solo. Spirits are restored, however, for the finale ("Jaunty"); as in the by short bassoon cadenzas, refers obliquely to the first movement. The second opening movement, the players are somewhat segregated at the outset—piano vs. movement (Scherzino), based on a quick, aggressive five-beat measure, begins winds—and the bassoon introduces a slower section in counterpoint to a spacious with a bassoon ostinato, over which oboe and clarinet play in rhythmic unison; line in the piano. The moods alternate with some suddenness, but the three players then the ensemble fragments and reworks the material in rearrangements of its unite in the final pages for a high-energy conclusion. small motifs. In the Finale, we are left unsure of the beat pattern—is it two, or —James M. Keller three, or both?—for the first highly charged section, a movement unto itself. A slow coda again referring to the melancholy first and third movements closes the work. Alexandre Tansman (1897-1986) —Robert Kirzinger Suite for Wind Trio Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Alexandre Tansman was born in Lodz, Poland, but moved to Paris in 1920, where Trio in B-flat for clarinet, cello, and piano, Opus 11 he remained for most of the rest of his long life. Having begun composing at nine, he had attended the Lodz Conservatory before earning a doctorate in law at War- Beethoven composed this trio in 1798, possibly for the clarinetist Joseph Beer, though saw University. Although he had some early success in Poland, seeing several works we know nothing about the actual circumstances of composition. It was published performed while still in his teens and winning three prizes in the 1919 Grand Prize later in the same year with a dedication to Countess Maria Wilhelrnine Thun, who of Poland competition, he found his home country's musical culture too conserv- had been a patron to Gluck, Mozart, and Haydn, and who was the mother-in-law of ative for his style, which incorporated elements of polytonality and atonality. In two of Beethoven's most important patrons, Prince Karl Lichnowsky and Count France he became part of a scene that included Stravinsky, Ravel, and Martinu, the Razumovsky. It was customary to try to increase sales of music by providing alter- latter arriving fresh from Bohemia in 1923. Future Boston Symphony music director natives for performance; Beethoven specified that this trio could also be performed Serge Koussevitzky took up Tansman's music for his Paris concerts, conducting with a violin rather than a clarinet, and he went so far as to rewrite a few passages the Scherzo sinfonico in 1923 there and leading the BSO in first performances of his for the use of a violin, but he had clearly conceived the top instrumental line for the A minor Symphony (No. 2) in March 1927, and his Piano Concerto No. 2, with the clarinet and he wrote for that instrument's strengths. Only once again did he write composer as soloist, in December 1927/January 1928. for this particular ensemble, in an arrangement for trio (published as Opus 38) of Tansman became a French citizen in 1938, also that year marrying Colette Cras, his Opus 20 septet. daughter of the French composer (and naval admiral) Jean Cras. Soon, however, The sonata form of the first movement is fairly straightforward, but there are like Martinu and so many others, he and his family were compelled to flee the coun- some lovely harmonic surprises. An unexpected D major in the piano early in the try after being blacklisted by Nazi authorities. In 1941 he settled in Los Angeles, exposition presents the material that opens the development, equally surprisingly, mixing with other expatriate European musicians there, renewing his acquaintance in D-flat. This leads into an unusually dark development section, but everything with Stravinsky and Milhaud, and getting to know Schoenberg. He even wrote a brightens again at the recapitulation. The Adagio opens with an Italianate theme few film scores, including music for Flesh and Fantasy (starring Edward G. Robinson) in the cello (here bassoon), accompanied by the piano, for all the world an operatic and Paris Underground. In 1946, though, he returned to Paris. cavatina. Clarinet (here oboe) and piano each get turns in the limelight, too, until a Following his return to France, career fortunes for the still respected Tansman "dying fall" brings down the curtain. suffered a perhaps inevitable, albeit ill-deserved, decline in the face of the nearly The finale is a set of variations on a popular air from Joseph Weigl's opera I!amor overwhelming push for the "new" among younger, and a few older, composers. marinaro, which had been produced in October 1797. According to one story, (The BSO hasn't played Tansman's work since 1956, when Vladimir Golschmann Beethoven was asked by the publisher Artaria to write variations on this tune and Music Center, Mr. Ranti has also participated in the Spoleto and Marlboro festivals.

only found out later what it was, to his outrage. Another story, to the effect that he He won second prize in the 1982 Toulon International Bassoon Competition and is the had used this aria at the request of the clarinetist for whom he wrote the trio, seems recipient of two Canada Council grants. Mr. Ranti can be heard frequently in Boston- more likely, since he identified the aria, "Prio ch'io l'impegno," in the printed edi- area chamber performances, with groups such as the Walden Chamber Players, with tion. In any case, Beethoven professed to be dissatisfied with the movement and whom he has recorded an album of bassoon and string music. He is on the faculty planned at one time to replace it with another. Weigl's theme is certainly simple- of both the New England Conservatory and Boston University School for the Arts. minded enough, but Beethoven rings some fascinating changes on it. The first vari- ation is a kind of etude for solo piano, followed by a canonic variation for clarinet Pianist Hugh Hinton has performed widely as a chamber musician, including concerts and cello (here oboe and bassoon). The biggest surprise comes after the climactic throughout the Middle East as a United States Information Agency Artistic Ambas- ninth variation when, avoiding the expected cadence, the piano wanders off, to our sador. Other international engagements have included concerts in Japan, Korea, Russia, astonishment, into the key of G for a lively, syncopated 6/8 view of the theme. Just Ukraine, and Moldova. He has performed since 1993 with CORE Ensemble, a con- as suddenly it slips back into B-flat for the final moments. temporary classical music trio composed of cello, piano, and percussion. Orchestral —Steven Ledberter engagements include the premieres of triple concertos by Bernard Rands and Chinary Ung with the Phoenix, New Hampshire, and Honolulu symphonies. Mr. Hinton has appeared at summer music festivals including Tanglewood and Monadnock, and at Keisuke Wakao joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra as assistant principal oboe such concert halls as the Gardner Museum in Boston and the Phillips Collection in in the fall of 1990, having previously been a member of the New World Symphony Washington, D.C. His recordings of chamber and contemporary music have been since its inaugural season. A native of Tokyo, Mr. Wakao received his performance broadcast internationally on "Art of the States" and can be found on the New World, diploma from the Manhattan School of Music, where he served on the faculty fol- Etcetera, CRI, Albany, and Newport Classics labels. Mr. Hinton earned his bachelor's lowing his graduation in 1987. He performed with the New Japan Philharmonic under degree from Harvard University and his master's and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees Seiji Ozawa in 1985 and made his concerto debut with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra from New England Conservatory. His piano teachers included Russell Sherman, under Kazuyoshi Akiyama in the summer of 1989. Since that time he has made nu- Wha-Kyung Byun, Lev Vlasenko, and Mykola Suk. Mr. Hinton has taught music merous solo appearances, including performances with the Boston Pops Orchestra history at New England Conservatory and currently serves as instructor of piano at under John Williams and the Tokyo City Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1994 he was in- the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, MA. vited to participate in the chamber music division of the Spoleto Festival in Italy. He made his Tokyo recital debut in September 1997 and performed with pianist Christoph Eschenbach in a recital at Sapporo's Pacific Festival in July 1998. At the Manhattan School, Mr. Wakao studied with Joseph Robinson, principal oboist of the New York Philharmonic, with whom he gave a joint recital in Tokyo in 1984. While a Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in 1984 and 1987 he studied with Alfred Gen- ovese and Ralph Gomberg. A finalist in the 1988 Lucarelli International Oboe Compe- tition at Carnegie Hall, Mr. Wakao started the Keisuke Wakao Oboe Camp in Tokyo in 1988 and is currently on the faculty of the New England Conservatory of Music.

Thomas Martin served as principal clarinet of the Alabama Symphony Orchestra before joining the Boston Symphony Orchestra in the fall of 1984. Born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Mr. Martin graduated from the Eastman School of Music, where he was a student of Stanley Hasty and Peter Hadcock. He participated in master classes with Guy Deplus of the Paris Conservatory. Mr. Martin performs frequently as a recitalist Symphony Shopping and chamber musician and has been heard on "Morning Pro Musica" on WGBH radio. He has appeared in the BSO's Chamber Music Teas and Community Concerts, in the Friday Preludes at Tanglewood, at the Longy School of Music, and at the Gardner Museum. Visit the Symphony Shop in the Cohen Wing Associate principal bassoonist Richard Ranti joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra at the West Entrance at the start of the 1989-90 season; he is also principal bassoonist of the Boston Pops Orchestra. Born on Huntington in Montreal, Mr. Ranti started bassoon at age ten, studying with Sidney Avenue. Rosenberg and David Carroll. After graduating from Interlochen Arts Academy, he Hours: Tuesday through Friday, 1 1-4 studied with ; Sol Schoenbach at the Curtis Institute of Music. At nineteen he won the BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA second bassoon Saturday, 1 2-6,- from one hour before each position in the Philadelphia Orchestra; he spent six years with that orchestra, the concert through intermission- and for up last as acting associate principal. A 1982 Fellow at the Tanglewood to thirty minutes after each BSO concert.