Tetzlaff Quartet Christian Tetzlaff, Violin Elisabeth Kufferath, Violin Hanna Weinmeister, Viola Tanja Tetzlaff, Cello
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Sunday, November 12, 201 7, 3pm Hertz Hall tetzlaff Quartet Christian tetzlaff, violin Elisabeth Kufferath, violin Hanna weinmeister, viola tanja tetzlaff, cello PROGRAM wolfgang Amadeus MOZARt Quartet No. 16 in E-flat Major, (1756 –1791) K. 428 (K. 421b) Allegro non troppo Andante con moto Menuetto & trio Allegro vivace Alban BERG (1885 –1935) Quartet, Op. 3 Langsam Mässige Viertel INTERMISSION Franz SCHUBERt (1797 –1828) Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887 Allegro molto moderato Andante un poco moto Scherzo: Allegro vivace – trio: Allegretto Allegro assai Recordings available on the CAvi Music and Ondine labels. The Tetzlaff Quartet appears by arrangement with CM Artists. This performance is made possible, in part, by Patron Sponsors Will and Linda Schieber. Cal Performances’ 2017 –18 season is sponsored by Wells Fargo. 19 PROGRAM NOTES Quartet No. 16 in E-flat Major, eras, and by the composer himself, who insisted K. 428 (K. 421b) that the Parisian publisher Sieber pay consider - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart ably more for them than for a set of three piano Of all the famous composer pairs—Bach and concertos. “the ‘Haydn’ Quartets are models of Handel, Bruckner and Mahler, Debussy and perfection,” wrote Homer Ulrich, “not a false ges - Ravel—only Mozart and Haydn were friends. ture; not a faulty proportion. the six quartets Mozart first mentioned his acquaintance with stand as the finest examples of Mozart’s genius.” Haydn in a letter to his father on April 24, 1784, Mozart played the first three of the quartets but he probably had met the older composer (K. 387, K. 421, K. 428) for Haydn on January 15, soon after moving to Vienna three years earlier. 1785, and proudly sent a report on the occasion though his duties kept him across the border to his father in Salzburg, with which he en - in Hungary at Esterháza Palace for most of closed the scores for the new pieces. A month the year, Haydn usually spent the winters in later, on Friday, February 11th, Leopold arrived Vienna, and it is likely that he and Mozart at - for his only visit to Vienna following wolfgang’s tended or even played together at some of the marriage in 1782 (which Papa constantly de - many “string quartet parties” that graced the so - cried). that same evening, Mozart whisked his cial calendars of the city’s music lovers during father to a concert at which he played the new the cold months. true friendship and mutual D- minor Piano Concerto (K. 466), the first of admiration developed between the two master six heavily subscribed “Academies” he presented musicians, despite the 24 years difference in that spring. the next night Mozart gave a long- their ages, and they took a special delight in planned party for Leopold and several friends learning from and praising each other’s music. at his flat in Schulerstrasse at which the last Mozart’s greatest testament to his respect for three of the “Haydn” Quartets were introduced. Haydn is the set of six superb string quartets (K. 464 and K. 465 were finished on January composed between 1782 and 1785, and dedi - 10th and 14th; K. 458 was composed the previ - cated to his colleague upon their publication ous November.) Haydn and Mozart were joined in September 1785. “to my dear friend Haydn,” in the performance by their Masonic lodge read the inscription. “A father who had resolved brothers Anton and Bartholomäus tinti. in to send his children out into the great world took a letter to his daughter in Salzburg, Leopold, it to be his duty to confide them to the protec - bursting with pride over the accomplishments tion and guidance of a very celebrated Man, es - and recognition of his son in the imperial city, pecially when the latter by good fortune was at recorded the highlight of that soirée: “Herr the same time his best Friend.” these works are Haydn said to me: ‘i tell you before God and as not just charming souvenirs of personal senti - an honest man that your son is the greatest ments, however, but they also represent a sig - composer known to me either in person or by nificant advance in Mozart’s compositional style, name. He has taste and, what is more, the most for in them he assimilated the techniques of profound knowledge of composition.’” For the thematic development and thorough integra - father who had devoted so much of his life to tion of the instrumental voices that Haydn the training and nurturing of his extraordinary had perfected in his Op. 20 (1771) and Op. 33 son, that moment was, according Alfred Ein - quartets (1781). “they are,” Mozart noted in the stein, “the climax of his life.” dedication, “the fruit of long and laborious en - the E-flat Quartet, K. 428 (corrected to K. deavor,” a statement supported by the manu - 421b in Einstein’s revisions of Ludwig von scripts, which show more experimentation and Köchel’s catalog) was composed in June and correction than any other of his scores. the su - July 1783, just before Mozart and Constanze perior quality of the “Haydn” Quartets was rec - journeyed to Salzburg to convince Papa Leo - ognized both by the publisher Artaria, who pold of the wisdom of their marriage the year paid Mozart the extraordinary fee of 100 ducats, before. (they did not succeed.) the couple’s a sum usually reserved only for complete op - first child, Raimund Leopold, born on June 17, 20 PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES i z z a t r e B a i g r o i G 1783, was placed with a nurse in their absence; for the next three-quarters of a century was pre - the baby died on August 18th, though the par - pared to follow that lead, however, so the theme ents seem not have learned of the tragedy until soon rights itself into E-flat Major, though the they returned to Vienna at the end of Novem - seed of chromatic ambiguity planted in the first ber. the emotional richness of Mozart’s new life measures sprouts in many phrases throughout as a husband, father, and family provider was the movement to cloud the bright home key. it almost certainly one of the reasons behind the is such peerless balancing of light and shadow, of increased depth of expression his music began pitting certainty against doubt in musical terms, to show at that time, a quality that appears with that is perhaps the greatest evidence of Mozart’s special force in the Quartet in E-flat Major. genius. there is simply no one else, not even though the elements of good taste and sonor - Haydn, who could have written this movement. ous beauty were always Mozart’s foremost con - the quest to burrow to the bedrock of feeling cerns in his compositions, Homer Ulrich noted continues in the Andante. wrote A. Hyatt King, that “during the last 10 years of his life, he gave “though the movement is in sonata form, there us music in which unrest, a degree of pessi - is little melody which lingers in the memory. mism, and some concern over the prospect the 96 bars are a richly harmonized, dream-like of death are reflected, however faintly.” the un - meditation, a quiet but restless inner searching settled quality of this work, the sense of strain - heightened by the use of chromatic syncopa - ing after strong emotional effect, is established tion. in all of Mozart’s chamber music, only the immediately with the main theme, one of Adagio of the great String trio of 1788 [K. 563] the most unusual opening gestures in Classical offers any comparison.” it is indicative of the na - music—an octave leap followed by a tortuous ture of this music that the formal second theme series of tonality-defying intervals played in bears a striking resemblance in its chromati - mysterious unison by all of the participants. cism and melodic leadings to a passage from Hans Keller pointed out that if Mozart had wagner’s Tristan und Isolde , the revolutionary followed the harmonic implications of this ex - work that was still 76 years in the future when traordinary motive, he would have produced Mozart penned these measures. there follows “something even more advanced historically an enormous Menuetto movement that bal - than Tristan .” Neither Mozart nor anyone else ances hammer-blow chords against a limpid 21 PROGRAM NOTES lyrical phrase. the central trio provides a re - agreed to take Berg on as a pupil for free. A for - markable harmonic adventure that begins in tunate inheritance in 1905 made it possible for the morose key of C minor but ends in the Berg to leave his government job and devote tonality of B-flat Major, an absolutely unex - himself assiduously to his lessons. He began pected progression made graceful by the suavity composing in earnest under Schoenberg’s tute - and sophistication of Mozart’s style. the finale, lage, and had soon produced the Seven Early a rondo based on the kittenish theme presented Songs , the first work that he was to include in in the opening measures, is, appropriately, the his mature canon. A piano sonata (Op. 1) fol - most cheerful movement of the quartet. the lowed in 1908, and a set of four songs (Op. 2) spirit and technique of Haydn are strongly evi - and a string quartet (Op. 3) two years later, by dent here, since Mozart borrowed such of his which time Berg considered that his musical friend’s procedures as instrumental interplay, apprenticeship had come to an end. He discon - sudden dynamic changes, and surprising si - tinued formal lessons with Schoenberg in 1910, lences.