Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra Simon Rivard, TSO Resident Conductor & TSYO Conductor
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Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra Simon Rivard, TSO Resident Conductor & TSYO Conductor Sunday, November 25, 2018 at 3:00pm George Weston Recital Hall Simon Rivard, conductor Leonard Bernstein Overture to Candide Claude Debussy Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune Johannes Brahms Academic Festival Overture, Op. 80 Intermission Leonard Bernstein Symphonic Dances from West Side Story Prologue Somewhere Scherzo Mambo Cha-cha Meeting Scene “Cool” Fugue Rumble Finale NOVEMBER 25, 2018 33 ABOUT THE WORKS Leonard Bernstein Overture to Candide Born: Lawrence, Massachusetts, USA, August 25, 1918 5 Died: New York, New York, USA, October 14, 1990 min Composed: Between 1953 and 1956 Conductor, composer, pianist, author, and weighty for the show to find success in broadcaster, humanitarian—Leonard the popular theatre. Candide had a disastrous Bernstein left indelible marks on an initial run of just 73 performances. Bernstein astonishing range of endeavours. He was and several different collaborators created the New York Philharmonic’s music director further versions, none entirely successful. from 1958 to 1969, the first native-born The plot comes from a satiric tale by the 18th- conductor to take charge of a major American century French author Voltaire. Candide is a orchestra. In later years, his guest-conducting young man who believes in the philosophy, engagements earned him as lofty an set out by his teacher, that everything that international reputation as the one he enjoyed happens must be for the best. His adventures in America. take him around the world and involve him in He composed music throughout his career, a long series of catastrophes. In the end, he ranging from witty, light-hearted songs renounces his former outlook and resolves to and superb stage musicals to substantial build a new, honest, and hopeful life. operas, ballets, concertos, and symphonies. Bernstein’s bright and witty music has always What unites them is a strong sense of been Candide’s strong suit. It pays satiric communication, reflecting his deep homage to the play’s period setting through understanding and celebration of the human take-offs on the classical dances and the condition. empty-headed operatic conventions of the The Broadway musicals Candide and West Side story’s period. The Overture weaves together Story came into being during the same period. snippets of the score’s themes into a bright, West Side Story won success from the start, vivacious potpourri that makes it the perfect but Candide has had a troubled history. The curtain-raiser for concerts of many kinds. book for the original version, written by famed Program note by Don Anderson playwright Lillian Hellman, proved too dark 34 TORONTO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA Claude Debussy Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune Born: St. Germaine-en-Laye, France, August 22, 1862 10 Died: Paris, France, March 25, 1918 min Composed: Between 1892 and 1894 Premièred in Paris on December 22, 1894, with magic. Short phrases melt one into the other; Gustave Doret conducting, this masterpiece of solo winds take the spotlight in turn; coolness musical atmosphere heralded the emergence alternates with passion. of Debussy’s mature style. Poet Stéphane Recalling the première, conductor Gustave Mallarmé had written “L’après-midi d’un faune” Doret wrote, “There was a vast silence in the in 1876. When Debussy encountered it some hall as I ascended the podium with some ten years later, he recognized in it a style emotion, but full of confidence. I waited a similar to his view of music. long moment, after imposing silence on the The words of the poem are those of a faun audience, then our marvellous flutist Barrère or satyr, a lazy, pleasure-loving half-man, unrolled his opening theme. Suddenly I felt half-goat creature from Classical mythology. behind my back a completely captivated Debussy described his musical reflection public! The triumph was complete, so much as “a very free rendering of Mallarmé’s so that I did not hesitate to break the rule beautiful poem. It does not purport to contain forbidding encores. The orchestra was everything that is in the poem. It is rather a delighted to repeat this work, which it had succession of scenes in which the desires and come to love and which, thanks to them, the dreams of the faun pass through in the heat audience had now accepted.” of the afternoon. Then, tired of chasing the The grateful Mallarmé gave Debussy a copy of frightened nymphs and naiads, he gives in to the poem, inscribed with a verse which may be intoxicating sleep.” translated as: Music as free and sensuous as this had Oh forest god of breath primeval never been heard before. Its improvisational If your flute be true, quality would become a Debussy trademark. Listen now to all the light Conjured out of silence by the unaccompanied Debussy will breathe through you. call of the faun’s flute, it evokes Mallarmé’s hazy, dream-like ideas with effortless tonal Program note by Don Anderson NOVEMBER 25, 2018 35 ABOUT THE WORKS Johannes Brahms Academic Festival Overture, Op. 80 Born: Hamburg, Germany, May 7, 1833 10 min Died: Vienna, Austria, April 3, 1897 Composed: 1880 Brahms created his only two concert overtures percussion instruments. The quiet yet bustling during the same brief period. They are utterly introduction appears to be based on original different in character. “One weeps, the other Brahms material. It playfully gives what proves laughs,” was how he described the Tragic to be a mistaken impression of seriousness Overture and the Academic Festival Overture. and solemnity. He wrote the merry Academic Festival Overture The main section quickly changes all that. as a gesture of thanks for a degree that Brahms founded it upon four traditional the University of Breslau bestowed upon German student songs. After a soft timpani him. His Honorary Doctorate of Philosophy roll, the brass play “We Had Built a Stately bore the inscription, “first among today’s House”. This is followed by “Most Solemn masters of serious music in Germany.” His Song to the Father of the Country”, a heartfelt ironic sense of humour, plus the fact that tune first heard in the strings. Next is “What he had received his musical education from Comes There from on High”, a satiric ditty private teachers rather than by attending which Brahms introduces on the bassoons. “institutes of higher learning,” led him to make He developed all this material extensively and it as jolly and informal as the university was ingeniously, then crowned the overture with conservative and stuffy. He didn’t care for the a majestic setting of the best-known of the title but couldn’t come up with a better one. songs, “Gaudeamus igitur”, a solemn medieval Comparing it with the music of the original hymn in praise of student life. master of Viennese operetta, he referred to it Here is a translation of the first verse: as a “boisterous medley of student songs à la (Franz von) Suppé.” Let us rejoice therefore While we are young. He conducted the première in Breslau in After a pleasant youth January 1881. The faculty frowned at his anti- After a troublesome old age traditional audacity, but the students laughed The earth will have us. and cheered for the same reason. Program note by Don Anderson He scored the overture for the largest orchestra he ever used, including a handful of 36 TORONTO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA Leonard Bernstein Symphonic Dances from West Side Story Born: Lawrence, Massachusetts, USA, August 25, 1918 22 min Died: New York, New York, USA, October 14, 1990 Composed: 1957 Leonard Bernstein’s stage musical West Side The following synopsis appears in the Story premièred on Broadway on September 26, published score: 1957. This orchestral suite, Symphonic Dances, Prologue: The growing rivalry between the was premièred by conductor Lukas Foss and the teenage street gangs, the Sharks and the Jets. New York Philharmonic on February 13, 1961, in the wake of the show’s 1961 film version, Somewhere: In a visionary dance sequence, the which won ten Academy Awards including two gangs are united in friendship. Best Picture. It uses the original Broadway Scherzo: In the same dream, they break orchestrations by Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal, through the city walls and suddenly find expanded under Bernstein’s supervision to full themselves in a world of space, air and sun. symphony orchestra. Mambo: Reality again; competitive dance The virtually operatic West Side Story is between the gangs. Bernstein’s masterpiece of musical theatre. It updates the spirit of Shakespeare’s Romeo Cha-cha: The star-crossed lovers see each and Juliet into contemporary times, placing other for the first time and dance together. the star-crossed lovers, Tony and Maria, on Meeting Scene: Music accompanies their first opposite sides of a conflict between street spoken words. gangs in the slums of New York’s Manhattan Island. “Cool” Fugue: An elaborate dance sequence in which the Jets practice controlling their Dance—dramatic, even violent in nature— hostility. plays a prominent role in the show and provided plentiful material for this symphonic Rumble: Climactic gang battle during which the synthesis, which links together many of the two gang leaders are killed. most familiar themes into a digest of the plot. Finale: Love music developing into a Even if you aren’t familiar with the storyline, it procession, which recalls, in tragic reality, the provides grand entertainment and a banquet vision of Somewhere. of memorable melodies. Program note by Don Anderson NOVEMBER 25, 2018 37 THE ARTISTS Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra For more than 40 years, the Toronto Symphony Youth Orchestra (TSYO) has been dedicated to providing a high-level orchestral experience for talented young musicians aged 22 and under.