Elgar's Cello Concerto
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Elgar's Cello Concerto Virtuoso Series Monday 5 September | 7:30pm City Recital Hall Three Parts Mozart Thursday 3 November, 7:30pm Guest Artists, Haydn Symphony No. 6 in D major Paul Meyer Mozart Bassoon Concerto in B flat major and Ben Hoadley Mozart Clarinet Concerto in A major Mozart Symphony No. 40 in G minor City Recital Hall Bookings 02 8256 2222 or cityrecitalhall.com Principal Sponsor Major Sponsor Media Partner Elgar's Cello Concerto Monday 5 September, 7:30pm City Recital Hall Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Fantasia in F minor (12 mins) Mark Grandison Riffraction (14 mins) Guillaume Connesson Sextet (13 mins) - interval (20 mins) - Benjamin Britten Sinfonietta (16 mins) Edward Elgar Cello Concerto in E minor (30 mins) Pre Concert Talk, Eva Frey 6:45pm-7:15pm This evening’s performance will be recorded by ABC Classic FM for future broadcast. Recording Engineer, Andre Shrimski Elgar's Cello Concerto - Monday 5 September 2016 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Fantasia in F minor K. 608 (1791) I. Adagio II. Allegro III. Adagio The items on display at Count The opening prelude, in the style Joseph Deym von Střítež' once of a French overture, leads into famous Viennese art gallery a dignified fugue. An andante included plaster copies of aria provides contrast before the famous objets d’art, original fugue returns in a more complex bronze and ivory statues, and form. life-like wax figures of real One of Mozart’s last works, the and mythical beings. Bespoke Fantasia looks to both the past musical soundscapes, brought to and the future: while drawing on life by mechanical instruments, the contrapuntal techniques of accompanied the exhibitions. Mozart’s predecessors, it is more In 1790, asked by the Count emotionally charged than most to write a piece for one such of the composer’s creations, instrument – a clockwork organ hinting at the romantic era to – Mozart agreed, if only because come. he needed the money. Although he moaned about the task in a letter to a friend, Mozart must have decided it was worth the effort, for a few months after fulfilling the commission he registered another ‘machine composition’; the Fantasia we hear today. The Fantasia fuses multiple movements into a single work. Ensemble: (clarinet), Rowden David (oboe), Bubb Matthew (flute), Lisa Osmialowski (violin), Yoshimoto Natsuko (horn), Michael Dixon (bassoon), Ben Hoadley (cello), Stender Paul Thompson (viola), Neil (violin), Nakamura Airena (piano) Raspopova Maria bass), (double Henery Alex Omega Ensemble Virtuoso Series Mark Grandison (1965-) Riffraction (2011) Riffraction is a triple pun: the are equal partners in work is based on riffs with polyrhythmic and contrapuntal pop/funk-inspired rhythmic textures. inflections; these riffs are A driving factor in composing progressively distorted by this piece was squeezing more processes analogous to the way out of less - for example, with light is refracted when it travels the exception of parts of the through a medium of differing interludes, the work is based on densities, like glass or water; and the same scale throughout. And all this leads to plenty of musical often one riff will have derived action. from an earlier one, rather In spirit, Riffraction is a than presenting entirely new scherzo, though one who’s material. For each section, the form and temperament is twice incessant repetition and gradual interrupted. Three brisk riff- metamorphosis of each riff based sections are separated offers a kaleidoscopic viewing by two hovering interludes, of a persistent musical object, darker in character and offering fundamentally the same and yet temporary respite from the apparently ever different. otherwise manic surface energy. - Notes by the composer The clarinet is often featured as a virtuoso soloist, with the piano and string quartet at times purely accompanimental, as though converging into a multi-limbed single instrument. At other times all six instruments Ensemble: (violin), Nakamura Airena (violin), Yoshimoto Natsuko (clarinet), David Rowden (piano) Raspopova Maria (cello), Stender Paul Thompson (viola), Neil Elgar's Cello Concerto - Monday 5 September 2016 Guillaume Connesson (1970-) Sextet (1998) Guillaume Connesson is a Of this Sextet, the composer French composer whose music writes: borrows freely from wherever “Composed for my friends, Eric he finds colour and interest – Le Sage and Paul Meyer for a from disco to techno, from the New Year concert, this Sextet concert hall to film, from the was written with festivities and Viennese masters to his fellow entertainment in mind. The first countrymen. Cosmopolitan in movement “Dynamic” is a series source and style, it is the product of variations, which multiply the of a curious, well-listened and rhythmic processes inherited well-trained ear. from repetitive American music. Connesson has won numerous The central “Nocturnal” section important awards, including is a soft and painful confidence the Nadia and Lili Boulanger sung by the clarinet amid a Prize in 1999 and the Grand harmonic backdrop of strings Prix Lycéen des Compositeurs, and piano. Finally, “Festivities” and has received commissions creates a sense of joy and from orchestras and chamber excitement (with an allusion to ensembles across Europe and Schubert's “Trout”). The score the United States. Currently ends with a “cadential” joke.” a Professor of orchestration at the Conservatoire National d'Aubervilliers-la Courneuve, Connesson’s instrumental casting is always superb and often surprising. Ensemble: bass), (double Henery Alex Thompson (viola), Neil (violin), Yoshimoto Natsuko (piano) Raspopova Maria Bubb (oboe), Matthew (clarinet), David Rowden Omega Ensemble Virtuoso Series Benjamin Britten (1912-1976) Sinfonietta Op. 1 (1932) I. Poco presto ed agitato II. Variations, andante lento III. Tarantella Sinfonietta Op 1. was composed begun to influence the young in just three weeks when composer. Benjamin Britten was just 18. The first movement is in sonata He was at the time a student at form and the opening bars London’s Royal College of Music, contain the intervallic structures and dedicated the work to his that form the basis of the work’s teacher Frank Bridge. melodic and harmonic themes. The Sinfonietta is a remarkably The rhapsodic second movement assured work for such a young is a loose set of variations composer. Prior to entering while the energetic Tarantella the College he had, however, is one of Britten’s first forays already produced such a volume into the music of dance that of works, and paid such attention would continue to fascinate him to detail in his scoring and throughout his career. presentation, that the much-in- demand Frank Bridge had been convinced to take him on. The Royal College of Music was then dominated by conservative musicians such as Vaughan Williams. Bridge was more open to new ideas such as those emerging from the Second Viennese School, and the Sinfonietta shows that Britten’s mentor has already Ensemble: (clarinet), Rowden David (oboe), Bubb Matthew (flute), Lisa Osmialowski (violin), Yoshimoto Natsuko (horn), Michael Dixon (bassoon), Ben Hoadley (cello), Stender Paul Thompson (viola), Neil (violin), Nakamura Airena bass) (double Henery Alex Elgar's Cello Concerto - Monday 5 September 2016 Edward Elgar (1857-1934) Cello Concerto in E minor Op. 85 (1919) arr. Iain Farringdon I. Adagio; Moderato II. Lento; Allegro molto III. Adagio IV. Allegro; Moderato; Allegro, ma non troppo; Poco più lento; Adagio Cello Solo, Teije Hylkema “My idea is that there is music the fact that one morning, still in the air, music all around us,” recovering from the effects of Elgar once said: “The world is full anaesthesia after having his of it and you simply take as much tonsils removed, Elgar asked as you require.” for a pen and paper in order to transcribe what would later Music had always been part of become the Cello Concerto’s Elgar’s world: his father owned main theme. a music shop, and Elgar taught himself the craft of composition It was not until the War had by diligently studying the great ended, however, that Elgar Masters. Through music, Elgar reapplied himself to the practice worked to make sense of the of composing, producing four world and his place in it. As significant works in the space music fed his life, so too, his life of only 12 months, this cello fed into his music. concerto amongst them. These works all possess a new restraint Yet during the Great War, music that only serves to intensify their as a form of expression failed effect. the composer; he was unable to do any real work, he said, The Cello Concerto can be heard under the cloud of such an as a haunting lament for a lost awful shadow. Yet on occasion world. And for Elgar, whose he still experienced a flicker health was failing and reputation Ensemble: (clarinet), Rowden David (oboe), Bubb Matthew (flute), Lisa Osmialowski (violin), Yoshimoto Natsuko (horn), Michael Dixon (bassoon), Ben Hoadley (cello), Stender Paul Thompson (viola), Neil (violin), Nakamura Airena (Trumpet), Morris Owen (piano), Raspopova Maria bass), (double Henery Alex (Timpani) Robinson Mark (trombone), Nigel Crocker of creativity. Much is made of dwindling, this theme resonated Omega Ensemble Virtuoso Series at a personal level as well as the Elgar’s finely crafted musical universal. At times heroic, but at backdrop it here becomes others touched with loneliness heartbreakingly poignant. and self-doubt and regret, the Elgar is said to have hummed work maintains a very human this melody to a friend as he connection. lay dying almost 15 years after It is a sign of Elgar’s genius the Concerto was completed. that such emotional complexity Perhaps he felt he was in some emerges from such simple way returning the music back musical brushstrokes. In just to the air around us, warning the opening few moments, the his friend that: "If ever after dramatic opening arrests the I'm dead you hear someone listener’s attention before a whistling this tune on the reflective cello solo gives way to Malvern Hills, don't be alarmed.