PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 1

Tuesday, August 7, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Inna Faliks, Piano

OPENING NIGHT: VIENNA I

SMITH The Star-Spangled Banner arr. Mueller

SIECZYNSKI Vienna, City of My Dreams*

BRAHMS Symphony No. 3 in F major, Op. 90 Allegro con brio Andante Poco allegretto Allegro

— INTERMISSION —

BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 1 in C major, Op. 15 Allegro con brio Largo Rondo: Allegro scherzando

* first PMF performance

This concert is sponsored by Ron & Pat Carkoski, OC & Pat Boldt. Also by Nancy Mills in memory of Catherine & William Kettanhoven.

Inna Faliks is performing on the Esther Browning Piano.

Ms. Faliks appears by arrangement with John Gingrich Management Inc., New York, NY

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 1 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 1 of several close friends, including his dear teacher, Marxsen, and he was feuding with the violinist Joseph Vienna, City of My Dreams Joachim, who had been a champion of his music for Rudolf Sieczynski (1877-1952) thirty years, by taking the side of Frau Joachim in the Composed in 1843. couple’s recent divorce proceedings. Many cross-cur- Premiered on February 3, 1844 in Paris, conducted by rents of emotion therefore impinged upon the Third Sym- the composer. phony, though Brahms certainly had no specific program in mind for the work. It has nevertheless been called Rudolf Sieczynski was a composer of the Viennese his “Eroica” (by Hans Richter and Eduard Hanslick), a café music known as Schrammel-Lieder, named for the forest idyll (Clara Schumann), a rendering of the Greek violin-playing Schrammel brothers, Johann and Josef, legend of Hero and Leander (Joachim), a depiction of the who founded a trio with a guitarist in 1878 to play at the statue of Germania at Rüdesheim (Max Kalbeck), and local wine houses. Clarinet and accordion were later of a young, heroic Bismarck (Richard Specht). It is all added to the little ensemble, which became the informal of these, at least to those individuals, but, more impor- counterpart of the full-dress society dances staged by tantly, it is really none of these or any other specifically the Strauss family. Among Sieczynski’s waltzes, march- non-musical subject, because this Third Symphony of es, galops and songs is the 1914 waltz that captures the Brahms is the pinnacle of the pure, abstract symphonic imperial city’s allure and sensuality as well as any ever art that stretched back more than a century to Haydn written — Vienna, City of My Dreams. and Mozart. It is a work of such supreme mastery of all the musical elements that it is a distillation of an almost Symphony No. 3 in F major, Op. 90 infinite number of emotional states, not one of which Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) can be adequately rendered in words. “When I look at Composed in 1882-1883. the Third Symphony of Brahms,” lamented the English Premiered on December 2, 1883 in Vienna, conducted master Sir Edward Elgar, “I feel like a tinker.” by Hans Richter. When the Third Symphony first appeared, it was generally acclaimed as Brahms’ best work in the form, Brahms had reached the not inconsiderable age of and perhaps the greatest of all his compositions, despite 43 before he unveiled his First Symphony. The Second well-organized attempts by the Wagner cabal to disrupt Symphony followed within eighteen months, and the the premiere. Critical opinion has changed little since. musical world was prepared for a steady stream of simi- This, the shortest of the four symphonies, is the most lar masterworks from his pen. However, it was to be an- clear in formal outline, the most subtle in harmonic con- other six years before he undertook his Third Symphony, tent, and the most assured in contrapuntal invention. No though he did produce the Academic Festival and Tragic time is wasted in establishing the conflict that charges Overtures, the Violin Concerto and the Second Piano the first movement with dynamic energy. The two bold Concerto during that time. When he got around to the opening chords juxtapose bright F major and a somber new symphony, he was nearly fifty and had just recov- chromatic harmony in the opposing moods of light and ered from a spell of feeling that he was “too old” for cre- shadow that course through the work. The main theme ative work, even informing his publisher, Simrock, that comes from the strings “like a bolt from Jove,” according he would be sending him nothing more. It seems likely to New York Times critic Olin Downes, with the opening — though such matters always remained in the shadows chords repeated by the woodwinds as its accompani- where Brahms was concerned — that his creative juices ment. Beautifully directed chromatic harmonies — note were stirred anew by a sudden infatuation with “a pretty the bass line, which always carries the motion to its Rhineland girl.” This was Hermine Spiess, a contralto of close- and long-range goals — lead to the pastoral excellent talent who was 26 when Brahms first met her second theme, sung softly by the clarinet. The develop- in January 1883 at the home of friends. (Brahms was ment section is brief, but includes elaborations of most fifty.) A cordial, admiring friendship sprang up between of the motives from the exposition. The tonic key of F is the two, but that affair, like every other one in Brahms’ re-established, not harmonically but melodically (again life in which a respectable woman was involved, never the bass leads the way), and the golden chords of the grew any deeper. He used to declare, perhaps only half opening proclaim the recapitulation. A long coda based in jest, that he lived his life by two principles, “and one of on the main theme reinforces the tonality and discharges them is never to attempt either an opera or a marriage.” much of the music’s energy, allowing the movement to Perhaps what he really needed was a muse rather than close quietly, as do, most unusually, all the movements a wife. At any rate, Brahms spent the summer of 1883 of this Symphony. not in his usual haunts among the Austrian hills and The second and third are the most intimate and per- lakes, but at the German spa of Wiesbaden, which just sonal movements found anywhere in Brahms’ orchestral happened to be the home of Hermine. Work went well output. A simple, folk-like theme appears in the rich on the new symphony, and it was completed before he colors of the low woodwinds and low strings to open the returned to Vienna in October. second movement. The central section of the movement More than just an attractive girl was on Brahms’ mind is a Slavic-sounding plaint intoned by clarinet and bas- in 1883, however. He had recently suffered the deaths

— 2 — soon that eventually gives way to the flowing rhythms bested such local keyboard luminaries as Daniel Steibelt of the opening and the return of the folk theme sup- and Joseph Wölffl to become the rage of the music-mad ported by a new, rippling string accompaniment. Edward Austrian capital. His appeal was in an almost untamed, Downes (son of Olin, referenced above) noted about passionate, novel quality in both his manner of per- this lovely Andante that its “almost Olympian grace and formance and his personality, characteristics that first poise recall the spirit if not the letter of Mozart.” The intrigued and then captivated those who heard him. romantic third movement replaces the usual scherzo. Václav Tomášek, an important Czech composer who It is ternary in form, like the preceding movement, and heard Beethoven play the C major Concerto in Prague in utilizes the warmest tone colors of the orchestra. 1798, wrote, “His grand style of playing had an extraor- The finale begins with a sinuous theme of brooding dinary effect on me. I felt so shaken that for several days character. A brief, chant-like processional derived from I could not bring myself to touch the piano.” the Slavic theme of the second movement provides con- Beethoven, largely self-taught as a pianist, did not trast. Further thematic material is introduced (one theme follow in the model of sparkling technical perfection is arch-shaped; the other, more rhythmically vigorous) for which Mozart, who died only a few months before and well examined. Brahms dispensed here with a true Beethoven’s arrival, was well remembered in Vienna. development section, but combined its function with that He was vastly more impetuous and less precise at the of the recapitulation as a way of tightening the structure. keyboard, as Harold Schonberg described him in his As the end of the movement nears, the tonality returns to fascinating study of The Great Pianists: “[His playing] F major and there is a strong sense of struggle passed. was overwhelming not so much because Beethoven The tension subsides and the work ends with the ghost was a great virtuoso (which he probably wasn’t), but of the opening movement’s main theme infused with a because he had an ocean-like surge and depth that sunset glow. made all other playing sound like the trickle of a rivulet.... No piano was safe with Beethoven. There is plenty of Piano Concerto No. 1 in C major, Op. 15 evidence that Beethoven was a most lively figure at the Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) keyboard, just as he was on the podium.... Czerny, who Composed in 1795; revised in 1800. hailed Beethoven’s ‘titanic execution,’ apologizes for his Premiered in December 18, 1795 in Vienna, with the messiness [i.e., snapping strings and breaking hammers] composer as soloist. by saying that he demanded too much from the pianos then being made. Which is very true; and which is also a “His genius, his magnetic personality were acknowl- polite way of saying that Beethoven banged the hell out edged by all, and there was, besides, a gaiety and of the piano.” animation about the young Beethoven that people found Beethoven composed the first four of his five mature immensely attractive. The troubles of boyhood were piano concertos for his own concerts. (Two juvenile es- behind him: his father had died very shortly after his de- says in the genre are discounted in the numbering.) Both parture from Bonn, and by 1795 his brothers were estab- the Concerto No. 1 in C major and the Concerto No. lished in Vienna, Caspar Karl as a musician, Johann as 2 in B-flat major were composed in 1795, the Second an apothecary. During his first few months in the capital, probably premiered at the Burgtheater on March 29th he had indeed been desperately poor, depending very and the First at a concert under Joseph Haydn’s direc- largely on the small salary allowed him by the Elector of tion on December 18th; both works were revised before Bonn. But that was all over now. He had no responsibili- their publication in 1801. Beethoven’s C major Concerto ties, and his music was bringing in enough to keep him sprang from the rich Viennese musical tradition of Haydn in something like affluence. He had a servant, for a short and Mozart, with which he was intimately acquainted: he time he even had a horse; he bought smart clothes, he had taken some composition lessons with Haydn soon learned to dance (though not with much success), and after his arrival, and he had profound affection for and there is even mention of his wearing a wig! We must not knowledge of Mozart’s work. At a performance of Mo- allow our picture of the later Beethoven to throw its dark zart’s C minor Piano Concerto (K. 491), he whispered to colors over these years of his early triumphs. He was a his companion, John Cramer, “Cramer, Cramer! We shall young giant exulting in his strength and his success, and never be able to do anything like that!” a youthful confidence gave him a buoyancy that was The opening movement of the First Piano Concerto both attractive and infectious. Even in 1791, before he is indebted to Mozart for its handling of the concerto- left Bonn, Carl Junker could describe him as ‘this ami- sonata form, for its technique of orchestration, and for able, lighthearted man.’ And in Vienna he had much to the manner in which piano and orchestra are integrated. raise his spirits and nothing (at first) to depress them.” Beethoven added to these quintessential qualities of Peter Latham painted this cheerful picture of the the Classical concerto a wider-ranging harmony, a more young Beethoven as Vienna knew him during his twen- openly virtuosic role for the soloist and a certain emo- ties, the years before his deafness, his recurring illnesses tional weight characteristic of his large works. The sec- and his titanic struggles with his mature compositions ond movement is a richly colored song with an important had produced the familiar, dour figure of his later years. part for the solo clarinet. The rondo-finale is written in an Beethoven came to Vienna for good in 1792, having infectious manner reminiscent of Haydn, brimming with made an unsuccessful foray in 1787, and quickly at- high spirits and good humor. tracted attention for his piano playing, at which he ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 3 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 2

Thursday, August 9, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Anna Burden, Cello Chris Wild, Karen Smuda Emerging Conductor†

THORNS OF LOVE: PARIS TO MUNICH

BERLIOZ Love Scene and “Queen Mab Scherzo” from Romeo and Juliet, Op. 17*

SCHUMANN Cello Concerto in A minor, Op. 129 Nicht zu schnell Langsam Sehr lebhaft Played without pause

— INTERMISSION —

WAGNER Prelude to Act I of Lohengrin†

STRAUSS Tod und Verklärung, Op. 24*

* first PMF performance

This concert is sponsored by Friends of PMF 3.0. Jerry Smuda, Charlotte Lukes, Rob Davis, Gretchen Maring and Jim & Geri Grine

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 4 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 2 Cello Concerto in A minor, Op. 129 Robert Schumann (1810-1856) Composed in 1850. Love Scene and “Queen Mab Scherzo” from Romeo Premiered on June 9, 1860 in Leipzig, with Ludwig Ebert and Juliet, Op. 17 as soloist. Hector Berlioz (1803-1869) Composed in 1839. In September 1850, the Schumanns left Dresden to Premiered on November 24, 1839 in Paris, conducted by take up residence in Düsseldorf, where Robert assumed the composer. the post of municipal music director. He was welcomed to the city with a serenade, a concert of his works, a Berlioz’s idea for a musical work based on Romeo supper and a ball. Though he had been cautioned by and Juliet was born as soon as he first encountered his friend Felix Mendelssohn a few years earlier that the Shakespeare’s tragedy in 1827, but it was not until 1839 local musicians were a shoddy bunch, he was eager that he was able to bring it to fruition. On December 16, to take on the variety of duties that awaited him in 1838, Berlioz, worn out from a grueling round of attend- the Rhenish city, including conducting the orchestra’s ing concerts and writing criticism and from the difficul- subscription concerts, leading performances of church ties of mounting the opera Benvenuto Cellini, found music, giving private music lessons, organizing a cham- enough strength to produce a concert that included the ber music society, and composing as time allowed. Men- Symphonie Fantastique and Harold in Italy. The legend- delssohn’s advice notwithstanding, Schumann found ary Nicolò Paganini, an ardent admirer of Berlioz, was the players acceptable and plunged into his work with in the audience and for the first time heardHarold , the energy and enthusiasm. Surprisingly, this busy, new situ- work he had commissioned (but never played). Two days ation had a salutary effect on his composition, and within later, Berlioz received the following note: “My dear friend, months he had composed the Scenes from Goethe’s Beethoven being dead, only Berlioz can make him live “Faust”, an Overture to Schiller’s The Bride of Messina, again; and I who have heard your divine compositions, many songs, the “Rhenish” Symphony (inspired by a trip humbly beg you to accept, as a token of my homage, upstream on September 29th to Cologne’s awesome 20,000 francs. Believe me to be your most affectionate cathedral) and the lovely Cello Concerto. friend, Nicolò Paganini.” Despite Schumann’s promising entry into the musical After paying his debts with Paganini’s gift, Berlioz still life of Düsseldorf, it was not long before things turned had left “a handsome sum of money,” and he deter- sour. His fragile mental health, his ineptitude as a con- mined to put it to a musical purpose — namely, to free ductor and his frequent irritability created a rift with the himself temporarily from the onerous critical obligations musicians, and the orchestra’s governing body present- that had sapped so much time and energy, and devote ed him with the suggestion that, perhaps, his time would himself instead to “a really important work, something be better devoted entirely to composition. Schumann, splendid on a grand and original plan, full of passion and increasingly unstable emotionally though at first deter- imagination, worthy to be dedicated to the glorious artist mined to stay, complained to his wife, Clara, that he to whom I owed so much.” By early 1839 he had settled, was being cruelly treated. Proceedings were begun by perhaps inevitably, on the topic that had first fired his the orchestra committee to relieve him of his position, spirit a dozen years before — Romeo and Juliet — and but his resignation in 1853 ended the matter. By early built on it a “dramatic symphony” for chorus, soloists the next year, Schumann’s reason had completely given and orchestra. way. On February 27th, he tried to drown himself in the The splendid Love Scene was Berlioz’s own favorite Rhine, and a week later he was committed to the asylum among his compositions and a work that he conducted in Endenich, where he lingered with fleeting moments of frequently on his programs. Of it, David Cairns wrote, sanity for nearly two-and-a-half years. His faithful Clara “The extraordinary purity of the music is not a paradox; was there with him when he died on July 29, 1856, at the it suggests not restraint but a passion so incandescent age of 46. that it transfigures sensuality.” The Cello Concerto was a product of Schumann’s The Queen Mab Scherzo that begins Part IV was first, happy months in Düsseldorf. Though it came near inspired by Mercutio’s speech about the love-struck the end of his career, it is the result of a special affec- Romeo having been visited by the dream fairy. Berlioz’s tion he harbored for the cello throughout his life. When a description of this music to the poet Heinrich Heine finger injury in 1832 ended his piano playing, he dabbled perfectly matches its gossamer strains: “Queen Mab in for a short time with the cello as a musical outlet. Though her microscopic car, attended by the buzzing insects of he never mastered the instrument, his familiarity with it a summer’s night and launched at full galop by her tiny is evident in this Concerto. “Last month,” Clara wrote in horses, fully displays her lovely drollery and her thou- her diary on November 16, 1850, “Robert composed a sand caprices.” concerto for the violoncello that pleased me very much. It appears to be written in the true violoncello style.” This work, like the earlier Piano Concerto, eschews the flash- ing pyrotechnics of the traditional 19th-century virtuoso

— 5 — concerto in favor of a musical language richer and more Wolfram von Eschenbach (who appears as a character subtle in its emotional expression. (“I cannot write a con- in Tannhäuser) and The Knight of the Swan by the Min- certo for the virtuosos. I must try for something else,” he nesinger (the German counterparts of the French trou- vowed early in his career.) Schumann’s Cello Concerto is badours) Conrad von Würzburg. In the opera, Lohengrin, among the most popular pieces in the literature for the son of Parsifal and a Knight of the Holy Grail, appears instrument. Mstislav Rostropovich claimed he enjoyed it in 10th-century Antwerp to defend Elsa against a false more than any other cello concerto, and the great cellist accusation of murder. She is absolved of the charge, Pablo Casals called it “one of the finest works one could and Lohengrin consents to wed her on the condition that wish to hear — sublime music from beginning to end.” she does not inquire about his name or his past. After a Schumann composed the Concerto’s three move- magnificent marriage ceremony (source of the familiar ments to be played without pause. This technical device Wedding March — “Here Comes the Bride”), she asks not only helped to unify the work into a single span of the forbidden questions. Lohengrin reveals his name and music from beginning to end, but also served to curtail his sacred mission to find the sacred chalice lost after the applause that 19th-century audiences dispensed it was used at the Last Supper, but he leaves Elsa, who after every movement, a custom Schumann abhorred expires of her grief. Wagner wrote of the Prelude to Act because it destroyed the work’s carefully calculated I, “Out of the clear blue sky there seems to condense a mood. The Concerto’s first two movements are expres- wonderful vision of an angel host bearing in its midst the sive and largely contemplative, “exactly those qualities sacred Grail.” of the beloved enthusiastic dreamer whom we know as Schumann,” wrote Sir Donald Tovey. The finale brings Tod und Verklärung (“Death and Transfiguration”), Op. 24 to the work a playful virtuosic verve that concludes the Richard Strauss (1864-1949) piece with a flurry of high spirits. Composed in 1888-1889. The Concerto’s first movement is a nearly seam- Premiered on June 21, 1890 in Eisenach, conducted by less sonata form that looks forward to the monolithic the composer. structures of Brahms’ opening movements. After three prefatory woodwind chords, the first theme is presented It was at his first conducting post as assistant to the by the soloist above an undulating accompaniment. renowned Hans von Bülow at Meiningen that Strauss Following an orchestral interlude, the more animated began composing his tone poems. Death and Transfigu- second theme appears. The movement’s central por- ration (1889) was the third of these, following Macbeth tion is occupied by one of Schumann’s best and most (1887) and Don Juan (1888). The literary inspiration compact developments, which utilizes the exposition’s for Death and Transfiguration originated with Strauss themes and a new, crisply rhythmic motive assigned himself, as he noted in a letter to his friend Friedrich to the cello’s low register. The first and second themes von Hausegger: “The idea came to me to write a tone return in the recapitulation to round out the movement. poem describing the last hours of a man who had striven The nocturnal slow movement, a wistful romanza in for the highest ideals, presumably an artist. The sick three-part form (A–B–A), follows without pause. Particu- man lies in his bed breathing heavily and irregularly in larly touching here is the opening strain, a pastoral duet his sleep. Friendly dreams bring a smile to his face; his for the soloist and the principal cellist of the orchestra. sleep grows lighter; he awakens. Fearful pains once A transition enlivened by an increasingly quick tempo more begin to torture him, fever shakes his body. When leads to the finale, whose form combines elements of the attack is over and the pain recedes, he recalls his sonata and rondo. Much of this movement’s thematic past life; his childhood passes before his eyes; his youth material springs from its bounding opening motive. A with its strivings and passions; and then, when the pain flourish of arpeggios sweeping though the cello’s entire returns, there appears to him the goal of his life’s jour- range brings this splendid Concerto to a close. ney — the idea, the ideal he attempted to embody in his Clara Schumann’s evaluation of this work, written on art, but which he was unable to perfect because such October 11, 1851, a year after it was composed, is still perfection could be achieved by no man. The fatal hour valid today. “I have played Robert’s Violoncello Concerto arrives. The soul leaves his body, to discover in the eter- again and thus procured for myself a truly musical and nal cosmos the magnificent realization of the ideal which happy hour,” she recounted. “The romantic quality, the could not be fulfilled here below.” flight, the freshness and the humor, and also the highly Strauss’ composition follows his literary program with interesting interweaving of cello and orchestra are, almost clinical precision. It is divided into four sections. indeed, wholly ravishing — and what euphony and what The first summons a vision of the sickroom and the ir- sentiment are in all those melodic passages!” regular heartbeat and distressed sighs of the man/artist. The second section is a vivid portrayal of his suffering. Prelude to Act I of Lohengrin The ensuing section, beginning tenderly and represent- Richard Wagner (1813-1883) ing the artist’s remembrance of his life, is broken off Composed in 1845-1848. when the anguished music of the second part returns. Premiered on August 28, 1850 in Weimar, conducted by This ultimate, painful struggle ends in death, signified by Franz Liszt. a stroke of the gong. The final section, hymnal in mood, depicts the artist’s vision of ultimate beauty as he is Wagner based his libretto for Lohengrin on two transfigured into part of “the eternal cosmos.” 13th-century German sources — a poem by the knight ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 6 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 3

Saturday, August 11, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Kathy Pyeatt, Soprano Keven Keys, Baritone

NEW YORK: BERNSTEIN CENTENNIAL

MAHLER Adagietto from Symphony No. 5 in C-sharp minor In Memory of Bibs, Marge and Sarah

BERNSTEIN Symphony No. 1 for Soprano and Orchestra, “Jeremiah”* Prophecy: Largamente Profanation: Vivace con brio Lamentation: Lento

— INTERMISSION —

COPLAND Selections from Old American Songs for Baritone and Orchestra* The Boatmen’s Dance (Minstrel Song) The Little Horses (Children’s Lullaby) Zion’s Walls (Revivalist Song) Long Time Ago (Ballad) I Bought Me A Cat (Children’s Song) At the River (Hymn Tune) Ching-a-ring-chaw (Minstrel Song)

BERNSTEIN Symphonic Dances from West Side Story Prologue — Somewhere — Scherzo — Mambo — Cha-Cha — Meeting Scene — “Cool” Fugue — Rumble — Finale

* first PMF performance

This concert is sponsored by Joan & Robert Schaupp.

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 7 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 3 a Russian Jewish family who had settled in Massachu- setts, he attended the prestigious Boston Latin School Adagietto from Symphony No. 5 in C-sharp minor as a youth and took piano lessons from Helen Coates Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) (whose influence on his life he recognized by dedicating Composed in 1901-1902; much revised through 1911. to her his 1954 book, The Joy of Music) and Heinrich Premiered on October 18, 1904 in Cologne, conducted Gebhard (a pupil of Leschetizky). In 1935, Bernstein by the composer. enrolled at Harvard, where he studied with some of the country’s most distinguished pedagogues: Tillman Mer- In November 1901, Gustav Mahler met Alma ritt (theory), Walter Piston (counterpoint and fugue) and Schindler, daughter of the painter Emil Jacob Schindler, Edward Burlingame Hill (orchestration). After his gradu- then 22 and regarded as one of the most beautiful ation in 1939, he was accepted at the Curtis Institute women in Vienna. Mahler was 41. Romance blossomed. of Music in Philadelphia (on the recommendation of the They were married in March and were parents by No- celebrated Greek conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos) to pol- vember. Their first summer together (1902) was spent at ish his already impressive piano technique with Isabelle Maiernigg, Mahler’s country retreat on the Wörthersee Vengerova and further his skills in conducting (with Fritz in Carinthia in southern Austria. It was at that time that Reiner) and composition (Randall Thompson). He spent the Fifth Symphony was composed, incorporating some the summers of 1940 and 1941 at Tanglewood, where he sketches from the previous summer. He thought of this became a student and protégé of Sergei Koussevitzky, work as “their” music, the first artistic fruit of his mar- music director of the Boston Symphony, and eventually ried life with Alma. But more than that, he may also have his assistant. In the autumn of 1942, Bernstein moved wanted to create music that would be worthy of the to New York City, working for a short time for Harms new circle of friends that Alma, the daughter of one of Publishing Company arranging popular pieces for piano Austria’s finest artists and most distinguished families, under the pseudonym Lennie Amber (Bernstein means had opened to him — Gustav Klimt, Alfred Roller (who “amber” in German). A year later, he was chosen by became Mahler’s stage designer at the Court Opera), Artur Rodzinski as his conducting assistant with the architect Josef Hoffmann and the rest of the cream of New York Philharmonic, and on November 14, 1943, cultural Vienna. In the Fifth Symphony, Mahler seems took over a concert for the ailing guest conductor Bruno to have taken inordinate care to demonstrate the ma- Walter at very short notice. The national broadcast of the ture quality of his thought (he was, after all, nearly twice program went ahead as scheduled, and the 25-year-old Alma’s age) and to justify his lofty position in Vien- Bernstein was instantly famous. The rest of his career is nese artistic life as director of the Court Opera. Free of now legend. his duties at the Opera between seasons, he labored Late in 1942, just as his career was shifting into throughout the summer of 1902 on the Fifth Symphony overdrive, Bernstein decided that writing a large sym- at his little composing hut in the woods, several minutes phonic piece would not only help establish him as a walk from the main house at Maiernigg. So delicate was concert composer but also might give him opportunities the process of creation that he ordered Alma not to play to appear as a conductor with a number of orchestras. the piano while he was working lest the sound, though He learned that the New England Conservatory of Music distant, should disturb him (she was a talented musician was just then sponsoring a composition contest, and and budding composer until her husband forbid her to that Koussevitzky, his chief mentor, would be a judge. practice those skills after their wedding), and he even The competition became the spur for Bernstein to cre- complained that the birds bothered him because they ate his Symphony No. 1. Three years before, he had sang in the wrong keys (!). The composition was largely sketched a Lamentation for voice and orchestra on a completed by early autumn when the Mahlers returned biblical text from Jeremiah, and in the spring of 1942 to Vienna, but Gustav continued to revise the orchestra- he set down some ideas for the opening movement of tion until the year he died. The serene Adagietto, per- a symphony. With the contest’s New Year’s Eve dead- haps the most famous (and most often detached) single line looming close, he reworked the earlier music as the movement among Mahler’s symphonies, serves as a symphony’s outer movements, and inserted between calm interlude between the gigantic dramatic move- them a scherzo, completing the piano score in ten days ments that surround it. and the orchestration (with the help of a small coterie of friends, working round the clock, serving as scribes and Symphony No. 1 for Mezzo-Soprano and Orchestra, copyists under his direction) in just three. The score was “Jeremiah” finished too late for delivery by mail, so Bernstein, true Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) to form, got on the train to Boston and handed in the Composed in 1939 and 1942. work in person two hours before midnight. Though the Premiered on January 28, 1944 in Pittsburgh, conducted omens all seemed good for another Bernstein triumph, by the composer with Jennie Tourel as soloist. Koussevitzky did not care for the “Jeremiah” Symphony, and the work did not win the competition. A year later, Leonard Bernstein had already accumulated a however, Fritz Reiner, his teacher at Curtis and then formidable curriculum vitae by the time he finished his music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony, arranged for “Jeremiah” Symphony at the age of 24. Born in 1918 to

— 8 — Bernstein to premiere the composition with his orches- in Jerusalem from 628 to 586 B.C. under Josiah and his tra on January 28, 1944 with mezzo-soprano Jennie successors. He lived during a transitional period when Tourel. Both Symphony and conductor drew raves from the old Assyrian empire, of which Israel was a part, was the critics: “unusual profundity of thought and a clear crumbling and being replaced by the neo-Babylonian manner of expression and presentation”; “we have rarely empire; there were periodic invasions of his country. His heard music of modern vintage of such honest and preachings centered around the sins of idolatry and false absorbing expression”; “[in conducting,] his cues are worship, and predicted that Jerusalem and its temple clean, his demands from the orchestra are within reason, would be destroyed unless there was a real commitment his careful molding of phrase and line, admirable....” to reform and a return to the spirit of religion, not merely Koussevitzky invited Bernstein to make his long-sought adherence to its rituals. Tradition has it that he was by Boston Symphony debut with the “Jeremiah” Symphony temperament introspective and reticent, but felt com- the following month, and Bernstein introduced the work pelled to condemn what he considered to be the evils of to New York in March at a Carnegie Hall concert with the age. He made some powerful enemies and was im- the Philharmonic to benefit a Palestine relief agency. prisoned several times. Jeremiah’s message contained The “Jeremiah” Symphony won the New York Music a new emphasis on the importance of a personal rela- Critics Circle Award for Best New American Work of the tionship with God, and his confessions contain dialogue Season. Bernstein recorded the score with the St. Louis with the Deity that question divine judgment, and even Symphony for RCA Victor shortly thereafter, his first of accuse God of having betrayed him.” three recordings of the work. Bernstein found in the writings of the ancient prophet In a 1994 biography of the composer, Meryle Se- an expression of what he called “the crisis of our centu- crest gave the following background about the historical ry, a crisis of faith.” Several of Bernstein’s pivotal works Jeremiah: “Jeremiah, son of a priestly family, preached — Jeremiah, The Age of Anxiety, Kaddish, Mass — con-

Text: The Lamentations of Jeremiah Chapter 1.1-3 Echa yashva vadad ha-ir How doth the city sit solitary, Rabati am That was full of people! Hay’ta k’almana; How is she become as a widow! Rabati vagoyim She that was great among the nations, Sarati bam’dinot And princess among the provinces, Hay’ta lamas. How is she become tributary! Bacho tivkeh balaila, She weepeth sore in the night, V’dim’ata al lecheya; And her tears are on her cheeks; En la m’nachem She hath none to comfort her Mikol ohaveha; Among all her lovers; Kol reeha bag’du va, All her friends have dealt treacherously with her, Hayu la l’oy’vim. They are become her enemies. Galta Y’huda meoni, Judah is gone into exile because of affliction, Umerov avoda; And because of great servitude; Hi yashva vagoyim, She dwelleth among the nations, Lo matsa mano-ach; She findeth no rest. Kol rod’feha hisiguha All her pursuers overtook her Ben hamitsarim Within the narrow passes. Chapter 1.8 Chet chata Y’rushalyim Jerusalem hath grievously sinned. (Echa yashva vadad ha-ir (How doth the city sit solitary ... k’almana. ) ... a widow.) Chapter 4.14-15 Na-u ivrim bachutsot They wander as blind men in the streets, N’go-alu badam, They are polluted with blood, B’lo yuchlu So that men cannot Yig’u bilvushehem. Touch their garments. Suru tame kar’u lamo, Depart, ye unclean! they cried unto them, Suru, suru al tiga-u ... Depart, depart! touch us not Chapter 5.20-21 Lama lanetsach tishkachenu ... Wherefore dost Thou forget us forever, Lanetsach taazvenu ... And forsake us for so long a time? ... Hashivenu Adonai elecha ... Turn Thou us unto Thee, O Lord ... — 9 — front the issue of what resolution, or renewal, or at least course, sung to the words of the biblical Lamentations comfort, can be found after faith is shattered, as symbol- of Jeremiah, and Mr. Bernstein uses motives as chanted ized in the “Jeremiah” Symphony by the destruction of by Ashkenazic (‘Germanic’) Jews. Other subconscious the Temple following the prophet’s warnings. Bernstein sources include various penitential modes, as well as explained the work’s expressive progression: “The inten- free cantorial improvisation. Significantly, the conclusion tion is not one of literalness, but of emotional quality. of the Lamentation recalls the Amidah theme from the Thus the first movement Prophecy( ) aims only to paral- first movement, indicating that the foreboding prophecy lel in feeling the intensity of the prophet’s pleas with his has been fulfilled.” people; and the scherzo (Profanation) to give a general sense of the destruction and chaos brought on by the Selections from Old American Songs pagan corruption within the priesthood and the people. Aaron Copland (1900-1990) The third movement (Lamentation), being a setting of Arranged for voice and piano in 1950 and 1952; orches- poetic text, is naturally a more literary conception. It is trated in 1954 and 1957. the cry of Jeremiah, as he mourns his beloved Jerusa- Orchestral versions of Set I premiered on January 7, lem, ruined, pillaged and dishonored after his desperate 1955 in Los Angeles, conducted by Alfred Wallenstein efforts to save it. The faith or peace that is found at the with William Warfield as soloist, and Set 2 on May 25, end of Jeremiah is really more a kind of comfort, not a 1958 in Ojai, California, conducted by the composer with solution. Comfort is one way of achieving peace, but it Grace Bumbry as soloist. does not achieve the sense of a new beginning, as does the end of The Age of Anxiety or Mass.” Soon after he completed the Twelve Poems of Em- Concerning the thematic sources of the work, the ily Dickinson in March 1950, Copland turned to some composer noted, “The Symphony does not make use lighter fare by “newly arranging” a set of five traditional to any great extent of actual Hebrew thematic material. 19th-century American songs for voice and piano on a The first theme of the scherzo is paraphrased from a commission from English composer Benjamin Britten traditional Hebrew chant, and the opening phrase of the and tenor Peter Pears for performance at the Aldeburgh vocal part in the Lamentation is based on a liturgical ca- Festival. A second group of five followed in 1952, and dence still sung today in commemoration of the destruc- Copland orchestrated Set I in 1954 and Set II three tion of Jerusalem by Babylon. Other resemblances to years later. In her study of Copland’s music, Julia Smith Hebrew liturgical music are a matter of emotional quality suggested that the Old American Songs form “a kind of rather than of the notes themselves.” In a preface to the vocal suite [and] the accompaniments offer moods by revised 1992 edition of the score, however, Jack Gottli- turns nostalgic, energetic, sentimental, devotional and eb, the composer’s long-time associate and spokesman, humorous.” These Songs tap a deep, quintessentially found richer resonances of traditional Jewish musical American sentiment in their sturdy simplicity and plain practices in the Symphony than Bernstein indicated: words, qualities that Copland captured perfectly in his “Actually, the composer was not aware that there was colorful, atmospheric settings. more influence of liturgical motives upon the music than The following notes in the orchestral score give the he consciously knew. This is certainly a testament to his sources for the Old American Songs: upbringing as a Jew both in the synagogue and at home, “The Boatmen’s Dance. Published in Boston in 1843 particularly through the example of his father, Samuel [to as an ‘original banjo melody’ by Old Dan D. Emmett, whom the score is dedicated]. who later composed Dixie. From the Harris Collection of “The opening theme of the first movement Proph( - American Poetry and Plays in Brown University. ecy),” Gottlieb continued, “is derived from the High “The Little Horses. A children’s lullaby, originating in Holy Days liturgy, heard for the first time as part of the the Southern States, the date of this song is unknown. Amidah (‘standing’) prayers, or eighteen blessings. This The adaptation is founded in part on John A. and Alan compilation of fixed benedictions, recited at all services, Lomax’s version in Folk Song U.S.A. Sabbath or holiday, with varying interpolations, probably “Zion’s Walls. A revivalist song, the original melody constitutes the second most important Jewish prayer and words are credited to John G. McCurry, compiler of after the monotheistic creed of Sh’ma Yisrael (‘Hear, O the Social Harp. Israel’). This theme nourishes the growth of the entire “Long Time Ago. Issued in 1837 by George Pope movement. Morris, who adapted the words, and Charles Edward “The scherzo (Profanation) theme from the second Horn, who arranged the music from an anonymous movement that Mr. Bernstein refers to is based on cantil- ‘black-face’ tune. Also from the Harris Collection. lation motives used during the chanting of the Bible “I Bought Me A Cat. A children’s nonsense song. on the Sabbath, especially the Haftara (‘concluding’) This version was sung to the composer by the American portion. The motives are well-known to those who chant playwright Lynn Riggs, who learned it during his boy- Bible passages in preparation for Bar Mitzvah. hood in Oklahoma. “In the third movement (Lamentation), the ‘liturgical “At the River. The words and melody of this hymn are cadence’ the composer mentions is a sequence of mo- by the Rev. Robert Lowry, and it dates from 1865. tives derived from the kinnot (‘dirges’) chanted on Tisha “Ching-a-ring-chaw. The words of this minstrel song B’Av (the Ninth Day of the month of Ab), an observance have been adapted from the original in the Harris Collec- of mourning for the lost Temple. These kinnot are, of tion at Brown University.”

— 10 — THE BOATMEN’S DANCE LONG TIME AGO High row the boatmen row, On the lake where droop’d the willow Floatin’ down the river the Ohio. Long time ago, Where the rock threw back the billow The boatmen dance, the boatmen sing, Brighter than snow. The boatmen up to ev’ry thing. And when the boatman gets on shore, Dwelt a maid beloved and cherish’d He spends his cash and works for more. By high and low But with autumn leaf she perish’d Then dance the boatmen dance, Long time ago. O dance the boatmen dance, Rock and tree and flowing water O dance all night ’til the broad daylight, Long time ago, And go home with the gals in the mornin’. Bird and bee and blossom taught her I went on board the other day Love’s spell to know. To see what the boatmen had to say. While to my fond words she listen’d There I let my passion loose, Murmuring low An’ they cram me in the callaboose. Tenderly her blue eyes glisten’d O dance the boatmen dance, etc. Long time ago. The boatman is a thrifty man. I BOUGHT ME A CAT There’s none can do as a boatman can. I bought me a cat I never see a pretty gal in my life, My cat pleased me But what she was a boatman’s wife. I fed my cat under yonder tree. My cat says “fiddle eye fee.” THE LITTLE HORSES I bought me a duck Hush you bye, My duck pleased me Don’t you cry, I fed my duck under yonder tree. Go to sleepy little baby. My duck says “Quaa, quaa” When you wake, My cat says “fiddle eye fee.” You shall have All the pretty little horses. I bought me a goose Blacks and bays, My goose pleased me Dapples and grays, I fed my goose under yonder tree. Coach and six a-little horses. My goose says “Quaw, quaw” My duck says “Quaa, quaa” Hush you bye, My cat says “fiddle eye fee.” Don’t you cry, I bought me a hen Go to sleepy little baby. My hen pleased me When you wake, I fed my hen under yonder tree. You’ll have new cake My hen says “Shimmy shack, shimmy shack” And all the pretty little horses. My goose says ... A brown and a gray, And a black and a bay, I bought me a pig And a coach and six a-little horses. My pig pleased me I fed my pig under yonder tree. Hush you bye, My pig says “Griffey, griffey” Don’t you cry, My hen says ... Oh you pretty little baby. Go to sleepy little baby, I bought me a cow Oh you pretty little baby. My cow pleased me I fed my cow under yonder tree. ZION’S WALLS My cow says “Baw, baw” Come fathers and mothers My pig says ... Come sisters and brothers I bought me a horse Come join us in singing the praises of Zion. My horse pleased me I fed my horse under yonder tree. O fathers don’t you feel determined My horse says “Neigh, neigh” To meet within the walls of Zion. My cow says ... We’ll shout and go round The walls of Zion. I bought me a wife My wife pleased me I fed my wife under yonder tree. My wife says “Honey, honey” My horse says ...

— 11 — AT THE RIVER Symphonic Dances from West Side Story Leonard Bernstein Shall we gather by the river, Composed in 1957. Where bright angels feet have trod. Broadway opening on September 26, 1957, conducted With its crystal tide forever by Max Goberman; the Symphonic Dances were pre- Flowing by the throne of God. miered in concert on February 13, 1961 in New York, Yes, we’ll gather by the river, conducted by Lukas Foss. The beautiful, the beautiful river, Gather with the saints by the river West Side Story was one of the first musicals to That flows by the throne of God. explore a serious subject with wide social implications. More than just the story of the tragic lives of ordinary Soon we’ll reach the shining river, people in a grubby section of New York, it was con- Soon our pilgrimage will cease, cerned with urban violence, juvenile delinquency, clan Soon our happy hearts will quiver hatred and young love. The show was criticized as With the melody of peace. harshly realistic by some who advocated an entirely Yes, we’ll gather by the river, etc. escapist function for the musical, depicting things that were not appropriately shown on the Broadway stage. CHING-A-RING CHAW Most, however, recognized that it expanded the scope of Ching-a-ring-a ring ching ching, the musical through references both to classical litera- Ho-a ding-a ding kum larkee ture (Romeo and Juliet) and to the pressing problems of Ching-a-ring-a ring ching ching, modern society. Brooks Atkinson, former critic of The Ho-a ding kum larkee. New York Times, noted in his book Broadway that West Side Story was “a harsh ballad of the city, taut, nervous Brothers gather round and flaring, the melodies choked apprehensively, the Listen to this story rhythms wild, swift and deadly.” West Side Story, like ’Bout the promised land very few other musicals — Show Boat, Oklahoma, Pal An’ the promised glory. Joey, A Chorus Line, Sunday in the Park with George, You don’ need to fear, Rent, Hamilton — provides more than just an evening’s If you have no money, pleasant diversion. It is a work that gave an entirely new You don’ need none there vision and direction to the American musical theater. To buy you milk and honey. Much of the show’s electric atmosphere was gener- ated by its brilliant dance sequences, for which Jerome There you’ll ride in style Robbins won the 1958 Tony Award for choreography. In Coach with four white horses, 1961, Bernstein chose a sequence of dance music from There the evenin’ meal West Side Story to assemble as a concert work, and Has one, two, three, four courses. Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal executed the orchestration Nights we all will dance of these “Symphonic Dances” under the composer’s To the harp and fiddle, direction. Bernstein said that he called these excerpts Waltz and jig and prance “symphonic” not because they were arranged for full “Cast off down the middle.” orchestra but because many of them grew, like a classi- cal symphony, from a few basic themes transformed into When the mornin’ come, a variety of moods to fit the play’s action and emotions. All in grand and splendor, The following summary, outlining the stage action that Stand out in the sun, occurs during the Symphonic Dances, appears in the And hear the holy thunder. orchestral score: “Prologue: The growing rivalry between Brothers hear me out, two teen-age gangs, the Jets and the Sharks. Some- The promised land’s a-comin’, where: In a visionary dance sequence, the two gangs are Dance and sing and shout, united in friendship. Scherzo: In the same dream, they I hear them harps a-strummin’. break through the city walls, and suddenly find them- selves in a world of space, air and sun. Mambo: Reality again; competitive dance between the gangs. Cha-cha: the star-crossed lovers, Tony and Maria, see each other for the first time and dance together Maria[ ]. Meeting scene: Music accompanies their first spoken words. Cool, Fugue: An elaborate dance sequence in which the Jets practice controlling their hostility. Rumble: Climactic gang battle during which the two gang leaders are killed. Finale: As Tony dies in Maria’s arms, love music develop- ing into a procession, which recalls, in tragic reality, the vision of Somewhere.” ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 12 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 4

Tuesday, August 14, 2018, 7:30 p.m. Andrew Altenbach, Guest Conductor Kathy Pyeatt, Soprano LONDON TO LEIPZIG

HANDEL Concerto Grosso in B-flat major, Op. 3, No. 2, HWV 313 Vivace – Grave — Largo — Allegro — [Minuet] — [Gavotte]

J.S. BACH Cantata No. 199, Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut, for Soprano, Oboe, Strings and Continuo, BWV 199 Recitative: Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut Aria (with oboe obbligato): Stumme Seufzer, stille Klagen — Recitative: Mein Herz ist itzt ein Tränenbrunn Recitative: Doch Gott muss mir genädig sein Aria: Tief gebückt und voller Reue Recitative: Auf diese Schmerzens-Reu Chorale (with cello obbligato): Ich Dein betrübtes Kind Recitative: Ich lege mich in diese Wunden Aria: Wie freudig ist mein Herz

HANDEL Suite No. 2 in D major from Water Music, HWV 349 Prelude — Hornpipe — Minuet — Lentement — Bourrée

— INTERMISSION — C.P.E. BACH Symphony in A major, Wotquenne 182, No. 4 (Helm 660) Allegro, ma non troppo Largo ed innocentemente Allegro assai Played without pause Performing parts based on the critical edition Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach: The Complete Works (www.cpebach.org) were made available by the publisher, the Packard Humanities Institute of Los Altos, California.

HANDEL Salve Regina for Mezzo-Soprano, Violins, Organ and Continuo, HWV 241* Salve Regina Ad te clamamus Eia ergo, avvocata nostra O clemens, o pia, o dulcis

J.S. BACH Brandenburg Concerto No. 1 in F major, BWV 1046 Allegro Adagio Allegro Menuetto * first PMF performance This concert is sponsored by Friends of PMF 1.0. Chris Risch, Bruce McKeefry & Geoff Yeomans, Lee & Barbara Jacobi and Anonymous

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited.

— 13 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Concerto Grosso in B-flat major, Op. 3, No. 2, HWV 313 Program 4 George Frideric Handel Suite No. 2 in D major from Water Music, HWV 349 Composed sometime between 1710 and 1722. George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) Composed in 1717. Handel’s first published concertos were the set of six Premiered on July 17, 1717 on the River Thames near Concerti Grossi issued by John Walsh in 1734 as the London. composer’s Op. 3, which Walsh assembled from pieces Handel had probably composed at various times be- On July 19, 1717, two days after the event, the tween 1710 and 1722. Except for the Concerto No. 1, London Daily Courant carried the following report: “On for which no models are known, many of the movements Wednesday Evening, the King took Water at Whitehall were reworkings of other of Handel’s pieces from such ... and went up the River towards Chelsea. Many other diverse sources as the Brockes Passion, the Chandos Barges with Persons of Quality attended, and so great a Anthems, the operas Amadigi and Ottone, and various Number of Boats, that the whole River in a manner was keyboard compositions. cover’d; a City Company’s Barge was employ’d for the Handel’s Op. 3 Concertos belong to the most im- Musick, wherein were 50 Instruments of all sorts, who portant genre of Baroque orchestral music, the “con- play’d all the Way from Lambeth ... the finest Sympho- certo grosso,” works that differ from later concertos in nies, compos’d express for the Occasion, by Mr. Hendel both form and instrumental disposition. The concerto [sic]; which his Majesty liked so well, that he caus’d it to grosso employs a small group of soloists (concertino) be plaid over three times going and returning.” accompanied by the full orchestra (tutti). The concertino Handel modeled the Water Music that he composed frequently plays with the tutti, but just as often displays for King George I’s boating party on the festive, outdoor itself soloistically against a reduced background. It is compositions written by such French masters as Lal- the alternation between orchestral and solo sections in ande and Mouret to accompany the al fresco suppers, which the concertino is absorbed, then featured, that parties and barge excursions at Versailles. (The theme produces the form of the fast movements of the Baroque for television’s original Masterpiece Theater derived from concerto. (Slow movements often resemble wordless just such a work by Mouret.) The Water Music, like those arias in their lyricism and through-composed form.) The French works, is simple in texture, dance-like in rhythm most prominent instrumental sonority of the concertino and majestic in spirit, and relies on the bracing sonorities in the Op. 3 Concertos is that of the oboe; actually, a of the wind instruments that made outside performance pair of oboes is used in all but the Third Concerto, in viable. In Handel’s score, many of the individual move- which Handel allows a choice of either a single flute or a ments recall the dance forms that are the basis of all single oboe. One or two solo violins and a cello usually Baroque suites. (The manuscript of the Water Music is round out the solo group. (These works are frequently, lost, and there is no way to know exactly the order or though somewhat erroneously, referred to as “Oboe even the precise instrumentation in which the various Concertos” to distinguish them from Handel’s Op. 6 movements were intended to be played. The compilation Concerti Grossi.) In his exemplary book on Handel, Paul of the music into suites was the job of later editors, and Henry Lang wrote of the Op. 3 Concerti Grossi, “This it is from these that present-day interpreters choose the is popular music in the best sense of the word; simple, specific movements to be performed. The actual music fluent, clearly articulated, and gloriously euphonious. The heard, therefore, may differ from one concert to another.) contrast between the tutti and the concertino is usually The dances include the minuet, a stately court dance in very sharp, the tuttis being robust, while the solos are triple meter that became a regular fixture in the Classi- gentle and at times even unaccompanied. Though one cal symphony; the leaping, triple-meter gigue, derived of the greatest contrapuntists of the time, Handel was from an English folk dance, and the model for many not interested in intricate part writing but in plasticity of instrumental finales by French and Italian musicians representation and expression, in melodiousness, and in when it migrated to the Continent in the 17th century; differentiated orchestral sound.” the bourrée, a spirited duple-meter dance of French The Second Concerto calls for pairs of oboes, vio- origin; the English hornpipe, whose nautical associa- lins and cellos and a single bassoon as its concertino tions are particularly appropriate for the Water Music; instruments, though their solo passages are distributed and the rigaudon, a Provençal dance especially popular throughout the work so that they are never heard all in the French opera-ballet. The other quick movements, in the same movement. The music is disposed in five though untitled, are related to these types. The slow sec- suite-like movements. First comes a sturdy triple-meter tions derive either from the limpid, flowing operatic aria Vivace, borrowed from Handel’s Brockes Passion of of which Handel was a master or from such dances as 1716, which is enlivened by bounding arpeggio figura- the saraband. A majestic Ouverture in the French style tions in the solo violins. There follows a Largo of nearly rounds out the complete set. Of this work, Martin Book- operatic pathos in which the plaint of the solo oboe is span wrote, “For sheer entertainment and joy, the music supported by a chordal accompaniment borne on cush- that Handel composed for the King’s pleasure on that ions of broken chords discussed by the solo cellos. The summer’s evening has few rivals in the whole literature.” tripping counterpoint of the third movement is also taken

— 14 — from the Brockes Passion. The Concerto closes with a mental music at the court of Anhalt-Cöthen in August Minuet and a Gavotte that are avowedly French in form 1717, and got the job. When Bach returned to Weimar and style while being invested with enough jolly English the following month to settle his affairs and clear up the pomp to accompany a festive procession upon the lawn formalities surrounding his release, Wilhelm Ernst was at Greenwich. so incensed at his celebrated organist’s defection (and by Bach’s gruff stubbornness) that he had him clapped Cantata No. 199, Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut (“My into jail. A month was deemed long enough for this penal Heart Is Bathed in Blood”) for Mezzo-Soprano, Oboe, exercise to have its effect (but not quite long enough to Strings and Continuo, BWV 199 stir up a row with Bach’s new employer, Prince Leopold Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) of Cöthen), and Bach was sent on his way in November Composed in 1714. “with notice of his unfavorable discharge.” Premiered on August 12, 1714 in Weimar, directed by the Among the sacred works that Bach composed composer. for Duke Wilhelm Ernst in Weimar was Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut (BWV 199), which was first heard on After serving in positions as organist and church August 12, 1714, the eleventh Sunday after Trinity. Bach musician at Arnstadt and Mühlhausen from 1703 to frequently performed the piece in later years. The score 1708, Bach won a more prestigious job at the court of was long thought to be lost, and was not rediscovered Weimar, presided over with iron will by the Saxon Duke until 1911, in the Royal Library, Copenhagen. The Canta- Wilhelm Ernst, a stern religionist who insisted that his ta’s text, which had been set two years earlier by Johann servants attend daily devotions and be always prepared Christoph Graupner, was by Georg Christian Lehms, the to answer questions about the minutiae of the morning’s court librarian at Darmstadt. Bach’s setting was influ- sermon. The Duke’s fervent Lutheranism did not, howev- enced by the then-modern style of the Italian secular er, prevent his appreciating Bach’s genius as an organist cantata, with its clear division of recitatives and arias, and composer, so when authorities in Halle tried to win scoring for a single solo voice, and use of da capo arias him away from Weimar in 1712, the ambitious musi- (A–B–A) in florid style. The literary progression of the cian leveraged a higher salary, a new title and increased Cantata begins with the anguished “mute sighs, silent responsibilities for composing and preparing the court lamentations” of the first aria (which has an unexpected chapel’s vocal music from Wilhelm Ernst. In 1716, the recitative passage inserted into its middle section) and court Kapellmeister, Johann Samuel Drese, died, and the humble confession of the second aria, and continues Bach, having largely performed Drese’s duties for the through the comforting sentiments of the chorale, a set- previous four years, expected to be named his succes- ting of the third verse of Johann Heermann’s Wo soll ich sor. Local custom prevailed, however, and Drese’s son fliehen hin (“Where Shall I Flee?”)of 1630. The work ends was appointed to the post. Bach, humiliated and disap- with a joyous song of thanksgiving. pointed, auditioned for an opening as director of instru-

Recitative Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut, My heart is bathed in blood, weil mich der Sünden Brut because the multitude of my sins makes me, in Gottes heil’gen Augen in God’s holy eyes, zum Ungeheuer macht. seem to be a monster. Und mein Gewissen fühlet Pein, And my conscience feels pain, weil mir die Sünden nichts als Höllenhenker sein. because these sins are nought to me but hellish tormentors. Verhasste Lasternacht! Hateful night of vice! Du, Du allein hast mich in solche Not gebracht! You, you alone have brought me to such distress! Und Du, Du böser Adams-Samen And you, evil Adams’ seed, raubst meiner Seelen alle Ruh, rob my soul of all peace, und schliessest ihr den Himmel zu! and bar it from heaven! Ach! Unerhörter Schmerz! Ah, unspeakable anguish, Mein ausgedorrtes Herz my heart is so parched, will ferner mehr kein Trost befruchten; no comfort can fructify it; and ich muss mich vor dem verstecken, and I must hide in shame vor dem die Engel selbst ihr Angesicht verdecken. before the One before Whom the very angels hide their faces. Aria Stumme Seufzer, stille Klagen, Mute sighs, silent lamentations, Ihr mögt meine Schmerzen sagen, you must express my anguish, Weil der Mund geschlossen ist. because my mouth is sealed. Und Ihr nassen Tränenquellen And you, wet springs of tears, Könnt’ ein sich’res Zeugnis stellen, can surely testify Wie mein sündlich Herz gebüsst. to the patience of my sinful heart.

— 15 — Recitative Mein Herz ist itzt ein Tränenbrunn, My heart is now a fount of tears, die Augen heisse Quellen. my eyes hot springs. Ach Gott! Wer wird Dich doch zufrieden stellen? Ah God! who will appease Thee? Recitative Doch Gott muss mir genädig sein, But God must have mercy on me, weil ich das Haupt mit Asche, since I cover my head with ashes, das Angesicht mit Tränen wasche, and wash my face in tears; mein Herz in Reu und Leid zerschlage I rend my heart in sorrow and remorse, und voller Wehmut sage: and declare my abject misery: Gott sei mir Sünder gnädig! God be merciful to me, a sinner! Ach ja! Sein Herze bricht, Ah yes! His heart breaks, und meine Seele spricht: and my soul speaks: Aria Tief gebückt und voller Reue Deeply bowed and filled with remorse Lieg’ ich, liebster Gott, vor Dir. I lie before Thee, dearest God. Ich bekenne meine Schuld; I acknowledge my guilt; Aber habe doch Geduld mit mir! forbear with me! Recitative Auf diese Schmerzens-Reu Upon my agonized remorse fällt mir alsdann dies Trostwort bei: falls now this gracious word of comfort: Chorale Ich Dein betrübtes Kind I, Your troubled child, Werf’ alle meine Sünd, cast all my sins,

Symphony in A major, Wotquenne 182, No. 4 (Helm 660) the “Prussian” and “Württemberg” Sonatas, date from Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-1788) the years in Berlin, as does the Essay on the True Art of Composed in 1773. Playing Keyboard Instruments, an indispensable source for understanding 18th-century performance practice. Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Johann Sebastian’s fifth Emanuel Bach was not completely happy in Berlin. child and his third (second surviving) son, gained fame Though he found the atmosphere of the court stimulat- with his contemporaries as a composer in the most ing and valued his circle of cultured friends, including the advanced style of the time, a keyboard player of unsur- poet Lessing, he realized that the conservative Frederick passed ability, and the author of an important treatise was not sympathetic to the new style of his music, and on contemporary performance style, as well as a man of would not encourage its production or performance. He wit, broad education and winning personality. Emanuel left when Georg Philipp Telemann, director of music for could hardly have avoided the musical atmosphere of the city churches of Hamburg and Emanuel’s godfather, the Bach household as a boy, and he learned the art died during the summer of 1767, and Bach was ap- directly from his father. After three years as a student at pointed to take his place. In Hamburg, Bach’s position Leipzig University, he enrolled in 1734 to study law at the was similar to his father’s in Leipzig. He was responsible University of Frankfurt-an-der-Oder, where he earned a for the music in five churches, including over 200 regular meager living giving keyboard lessons and composing, performances a year as well as countless special occa- and leading works for special occasions. In 1738, leaving sions. He handled his administrative duties with ease, behind the legal profession but immeasurably enriched and provided a large amount of music for the services. by the excellent general education it had brought him, he Beside his liturgical compositions, he also completed in joined the musical establishment of Frederick the Great Hamburg six collections of sonatas, rondos and fanta- of Prussia in Potsdam, near Berlin. Frederick, one of the sias for keyboard, ten symphonies, a dozen keyboard 18th century’s most enlightened rulers, promoted and concertos and many chamber works. As in Berlin, he participated in a wide range of intellectual and artistic collected a circle of respected and well-educated poets, endeavors. His special talent was playing the flute, and it dramatists, philosophers, clergymen and musicians was Bach’s job to accompany him at the keyboard. Such as close friends, and was renowned for his hospitality notable musicians as Franz and Johann Benda, C.H. and and the sparkling quality of his conversation. He died in J.G. Graun and J.J. Quantz (who died while compos- Hamburg in 1788. ing his 300th concerto for the flute — each new piece Emanuel Bach wrote nineteen symphonies, ten of meant a supplement to his already enormous salary as them in Hamburg. The six Hamburg symphonies of 1773 Frederick’s flute teacher) were Bach’s colleagues at the (Wotquenne 182) were commissioned by Baron Gottfried court. Many of his greatest keyboard works, notably van Swieten for his “Aristocratic Concerts” in Vienna, in

— 16 — which Haydn, Mozart and later Beethoven all participat- and heir of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, who advised the ed. In these works, Bach sought a new, more passionate young composer to pursue his career in Italy. Handel style to supersede the niceties of the Rococo. Before was intrigued by the Prince’s proposal, but since Medici they were sent to Vienna, the new symphonies were giv- would not finance the venture, Handel “resolved to go en a trial performance at the Hamburg residence of one to Italy on his own bottom, as soon as he could make a Professor Büsch. Of that soirée, the writer and compos- purse for that occasion,” according to his first biogra- er Johann Friedrich Reichardt, who participated in the pher, the Rev. John Mainwaring. (Despite the delightful performance, enthusiastically reported, “One heard with prospect of Handel bouncing along uncomfortably in a rapture the original and bold course of ideas as well as coach over the Alps for the week’s trip to Italy that this the great variety and novelty in forms and modulations. quotation invokes, “bottom” in the 18th-century sense Hardly ever did musical compositions of higher, more could also mean a “financial foundation” or “resources.”) daring, and more novel character flow from the soul of a Handel arrived in Florence late in 1706 (his first Italian genius. They were received with enthusiasm.” opera, Rodrigo, was premiered in that city the follow- Like many orchestral works of the early Classical pe- ing year), and he traveled on to Rome before the end riod, Bach’s Symphony No. 4 in A major (W. 182/4) is in of the year. The town immediately started to buzz with three movements, lacking the minuet that later became reports of his spectacular organ playing, and local music an integral part of the genre. The opening movement lovers soon learned of his compositional gifts when he is built from the development and juxtaposition of the produced his first oratorio,Il Trionfo del Tempo e del cluster of motives presented in the first few measures: Disinganno (“The Triumph of Time and Truth”), during the pointillistic arpeggios traded between the violins; a gruff spring of 1707 and followed it with a series of cantatas unison statement of unsettled harmonic character; and and motets. In May, he was hired by Marchese Frances- a delicate phrase with grace notes. The tempestuous co Maria Ruspoli, one of Rome’s wealthiest nobles and quality of this music, created by its powerful rhythmic leading patrons of music, just in time to accompany the motion and unsettled harmony, was the characteristic household to the Marchese’s country summer estate at for which Emanuel Bach’s music was so highly prized Vignanello, forty miles northwest of Rome. There Handel by his contemporaries and which was such an impor- composed secular Italian cantatas (different from Bach’s tant model to the early Romantic composers. An abrupt Lutheran model, these consist of two or three recitative- change of rhythm and key leads directly into the second and-aria pairs for solo voice and modest accompani- movement. This music is marked to be played Largo ed ment on texts reminiscent of an opera libretto) for the innocentemente — “broad [i.e., very slowly] and inno- regular palace concerts, and sacred pieces on Latin cently” — but, with its unexpected rhythmic, dynamic texts for the services at the local church of San Sebas- and harmonic deflections, it excites sophisticated states tiano; the soloist in these pieces was probably Ruspoli’s of tenderness and deep pathos. A soft, inconclusive house soprano, Margherita Durastanti (who remained harmony provides the link to the finale, which takes a friendly with Handel and later worked for him in London). muscular, leaping motive and a bustling phrase sounded The Salve Regina (“Hail, Queen, Mother of Mercy”) below sustained octaves in the first violins as its princi- is the Marian hymn included in the daily minor services pal thematic materials. (i.e., non-Mass) of the Roman Catholic liturgy during the long season of Trinity, which begins at Pentecost (fifty Salve Regina for Mezzo-Soprano, Violins, Organ and days after Easter) and lasts until the start of Advent. The Continuo in G minor, HWV 241 hymn, traditionally attributed to the 11th-century Ger- George Frideric Handel man monk Hermann of Reichenau though its origin is Composed in 1707. unconfirmed, is usually sung atCompline , the last of the Probably premiered on June 19, 1707 in Vignanello, Italy, liturgical day’s eight services (not counting Mass). Three with Margherita Durastanti as soloist. movements of Handel’s Salve Regina, with their somber moods, piquant harmonies, chromatic melodic lines and Early in 1703, Handel left his native Halle to gain attenuated textures, are deeply felt settings of verses experience and make some musical allies in Hamburg, from this supplication to the Virgin, while the third of its then the most important opera center in Germany. The four movements offers an expressive contrast with its reputation he established there brought him to the at- buoyant duet for soprano and organ. tention of the visiting Prince Ferdinando de’ Medici, son

Salve Regina, mater misericordiae, Hail, Queen, Mother of Mercy, vita, dulcedo, et spes nostra, salve. Hail, our life, our sweetness and our hope. Ad te clamamus, filii Evae. To thee we cry, children of Eve. Ad te suspiramus, gementes et flente To thee we send up our sighs, in hac lacrimarum valle. mourning and weeping in this vale of tears. Eia ergo Advocata nostra, illos Turn then, O Advocate, tuos misericordes oculos ad te convene. thine eyes of mercy towards us. Et Jesum, benedictum fructum ventris And show unto us Jesus, the blessed fruit tui nobis, post hoc exilium, ostende. of thy womb, after this, our exile. O clemens, o pia, o dulcis Virgo Maria. O merciful, o loving, o sweet Virgin Mary.

— 17 — Brandenburg Concerto No. 1 in F major, BWV 1046 and he rejected an offer to become organist at the Johann Sebastian Bach Jacobkirche in Hamburg, so it was more than two years Composed around 1720. before he fulfilled Brandenburg’s request. By 1721, how- ever, Leopold had become engaged to marry a woman Brandenburg, in Bach’s day, was a political and who looked askance at his huge expenditures for musi- military powerhouse. It had been part of the Holy Roman cal entertainment. Bach seems to have realized that Empire since the mid-12th century, and its ruler — the when she moved in, he would probably be moved out, Markgraf, or Margrave — was charged with defending so he began casting about for a more secure position. and extending the northern imperial border (“mark,” or He remembered the interest the Margrave Brandenburg “marche” in Old English and Old French), in return for had shown in his music, and thought it a good time which he was allowed to be an Elector of the Emperor. to approach him again, so he picked six of the finest The house of Hohenzollern acquired the margraviate concertos he had written at Cöthen, copied them out of Brandenburg in 1415, and the family embraced the meticulously, had them bound into a sumptuous volume Reformation a century later with such authority that they (at no little cost), and sent them to Christian Ludwig in came to be regarded as the leaders of German Protes- March 1721 with a flowery dedication in French — but tantism; Potsdam was chosen as the site of the electoral to no avail. No job materialized at Brandenburg, and in court in the 17th century. Extensive territorial acquisi- 1723 Bach moved to Leipzig’s Thomaskirche, where he tions under Frederick William, the “Great Elector,” before remained for the rest of his life. It is possible the Mar- his death in 1688, allowed his son Frederick III to secure grave never heard any of these magnificent works that the title and the rule of Brandenburg’s northern neighbor, immortalized his name, since records indicate that his Prussia, with its rich (and nearby) capital city of Berlin; modest Kapelle might not have been able to negoti- he became King Frederick I of Prussia in 1701. Fred- ate their difficulties and instrumental requirements. The erick, a cultured man and a generous patron, founded Concertos apparently lay untouched in his library until academies of sciences and arts in Berlin, and built the he died thirteen years after Bach had presented them magnificent palace Charlottenburg for his wife, Sophie to him, when they were inventoried at a value of four Charlotte, which became one of the most important mu- groschen each — only a few cents. Fortunately they sical centers in early-18th-century Germany. When Fred- were preserved by the noted theorist and pedagogue erick William I succeeded his father in 1713, however, Johann Philipp Kirnberger, a pupil of Bach, and came he turned the court’s focus from music to militarism, and eventually into the collection of the Royal Library in Ber- dismissed most of the excellent musicians that his father lin. They were brought to light during the 19th-century had assembled; several of them found employment at Bach revival, published in 1850, and have since come the court of Anhalt-Cöthen, north of Leipzig, where a to be recognized as the supreme examples of Baroque young prince was just starting to indulge his taste and instrumental music. talents for music. Frederick William did, however, allow The Brandenburg Concerto No. 1, whose solo group his uncle, Christian Ludwig, younger brother of the late includes two horns, three oboes and a violin, originated King Frederick and possessor of the now-lesser title of in the three-movement Sinfonia in F major (BWV 1046a) Margrave of Brandenburg, to remain at the palace and that Bach composed to introduce the “Hunting Cantata” retain his own musical establishment. he wrote to celebrate the birthday of Prince Christian of Johann Sebastian Bach met Christian Ludwig, Saxe-Weissenfels in 1713 — Was mir behagt, ist nur die Margrave of Brandenburg, in 1719, during his tenure as muntre Jagt (“The Merry Hunt Is My Delight,” BWV 208, music director at the court of Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, source of the much-loved pastorale Sheep May Safely the young prince who had recently signed up some Graze). To create the First Brandenburg Concerto several of the musicians fired by Frederick William I. Bach years later, Bach thoroughly revised the Sinfonia, adding worked at Anhalt-Cöthen from 1717 to 1723, and he a violin to the soloists, expanding the finale with an ad- and Leopold seem to have gotten along splendidly. The ditional Polacca episode, and composing anew the third Prince enjoyed travel, fine art and, above all, music, and movement. Bach again reworked portions of the Con- he respected and encouraged Bach in his work, even certo No. 1 for the secular cantata Vereinigte Zwietracht occasionally participating in the court concerts as violin- (“United Discord,” BWV 207), written in 1726 for the ist, gambist or harpsichordist. Provided by Leopold with installation of Dr. Gottlieb Kortte as Professor of Law at an excellent set of instruments and a group of fine play- Leipzig University. The opening movement, whose lusty ers (and the second-highest salary of any of his court horn-calls recall the Concerto’s origin in a work inspired employees), Bach enjoyed a fruitful period at Cöthen by the hunt, contains a joyous abundance of notes — many of his greatest works for keyboard, chamber driven by a muscular rhythmic energy. The Adagio is a ensembles and orchestra date from those years. poignant lament largely carried on in dialogue between Early in 1719, Leopold sent Bach to Berlin to finalize the first oboe and solo violin. The third movement, in arrangements for the purchase of a new harpsichord, vigorous 6/8 meter, is bright and virtuosic. The finale is a a large, two-manual model made by Michael Mietke, procession of dances. It begins with a Menuetto for the instrument-builder to the royal court. While in Berlin, full ensemble that returns, rondo fashion, as the structur- Bach played for Christian Ludwig, who was so taken al support of the movement. Interspersed are a section with his music that he asked him to send some of his for two oboes and bassoon, a Polacca (“Polonaise”) for compositions for his library. Bach lost an infant son a strings, and a rousing trio for horns and unison oboes. few months later, however, and in 1720, his wife died ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 18 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 5

Thursday, August 16, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Tessa Lark, Violin Chris Wild, Karen Smuda Emerging Conductor†

ST. PETERSBURG TO MOSCOW I

BORODIN In the Steppes of Central Asia†

SCRIABIN Symphony No. 1 in E major, Op. 26* Lento Allegro dramatico Lento Vivace Allegro

— INTERMISSION —

TCHAIKOVSKY Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 Allegro moderato Canzonetta: Andante — Finale: Allegro vivacissimo

* first PMF performance

This concert is sponsored by Tony & Prilla Beadell in memory of Charles & Marcia Larsen and Cindy Larsen.

Ms. Lark appears by arrangement with Sciolino Artist Management.

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 19 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 5 the Russians is chanted softly by clarinet and horn, as if from a great distance. Pizzicato basses enter, imitating In the Steppes of Central Asia the steady gait of the caravan animals, as an accompa- Alexander Borodin (1833-1887) niment for the Oriental melody intoned by the English Composed in 1880. horn. The clarinet and horns again quietly sound the Premiered on April 8, 1880 in St. Petersburg, conducted Russian melody before it is played by the full orchestra. by Rimsky-Korsakov. The Oriental theme returns in the English horn and cellos and then combined with the Russian song. Waning frag- Early in 1880, two men with the elocution-endanger- ments of the Russian theme escort the caravan across ing names of Korvin-Kryukovsky and Tatishchev ap- the shimmering horizon. proached Alexander Borodin and eleven other compos- ers with a proposal to write some music for a production Symphony No. 1 in E major, Op. 26 they were planning. A few months hence, it seemed, Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915) Alexander II would be celebrating the 25th anniversary Composed in 1899-1900. of his coronation as Tsar, and this intrepid pair of impre- Premiered without finale on November 24, 1900 in St. sarios envisioned an extravaganza of twelve tableaux Petersburg, conducted by Anatoly Liadov; complete vivants that would celebrate the major events of his premiere on March 29, 1901 in Moscow, conducted by reign. Having been immersed for years in the music, Vasily Safonov. history and lore of Central Asia as background for Prince Igor, Borodin chose the tableau set on the vast Russian According the old style Julian calendar then in effect plains where the opera takes place as the subject of his in Russia, Alexander Scriabin was born in Moscow on contribution. He completed In the Steppes of Central Christmas Day 1871 (January 6, 1872 in the modern Asia in a few weeks, but the projected production never Gregorian calendar), which he took as a portent of his took place, so the work was introduced on April 8, 1880 exceptional life. His mother, a gifted pianist, died from at a concert of the orchestra of the Russian Opera in St. tuberculosis before his first birthday. His father remar- Petersburg, conducted by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The ried and spent most of his life abroad in the diplomatic piece had an immediate success at its premiere, and service, so Alexander was brought up (and thoroughly it was the first composition to carry Borodin’s name to spoiled) by a grandmother and an aunt whose piano les- western Europe after it was heard at the Antwerp Exhibi- sons revealed an exceptional musical talent in the boy. tion in 1885. The American premiere, by the Brooklyn The family deemed a military career appropriate for him, Philharmonic conducted by Theodore Thomas, followed so Alexander was duly enrolled at the local cadet school within a year of the Antwerp performance. Of the inter- when he was nine, but piano lessons with the noted national prestige that the composition brought to him, Moscow theorist and composer Georgi Conus and with Borodin wrote to a friend in 1886, “The most popular Tchaikovsky student Nikolai Zverev (at whose resident of my works abroad is my symphonic sketch, In the music school Sergei Rachmaninoff was then a pupil) Steppes of Central Asia. It has made the rounds of Eu- kindled his musical ambitions, as did theory lessons with rope from Christiania to Monaco.... The composition has Sergei Taneyev, and Scriabin began to compose and to been encored almost everywhere and often repeated plan for a life as a virtuoso. He gave up on the military by request, as at the [Johann] Strauss concert in Vienna when he was eighteen to enter the Moscow Conser- and the Lamoureux concerts in Paris.” The score was vatory, and found in the school’s director, pianist and dedicated to Franz Liszt, the inventor of the symphonic conductor Vasili Safonov, a supportive and influential poem, who encouraged Borodin in his composing and mentor. (Scriabin flunked Anton Arensky’s fugue class, helped him make a four-hand piano transcription of the however, and he never received a degree.) Soon after piece. leaving the Conservatory in 1892, Scriabin began ap- A note in the score explains the program of In the pearing as a concert pianist and had some of his piano Steppes of Central Asia: “In the silence of the monoto- pieces issued by Jurgenson, Tchaikovsky’s publisher. In nous steppes of Central Asia is heard the unfamiliar 1894, the rival publisher Mitrofan Belaiff heard Scriabin sound of a peaceful Russian song. From the distance, play some of his own music and secured the rights to we hear the approach of horses and camels and the issue his Piano Sonata No. 1. Belaiff supported the bizarre and melancholy notes of an oriental melody. A promising pianist-composer generously by rewarding caravan approaches, escorted by Russian soldiers, and him with high publishing fees and competition prizes and continues safely on its long way through the immense by underwriting the European debut tour in late 1895 desert. It disappears slowly. The notes of the Russian that culminated in a triumphant recital of Scriabin’s own and Asiatic melodies join in a common harmony, which works in Paris in January. Soon after returning to Mos- dies away as the caravan disappears in the distance.” cow, Scriabin began a piano concerto, his first work with The structure of this small masterpiece is simple, and orchestra, as a vehicle for his own performances. He follows exactly the program Borodin outlined. A motion- completed the score early in 1897 and successfully gave less note high in the violins suggests the featureless its premiere in Odessa on October 23; Safonov conduct- immensity of the vast prairie, over which the song of ed. Scriabin joined the faculty of the Moscow Conserva- tory the following year.

— 20 — Scriabin was encouraged by the success of the Piano Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 Concerto to write a four-minute Rêverie for orchestra in Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) 1898 and, never one to deny his apparently insatiable Composed in 1878. desire to express the transcendent, followed that with Premiered on December 4, 1881 in Vienna, conducted his first symphony a year later. (Margarita Kirillovna Mo- by Hans Richter with Adolf Brodsky as soloist. rozova, the prominent Moscow philanthropist, editor and later director of the local branch of the Russian Musical In the summer of 1877, Tchaikovsky undertook the Society who was then studying privately with Scriabin, disastrous marriage that lasted less than three weeks recalled, “He was very expansive, ready to give his art to and resulted in his emotional collapse and attempted all…. He loved the illusion of the titanic.” Following his suicide. He fled from Moscow to his brother Modeste in death, Mme. Morozova established a Scriabin museum St. Petersburg, where he recovered his wits and discov- in the Moscow apartment in which he lived the last three ered he could find solace in his work. He spent the late years of his brief life.) This First Symphony was not a fall and winter completing his Fourth Symphony and the succinct student exercise, however, something com- opera Eugene Onégin. The brothers decided that travel parable to Prokofiev’s “Classical” Symphony of 1915, outside of Russia would be an additional balm to the but an ambitious composition for large orchestra with composer’s spirit, and they duly installed themselves at chorus and vocal soloists in the last of its six full-scale Clarens on Lake Geneva in Switzerland soon after the movements. He completed the score early in 1900 and first of the year. submitted it to Belaiff for publication, but the editorial In Clarens, Tchaikovsky had already begun work on committee found the finale “unperformable” because a piano sonata when he heard the colorful Symphonie of the perceived difficulty of the vocal parts (though Espagnole by the French composer Edouard Lalo. He Beethoven’s “Choral” Symphony is harder for the per- was so excited by the possibilities of a work for solo formers) and declined to issue it. One of the committee’s violin and orchestra that he set aside the sonata and members, however, long-time St. Petersburg Conserva- immediately began a concerto of his own. By the end of tory faculty Anatoly Liadov, liked the piece well enough April, the work was finished. Tchaikovsky sent the manu- to conduct its premiere in St. Petersburg on November script to Leopold Auer, a friend who headed the violin 24, 1900, though without its closing choral movement; department at the St. Petersburg Conservatory and Safonov led the first performance of the complete work who was also Court Violinist to the Czar, hoping to have in Moscow four months later. Belaiff published the score him premiere the work. Much to the composer’s regret, before the end of the year. Auer returned the piece as “unplayable,” and apparently Though Scriabin disposed his First Symphony in an spread that word with such authority to other violinists unconventional six movements, it is constructed around that it was more than three years before the Violin Con- the Classical core of four movements — sonata-form certo was heard in public. It was Adolf Brodsky, a former opening movement, Lento, scherzo, finale — framed colleague of Tchaikovsky at the Moscow Conservatory, by an atmospheric prologue and a grandiloquent choral who first accepted the challenge of this Concerto when epilogue extolling the elevating spirituality of the musi- he premiered it with the Vienna Philharmonic in 1881. cal art. (Because of the logistics of assembling a large The Concerto opens quietly with a tentative introduc- chorus and two soloists for such limited use and the tory tune. A foretaste of the main theme soon appears in sufficiency of the fifth movement to provide a satisfy- the violins, around which a quick crescendo is mounted ing conclusion for the work, the finale is often omitted to usher in the soloist. After a few unaccompanied in performance, as it is at this concert.) The Symphony measures, the violin presents the lovely main theme opens with soft, rustling music whose languid, luminous above a simple string background. After an elaborated atmosphere suggests French Impressionism, but its rich repeat of this melody, a transition follows that eventually harmonic palette bears the influence of Richard Strauss involves the entire orchestra and gives the soloist the and its arching, yearning clarinet theme of Wagner. The first opportunity for pyrotechnical display. The second sonata form of the Allegro dramatico is built around theme begins a long buildup leading into the develop- an impetuous main theme musically descriptive of the ment, launched with a sweeping presentation of the movement’s title and a lyrical second subject initiated by main theme. The soloist soon steals back the attention the clarinet. Both ideas figure in the development section with breathtaking leaps and double stops. The sweeping and are recapitulated to round out the movement. The mood returns, giving way to a flashing cadenza as a link following Lento is passionate music of almost Italianate to the recapitulation. The flute sings the main theme be- lyricism, modestly expressed in its outer sections but fore the violin it takes over, and all then follows the order more animated, though no less melodious, in its central of the exposition. episode. Next comes a featherweight scherzo, lithe in The Andante begins with a chorale for woodwinds spirit and deftly scored, nowhere more so than in the that is heard again at the end of the movement to serve charming music-box evocation of the twittering birds as a frame around the musical picture inside. On the of spring in the trio. The Vivace takes as the principal canvas of this picture is displayed a soulful melody for theme of its sonata structure a striving, turbulent melody the violin suggesting a Gypsy fiddler. The finale is joined and as its contrasting subject an expressive strain again to the slow movement without a break. With the propul- initiated by the clarinet. Both themes are treated in the sive spirit of a dashing Cossack trepak, the finale flies by development and properly reprised before they return in amid the soloist’s show of agility and speed. the movement’s powerful, tragic coda. ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 21 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 6

Saturday, August 18, 2018, 7:30 p.m. Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Andrew Armstrong, Piano

MUSIC OF HAYDN AND MOZART: VIENNA II

HAYDN Symphony No. 39 in G minor Allegro assai Andante Menuet Finale: Allegro di molto

MOZART Piano Concerto No. 12 in A major, K. 414 (K. 385p)* Allegro Andante Allegretto In Memory of Marilyn Peterson

— INTERMISSION —

HAYDN Notturno No. 1 in C major, Hoboken II:25* Marcia Allegro Adagio Finale: Presto

MOZART Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K. 183 Allegro con brio Andante Menuetto Allegro

* first PMF performance

This concert is sponsored by the Ralph & Genevieve B. Horween Foundation in memory of Marion Horween Chase.

Andrew Armstrong is performing on the Esther Browning Piano.

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 22 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 6 works underwent in the late 1760s: “Very little is known about Haydn’s personal life during these critical years. Symphony No. 39 in G minor This almost total absence of concrete facts about his Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) early years as Kapellmeister to the Esterházy court Composed in 1768. renders it difficult to explain the extraordinary change which began to take place during the latter half of the There exists a strain in the Northern European char- ’sixties. One explanation is perhaps that Haydn seems to acter that seems to demand the expression of strong have suffered a dangerous illness about 1766; in fact he emotions and profound thoughts in its art works. It was nearly died from it. Many years later, when in London, he probably inevitable, therefore, that the ephemeral sweet- explained the circumstances to the Rev. Christian Igna- ness of much music of the Rococo and early Classic tius Latrobe, a Moravian minister and composer. Latrobe periods would not be entirely satisfactory to German tells us how in his early years he studied Haydn’s Stabat and Austrian tastes. Beginning as early as the 1750s, Mater [a work contemporary with the Symphony No. 39], there came into the works of several important compos- which ‘more than any other ... helped to form my taste, ers, notably Carl Philip Emanuel Bach, a striving after a & make me more zealous in the pursuit of this noble heightened musical style through the use of minor keys, science.... Haydn seemed delighted to hear my remarks sudden contrasts, bold chromatic harmonies and a on a Composition which he declared to be one of his pervasive sense of agitation. The name given to this new favorites, & added that it was no wonder, since it partook expressive tonal dialect was borrowed from Friedrich of a religious fervor, for it had been composed in the Maximilian von Klinger’s 1776 play Wirrwarr, oder, Sturm performance of a religious Vow. He then gave me the fol- und Drang (“Confusion, or, Storm and Stress”), though lowing account of it. Sometime about the year 1766, he evidences of the style had begun manifesting them- was seized with a violent disorder, which threatened his selves in music during the preceding decade. Klinger’s life. “I was,” said he, “not prepared to die, and prayed to drama grew from the soil of Rousseau’s philosophy of God to have mercy upon me & grant me recovery. I also free personal expression, an idea that was to become vowed, that if I were restored to health, I would compose doctrine for Romantic artists and had found an earlier a Stabat Mater in honor of the blessed Virgin, as a token venue in some music of the late 18th century. Mozart of thankfulness. My prayer was heard & I recovered. tried out the Sturm und Drang idiom in his Symphony With a grateful sense of my duty, I cheerfully set about No. 25 in G minor of 1773, and returned to it with stun- the performance of my Vow, & endeavored to do it in my ning results in Don Giovanni, Symphony No. 40, Re- best manner....”’ This emotional upheaval brought with quiem and other of his Viennese masterworks. Haydn, it the composer’s full maturity. Haydn had, in a word, as well, explored the expanded expression of the Sturm become a profound composer.” und Drang in his Op. 20 String Quartets and Symphonies The Symphony No. 39 of 1768, one of the earliest No. 26 in D minor (Lamentatione”), No. 39 in G minor, manifestations of Haydn’s Sturm und Drang proclivities, No. 44 in E minor (“Mourning”), No. 45 in F-sharp minor is characterized by ferocious intensity in the fast move- (“Farewell”), No. 49 in F minor (“La Passione”) and No. ments, extreme leaps in the thematic material, sudden 52 in C minor. contrasts in dynamics, frenetic rhythmic drive, lean The Symphony No. 39, probably composed in textures bordering on the ascetic, a wide range of emo- 1768, stands at the crucial time in the evolution of tional states and a pervasive sense of tragedy. The first late-18th-century music when old ideas from the Ba- movement is a tightly compacted sonata structure built roque era were being boiled in the stylistic cauldron of from a sparse theme, interrupted by portentous pauses, contemporary technique to yield the mature symphonic given by the violins at the outset. The mood brightens form. Haydn was the chief cook. He produced some somewhat as the exposition proceeds, though the un- thirty specimens of the genre during the 1760s, more settling apprehension with which the Symphony began than in any other decade of his career, and tried out in hovers indelibly above the music. The agitated demean- them all manner of musical ingredients: concertante or continues through the development section. A sudden writing, fugues, three-movement sinfonias, spun-out drop in the dynamic level marks the recapitulation, which Bachian themes, square-cut folksy tunes, extra-musical maintains the darkly colored tonality until the end of programs, thematic quotations, minor keys, harmonic the movement. The Andante, a throwback to the polite audacities. “As head of an orchestra,” he wrote, “I could sentiments of the Rococo age, is demure by comparison experiment, observe what heightened the effect and with the tragic implications of the preceding music. The what weakened it, expand, cut, take risks. I was cut off troubled mood and minor mode of the first movement from the world, there was no one near me to torment are revived in the Menuet; the central trio, dominated by me or make me doubt myself, and so I had to become the oboes and horns, is lighter in expression. The rest- original.” The noted Haydn authority H.C. Robbins less finale, disposed in a concentrated sonata form, is Landon offered a fascinating thesis on the cause of the propelled by a nervous rhythmic energy that drives the vast expansion of expressive vistas the composer’s Symphony to its stark conclusion.

— 23 — Piano Concerto No. 12 in A major, K. 414 (K. 385p) manuscript score for public subscription early in 1783. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Artaria published the three concertos in March 1785. Composed in 1782. The melodies of the A Major Concerto’s opening Premiered in March 1783 in Vienna, with the composer movement are stated by the ensemble: an ingratiating as soloist. main theme juxtaposing a sweet, rising motive and a skipping descent down the scale; a vigorous dialogue; a When Mozart resigned from his Salzburg post in the hesitant little tune given by the violins above a pizzicato musical establishment of Archbishop Colloredo in 1781 bass line; and some compact cadential material. The to move to Vienna, he anticipated making his living as pianist enters and weaves a brilliant embroidery around a free-lance pianist, composer and teacher. He outlined the melodies, which are reiterated from the introduc- his plan in a letter to his father in January 1782: “I have tion. After a central section based on a new octave-leap three pupils now, which brings me in some eighteen motive, a short cadenza leads to the recapitulation of ducats a month.... I really need only one more, because the themes. The Andante, whose principal theme Mozart four pupils are quite enough. With the income, a man borrowed from the overture to his friend Johann Chris- and his wife can manage in Vienna if they live quietly tian Bach’s opera La calamitá dei cuori (“The Calamity of and in the retired way which we desire; but, of course, Hearts,” 1763), is one of the tenderest and most touch- if I were to fall ill, we should not make a farthing. I can ing slow movements among his works. The Concerto’s write, it is true, at least one opera a year, give a concert finale is a sparkling rondo. annually and have some things engraved and published by subscription. There are other concerts too where one Notturno No. 1 in C major, Hoboken II:25 can make money, particularly if one has been living in a Joseph Haydn place for a long time and has a good reputation.” The Composed 1788-1790. pupils, commissions and concerts did materialize soon after his arrival, and he felt confident enough about the King Ferdinand IV of Naples (1751-1825) was a bit future to marry Constanze Weber the following August. of an eccentric. He had a haphazard formal educa- She was expecting within a month — the first of a series tion and developed little taste for reading, writing and of almost constant pregnancies during the nine years of conducting matters of state, but always enjoyed dining, their marriage that nearly ruined her health for good — hunting, riding, games, and physical culture in general and Mozart soon had to incorporate supporting a grow- (and fathering children — he had eighteen), and was ing family into his career plans. given to somewhat boorish social behavior. One noble Mozart’s first years in Vienna were good. He was hap- guest at a party in 1769, for instance, reported, “The py with his marriage. He was in demand as a pianist and King gave me a great salute with all his might on my composer, with a reputation that extended through much behind in the presence of several people…. I also had of Europe. He was invited to perform at the houses of the honor of carrying him on my back for an age.” One important members of the Viennese aristocracy. Publish- year before that festive occasion, Ferdinand had married ers and music dealers vied for his works. The concerts Maria Carolina of Austria, the thirteenth of the Habsburg he produced were well attended. Everyone, it seemed, Empress Maria Theresa’s sixteen children, and she had talked of him. undertaken to give her new husband some social grace In autumn 1782, he began planning his concerts for and cultural polish, and to curb his more impulsive ten- the following Lenten season. (Opera was forbidden in dencies. (The above guest at the party was her brother.) Catholic Austria during the Lent, and early spring was Part of her project included developing his musical the only time of the year when auditoriums were free for sympathies, and she managed to get him interested in a instrumental concerts.) By December, he was at work on strange instrument whose eccentricities perfectly suited a series of three new concertos, the first he composed his own — the lira organizzata. The lira was essentially after moving to Vienna. That he was concerned they a hurdy-gurdy (a guitar-like instrument whose strings should satisfy the popular Viennese taste for pleasant were set vibrating by a rosined rotating wheel cranked diversion while possessing something of deeper musical by hand and altered in pitch by depressing buttons on value is evidenced by a letter of December 28th to his an attached keyboard), which had been augmented by a father: “These concertos are a happy medium between tiny pipe organ in an attached case whose bellows and what is too easy and too difficult; they are very brilliant, sounds were activated by the same wheel and keyboard. pleasing to the ear and natural, without being vapid. (There is a demonstration of one on YouTube.) The peak There are passages here and there from which connois- of popularity for the soon-obsolete lira was reached seurs alone can derive satisfaction; but these passages around 1780 in Naples, and Norbert Hadrava, the Aus- are written in such a way that the less learned cannot fail trian ambassador to Ferdinand’s court, had developed a to be pleased, though without knowing why.” There is certain skill on it. He introduced the King to the lira and further evidence that he took care to please a wide audi- His Highness liked it well enough to cultivate sufficient ence with the three new concertos (K. 413, 414, 415): technique that Hadrava commissioned concertos for two in addition to their easily accessible musical style, their lire from Adalbert Gyrowetz, Ignaz Pleyel and Johann orchestration was devised so that the wind parts were Sterkel that he and the King could play together. In 1786, expendable, thereby making these works performable Hadrava asked the most famous composer of instru- by as small an ensemble as a string quartet. In this form mental music in Europe, Joseph Haydn, to write several — as chamber music for the home — he offered them in more such pieces.

— 24 — Haydn delivered at least five concertos for twolire Magic Flute (Ach, ich fühl’s) of her hopelessness and organizzate, two horns and strings that pleased the wish to die. In addition to the later G minor Symphony, Neapolitan court so well he was commissioned to write Mozart also used this key in his Piano Quartet, K. 478 a set Notturni for a similar ensemble, probably in 1788. and String Quintet, K. 516, all works of the most agitated The six Notturni (one now exists only as a fragment) emotion. found favor as well, and when Ferdinand visited Vienna The occasion for which this “Little” G minor Sym- in September 1790 for a triple wedding of members of phony was composed is unknown, as is the date of the Neapolitan royal family to a trio of suitable Habsburg its premiere. Some commentators assert that Mozart offspring, Haydn met him and received an order for three composed it to vent his anger and frustration over his more Notturni (two are extant). Haydn was fond enough “Salzburg captivity,” as he rather injudiciously dubbed of the pieces that he arranged them for flute and oboe his position at the archiepiscopal court in his home- substituting for the lire and added a pair of clarinets to town. It is unlikely, however, that he would have voiced the ensemble, though those instruments were then rare his rage in just this one isolated piece. Not only are enough outside Germany and Austria that he allowed the works surrounding it of consistently sunny counte- their parts could also be played on violins. He also nance, but Mozart also kept the emotions of his daily reworked a movement from the Concerto No. 3 (Hob. life separate from those of his music more deliberately VII:3) when he was in London in 1794 as the Allegretto of than almost any other of the great composers. It is more the Symphony No. 100, whose added percussion gave probable that, in this daring work, he was simply trying that work its “Military” sobriquet. the limits of the newly discovered Sturm und Drang style. The Notturno No. 1 in C major (Hob. II:25) is a de- Such a notion aligns with the development of his music light in both its musical content and its scoring, which at that time toward enriching his earlier sweet, gallant includes two horns and divided violas as well as the style based on Italian music with the harmonic and option for clarinets to replace the violins. Its four move- textural weight of the German composers. The influence ments comprise a March (late-18th-century musical of Haydn in particular is in evidence in K. 183, and the entertainments often opened with the musicians accom- work’s relations with the Esterházy master’s Symphony panying themselves as they processed into the perfor- No. 39 in G minor have often been noted. Describing the mance venue), a compact sonata-form Allegro, a noctur- emotional worlds of Mozart’s only two minor-key sym- nal Adagio, and a galloping, sonata-form Presto. phonies, Edward Downes wrote, “In comparison with the larger, greater G minor Symphony of Mozart’s later Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K. 183 years, the ‘Little’ G minor is wilder and perhaps more Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart despairing. The spirit of revolt seems more furious here, Composed in 1773. more unrestrained, with an adolescent emotion that has not yet been tamed by an adverse world.” Vienna was the home to many of the most outstand- The Symphony No. 25 opens with a pulsing motive, ing musicians of the late 18th century. Hasse, Gluck, more rhythmic than melodic, that looks forward in style Gassmann, Wagenseil, Salieri, Haydn, Dittersdorf, and spirit to the D minor Piano Concerto, K. 466 and Vanhal and many others made Vienna the greatest music the Overture to Don Giovanni. The movement follows city of the day. Several of those composers, most nota- sonata form. After a simple, poignant phrase in the bly Joseph Haydn, were experimenting in the 1770s with oboe and a pregnant silence, the stormy transition from a style that brought a new, passionately romantic sen- G minor to the contrasting key begins. Another, briefer sibility to their music — the so-called Sturm und Drang pause precedes the second theme, a step-wise mo- (“Storm and Stress”) — that was characterized by minor tive presented by the violins in B-flat major. A compact keys, expressive harmonies and rhythmic agitation. development section leads to a recapitulation of the During his visit to Vienna that summer, the seventeen- earlier themes, with the second theme heard in the dark year-old Mozart heard Haydn’s Symphony No. 39 in G coloring of the principal tonality. A short coda returns minor, and it stirred his interest in exploring the expres- the opening pulsing motive to close the movement. The sive possibilities of this revolutionary musical language. second movement is filled with the marvelous synthesis On his return to Salzburg in September, Mozart wrote his of Italian charm and Germanic emotion that character- own Sturm und Drang symphony — No. 25, K. 183. He izes Mozart’s best works. The touching lyrical style and cast it in G minor, his first orchestral piece in that som- languorous orchestral sound are wedded to a melody ber key except for the overture to the early oratorio La that comprises almost exclusively falling steps — the Betulia liberata, K. 118 (1771). He was to write only one “musical teardrop” that was inextricably linked with the other minor-key symphony: the sublime No. 40, K. 550 expression of wistful sadness in 18th-century German of 1788, also in G minor. music. The Minuet, with its bare octaves, returns the The individual tonalities in 18th-century music were Symphony to the stark mood of the opening movement; felt to convey certain emotional characteristics well be- the contrasting central trio for wind choir without strings yond the simple happy/sad, major/minor dichotomy. The provides the only emotionally untroubled portion of the key of G minor for Mozart was one of utmost despair work. The finale, another sonata structure, maintains the and intensity of feeling. Pamina sings in G minor in The mood of agitation to the end of this haunting Symphony. ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 25 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 7

Tuesday, August 21, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Alastair Willis, Guest Conductor Maya Anjali Buchanan, Violin

LOS ANGELES TO NEW YORK

WILLIAMS The Cowboys Overture

KORNGOLD Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 Moderato nobile Romance: Andante Finale: Allegro assai vivace

— INTERMISSION —

RODGERS “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue” from On Your Toes orch. Bennett

GERSHWIN Promenade, Walking the Dog

HERRMANN Suite from Psycho Prelude The City The Rainstorm The Madhouse The Murder The Water The Swamp The Stairs The Knife The Cellar Finale

WILLIAMS “Adventures on Earth” from E.T. (The Extra-Terrestrial) Selections from Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens March of the Resistance — Rey’s Theme — Jedi Steps “The Rebellion Is Reborn” from Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi

This concert is sponsored by Gail Fischer in memory of her son, Gregory B. Boulanger (1965-1985).

Mr. Willis appears by arrangement with William Reinert Associates, Millerton, NY.

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 26 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 7 appeared as piano soloist. Korngold was an international celebrity at thirteen. The Cowboys Overture In 1915 and 1916, Korngold wrote the first two of John Williams (born in 1932) his five operas:Der Ring des Polykrates, a comedy, and Composed in 1972. Violanta, a tragedy. Following a two-year stint in the Austrian army playing piano for the troops during World John Williams was born in New York in 1932, stud- War I, Korngold turned again to opera, producing his ied at Juilliard and UCLA, and by the early 1960s was dramatic masterpiece, Die Tote Stadt (“The Dead City”), composing for feature films and television, as well as which was premiered simultaneously in Hamburg (where working as a pianist, arranger and conductor in Los An- he served as conductor for three years after the war) and geles. His music began to receive wide recognition when Cologne on December 4, 1920; Die Tote Stadt was the he won Emmys for his scores for the television movies first German opera performed at the Met after World War Heidi and Jane Eyre. He has since composed music and I. After Korngold returned to Vienna in 1920, he was ap- served as music director for well over 300 movies and pointed professor of composition at the Staatsakademie. television shows, receiving 51 Academy Award nomina- In 1934, the Austrian director Max Reinhardt was tions (the most of any living person and second only to conscripted by Warner Brothers in Hollywood to film a Walt Disney) and winning five Oscars, 24 Grammys, four version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. He chose to Golden Globes and three Emmys, as well as numerous use Mendelssohn’s incidental music as background, gold and platinum records. In addition to his film music, and took Korngold along to arrange the score. Korn- Williams has written many concert works. From 1980 gold, who, as a Jew, felt increasingly uneasy in Austria, to 1993, he was conductor of the Boston Pops and has accepted other offers in Hollywood, and, when the Nazi also appeared as guest conductor with major orches- Anschluss in 1938 prevented him from returning home, tras. Among Williams’ many distinctions are twenty he settled permanently in California. (He became a honorary degrees, induction into the Hollywood Bowl United States citizen in 1943.) For the next seven years, Hall of Fame, a Kennedy Center Honor (America’s high- he devoted his talents to creating a body of film music est award for artistic achievement), Golden Baton Award that set a standard for Hollywood composers, and won for Lifetime Achievement from the League of American two Academy Awards (for Anthony Adverse and The Orchestras, and National Medal of Arts. Adventures of Robin Hood). His father’s death in 1945, The Cowboys Overture is based on music from the however, caused him to re-evaluate his career, and he 1972 film of the same name directed by Mark Rydell and returned to writing concert music with concertos for starring John Wayne, Roscoe Lee Browne, Bruce Dern, violin and cello, and a large symphony. Korngold died on Colleen Dewhurst and Slim Pickens. The outer sections November 29, 1957, and his remains were interred in the of the sparkling Overture are vigorous and optimistic, Hollywood Cemetery, within a few feet of those of Doug- reminiscent in about equal amounts of hoe-down and las Fairbanks, Sr., D.W. Griffith and Rudolf Valentino. Coplandesque Americana, while the central portion is The first work Korngold undertook upon his return more lyrical and nostalgic. to composing concert music was a concerto written at the urging of the Polish violinist Bronislaw Huberman, Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 who, like the composer, had been driven from Europe to Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957) America by the war. The piece was written largely dur- Composed in 1945. ing the summer of 1945, but its premiere was delayed Premiered on February 15, 1947 in St. Louis, conducted until early 1947, by which time Huberman had returned by Vladimir Golschmann with Jascha Heifetz as soloist. home. Jascha Heifetz was therefore enlisted as solo- ist for the first performance, on February 15 in Saint Erich Wolfgang Korngold (his middle name honored Louis, an event that one local critic reported inspired the Mozart) was the younger son of Julius Korngold, one of greatest ovation in his experience; he predicted the new Vienna’s most influential music critics at the turn of the Concerto would endure as long as that by Mendelssohn. 20th century. By age five, Erich was playing piano duets When Heifetz subsequently played the work in New with his father; two years later he began composing, and York, Los Angeles, Chicago and elsewhere, audience at nine, he produced a cantata (Gold) that convinced his reaction was uniformly enthusiastic, but critical opinion father to enroll him at the Vienna Conservatory. When was sharply divided. It was not until the 1970s, with the Gustav Mahler heard Erich play his cantata the following revival of interest in Korngold’s film and concert music, year, he proclaimed the boy “a genius” and arranged for that the Concerto secured its place in the violin reper- him to take lessons with Alexander Zemlinsky. Korn- tory. Upon its publication in 1950, Korngold dedicated gold made remarkable progress under Zemlinsky — his the score to Alma Mahler-Werfel, the widow of Gustav Piano Sonata No. 1 was published in 1908, when he had Mahler and wife of the writer Franz Werfel, who is best ripened to the age of eleven. The following year he wrote remembered for the novel The Song of Bernadette, the a ballet, Der Schneemann (“The Snowman”), which was source of the popular 1943 movie. Korngold had be- staged at the Vienna Royal Opera at the command of friended the Werfels when they arrived in Los Angeles in Emperor Franz Josef. In 1911, the budding composer 1940, and he made a gift of the Concerto to Alma on her gave a concert of his works in Berlin, in which he also 69th birthday, in 1948. — 27 — Korngold’s Violin Concerto has an abundance of two Most Beautiful Girl in the World and My Romance. qualities essential in a work of its species — melody Once Jumbo was on the boards, Rodgers and Hart and virtuosity. The brilliance and difficulty of the writing worked their ballet-cum-musical scenario into a script for the soloist are evident throughout, while the work’s titled On Your Toes for Shubert, who brought in George lyricism is inherent in its thematic material, which the Abbott, already well established on Broadway as a top- composer borrowed from four of his best film scores. notch director of fast-paced musicals, to sharpen the (Korngold’s advantageous contract with Warner Broth- story and brighten the dialogue. As it turned out, Shu- ers allowed him to retain the rights to his scores.) The bert was already too heavily committed to produce On haunting first theme of the opening movement is from Your Toes himself, so he turned the whole project over the 1937 picture Another Dawn, a desert-outpost drama to another experienced Broadway impresario, Dwight whose most memorable component is Korngold’s music. Deere Wiman. On Your Toes was revolutionary in that it To provide a contrasting element in this loosely woven called not just for conventional Broadway dancing but sonata form, the composer used the gently yearning also for two extended sequences of ballet, so Tamara love theme from Juarez, the 1939 film biography of Geva, one of the leading ballerinas of the Ballet Russe, the Mexican statesman and hero, which was based in was engaged to star opposite Ray Bolger; the brilliant part on Franz Werfel’s play Juarez and Maximilian. The George Balanchine, former master of the Diaghilev Bal- second movement (subtitled Romance) is initiated by let and the Ballet Russe de Mon Rózsa te Carlo (and a poignant melody from Korngold’s Academy Award- recently divorced from Geva), agreed to do the chore- winning score for Anthony Adverse, the 1936 film about ography. On Your Toes opened at the Imperial theater an orphan who struggles to overcome the adversities on April 11, 1936, played for 320 performances, and of life in early 19th-century America. The score is one became enshrined in Broadway legend. It was revived in of the most extensive ever composed for a Hollywood 1954 and again in 1983, for which the original jazz-age movie, containing no fewer than 43 themes and provid- orchestrations by the prolific Hans Spialek (147 shows ing almost continuous background music for the film’s for Broadway, twelve of them for Rodgers and Hart) were 136 minutes. The Concerto’s finale is a sparkling rondo reconstructed and heard for the first time in nearly fifty whose witty main theme is a tarantella melody from The years. Prince and the Pauper, the 1937 screen recreation of In the story, Junior (the Ray Bolger role), who had Mark Twain’s well-known story. danced with his family in vaudeville as a kid, is a mu- sic professor at WPA Extension University. A student “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue” from On Your Toes of his, Sidney Cohn, has composed a jazz ballet titled Richard Rodgers (1902-1979) Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, which takes a mob hit as Composed in 1936. its subject, and wants to get it performed. There is a Premiered on April 11, 1936 at the Imperial Theater in growing mutual attraction between Junior and another New York City. of his students, Frankie Frayne (their numbers include There’s a Small Hotel), and she introduces him to Peggy Dick Rodgers and Larry Hart spent the years from Porterfield, the principal benefactor of the Russian 1931 to 1935 away from troubled Broadway in the Ballet. Junior would like to have the company produce largely Depression-proof creative enclave of Hollywood, Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, so Peggy takes him to meet writing the music and lyrics for three feature films and Vera Baronova (Tamara Geva), the prima ballerina, and contributing songs to several others; their Hollywood Sergei Alexandrovich, the impresario. When Junior later hits included Blue Moon, Lover, Mimi and Isn’t It Roman- turns up to see Sergei’s Arabian Nights ballet called La tic? By early 1935, Rodgers and Hart were envisioning a Princesse Zenobia, he is pressed into duty by Peggy to new kind of musical, one that would integrate the songs replace an ill slave, and almost ruins the performance. into the story, reveal character and move the action After the debacle, Sergei is hardly in the mood to stage forward, and to try out their ideas they came up with Sidney’s ballet, but Peggy informs him that she will with- a scenario about a former vaudeville hoofer who gets draw her financial support if he does not, and the matter drawn inadvertently into the formal world of ballet. They is then quickly settled. During rehearsals for Slaughter pitched their draft to Pandro Berman, head of RKO, as on Tenth Avenue, Vera incites the jealousy of Konstan- a vehicle for Fred Astaire, but the world’s most famous tine Morrosine, the company’s male lead whose affair dancer turned it down because he felt that the required with her is on the rocks, by encouraging Junior’s interest ballet sequences would not fit his top-hat-and-tails in her. Konstantine becomes so enraged that he hires a image. When Rodgers and Hart returned to New York real-life hit man to knock off Junior during the premiere that spring, they presented their idea to producer Lee of the new ballet. The climax of On Tour Toes comes Shubert. Shubert liked their concept since it would give with the performance of Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, with a leading role to a young dancer named Ray Bolger he its pretend murder on stage and its threatened murder in was then grooming for stardom, but he told them that it the wings. Junior, however, is tipped off about the plot, would have to wait until he had staged a revue titled At and he keeps the band repeating the last section of the Home Abroad featuring Beatrice Lillie. Rodgers and Hart ballet long enough for the police to arrive. The thug is therefore made their return to Broadway with the score carted off, the ballet is a success, and all the couples are for Billy Rose’s circus spectacle Jumbo, which opened properly matched — Junior and Frankie, Vera and Kon- at the Hippodrome Theater on November 16, 1935 and stantine, Peggy and Sergei — before the final curtain. produced the soon-to-be standards Little Girl Blue, The

— 28 — Promenade, Walking the Dog George Gershwin (1898-1937) several radio series, including Orson Welles’ Mercury Composed in 1937. Theater. (Herrmann was a collaborator on the famous 1938 War of the Worlds broadcast that panicked the George Gershwin, born Jakob Gershvin in Brooklyn, nation.) When Welles moved to Hollywood to produce New York to a Russian immigrant father, rose from plug- Citizen Kane, he took along Herrmann as his composer. ging songs in Tin Pan Alley as a teenager to become The music that Herrmann provided for that epochal Broadway’s brightest light, the toast of Hollywood and movie became the touchstone of his work in Hollywood, one of society’s darlings. But that was not enough for and a paragon of the sweeping, symphonic film score him — he had to prove himself in the concert world precisely integrated to the drama on the screen. For the as well. First there was the Rhapsody in Blue of 1924, next quarter century, Herrmann was one of the busiest which, according to Walter Damrosch, “made a lady composers in Hollywood, creating perhaps his most out of jazz.” A year later came the Concerto in F. There outstanding work for the medium with Alfred Hitch- followed An American in Paris (1928), A Cuban Over- cock’s The Trouble with Harry, The Man Who Knew Too ture (1932), and, in 1935, Porgy and Bess. The legacy Much, The Wrong Man, Vertigo, North by Northwest, that Gershwin left is as fresh and invigorating today as Psycho and Marnie; Herrmann also provided music for when it was new. The words of the novelist John O’Hara, Hitchcock’s television series. In 1966, with fashion and written just after the composer’s death, are still valid: commercial expediency prompting studio executives to “George Gershwin died last week. I don’t have to believe abandon the traditional symphonic film score in favor of it if I don’t want to.” a more saleable collection of potentially popular tunes, For the 1937 RKO filmShall We Dance, starring Fred Herrmann had a falling out with Hitchcock over the Astaire and Ginger Rogers, George and Ira Gershwin music for Torn Curtain, which was scrapped in favor of provided such memorable songs as Let’s Call the Whole a more conventional score by John Addison. Herrmann Thing Off, They All Laughed and They Can’t Take That moved to London, where he continued to write for films Away from Me. To accompany a ship-board stroll of and to conduct and record his own music as well as Astaire and his pooch, George wrote an instrumental works by other composers. In 1975, he returned to Hol- interlude called Walking the Dog, which was later pub- lywood to record the soundtrack for Taxi Driver; he died lished in a piano version as Promenade. of a heart attack just hours after finishing the sessions. In addition to his widely known work as a film com- Suite from Psycho poser, Herrmann also created concert and stage works Bernard Herrmann (1911-1975) throughout his life. His creative catalog includes a ballet Composed in 1960. (The Skating Rink, inspired by the 19th-century prints of Currier & Ives), an opera drawn from Emily Brontë’s All who have seen Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho or Wuthering Heights, a symphony, a violin concerto, sever- Vertigo, Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane or The Magnificent al orchestral pieces (some incorporating music from his Ambersons, Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver or any other movies), works for chorus and orchestra (including one of the 56 movies for which he provided the background based on Dickens’ A Christmas Carol) and a few cham- scores know the music of Bernard Herrmann. Herrmann ber compositions. Herrmann’s music, whether intended was not only among the most prolific, and one of the to be heard in the dark or in the light, always grew from greatest, of all the native-born composers for American his strongly held belief in the essentially communicative films during the golden age of Hollywood in the 1940s power of his art. “Musically I count myself as an individ- and 1950s, but he also wrote a sizeable body of concert ualist,” he said. “I believe that only music which springs and stage music, and was one of the most enterprising out of genuine emotion is alive and important. I hate all conductors of his generation. cults, fads and circles. I feel that a composer should be Bernard Herrmann, born in New York City in 1911, true to his own innate instincts and tastes, and develop studied violin as a youngster and won a $100 prize for a these to the best of his ability, no matter what the pres- song titled The Bells in a composition competition when ent vogue may be.... I am not interested in music, or any he was thirteen. That success decided him on a career work of art, that fails to stimulate the appreciation of life in music, and he studied composition as an undergradu- and, more importantly, pride in life.” ate at New York University with Philip James and Percy Though it became Herrmann’s most famous score, Grainger, and later with Bernard Wagenaar at Juilliard, and one of Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest commercial suc- where he also took conducting lessons from Albert cesses, Psycho almost never reached the movie screen. Stoessel. Herrmann made his debut as composer and Hitchcock made the film, based on a grisly novel by conductor on Broadway with his score for a ballet scene Robert Bloch, as an experiment in what he wryly termed in the 1932 show Americana; two years later, he was ap- “black comedy” on a tight budget and in stark black- pointed to the musical staff of CBS. In 1933, he founded and-white. Paramount Studios and Hitchcock both dis- the New Chamber Orchestra, which he directed for sev- liked the first cut of the film and thought that it should be eral years in adventurous concerts featuring the music edited to one hour and “got rid of” as a television show. of Ives, Cowell, Varèse and other modernists, an activity When Hitchcock screened that initial version for Her- for which he received awards for broadening the musical rmann in December 1959, however, the composer had repertory from the department store Lord & Taylor and an idea, and he told the director to “go away for your the Society of American Composers. At CBS, Herrmann Christmas holidays, and when you come back we’ll re- was responsible for providing background music for cord the score and see what you think.” Herrmann’s idea

— 29 — was to match the tense, shocking images and the mono- they fly ‘over the moon.’ The more sentimental music chrome look of the film with music for strings alone, “to that follows accompanies the dialogue as E.T. bids fare- complement the black-and-white photography of the well to his earthling friends. This is followed by timpani film with a black-and-white score” (and to fit Hitchcock’s and brass fanfares as the orchestra brings the film to a tight budget restrictions). With Herrmann’s score height- close.” ening the movie’s drama and providing it with continuity, Star Wars is a phenomenon, the most successful film Psycho not only created a sensation when it was re- series of all time and a cultural icon of almost mythic leased the following year, but quickly became an icon of proportions. George Lucas’ original movie, now titled Hollywood film-making. Episode IV: A New Hope, created an unprecedented Herrmann’s score has lost none of its power to sensation when it was released in 1977. Lucas had disturb and to shock, and Psycho still offers one of the conceived a screen epic of six films, with the original most chilling experiences available to the movie-goer. Star Wars as its centerpiece, that would tell the full The present suite for strings provides both an example tale of Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia, Darth of the composer’s technique of developing short motives Vader, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and the galaxy of beings, into substantial blocks of music as well as an emotional machines and planets they encounter in the struggle distillation of several of the film’s most memorable to save the universe from the evil Empire. The entire scenes. (Herrmann’s screaming violins, which mirror original series was completed by 2005, but the endur- Janet Leigh’s terror during the murder-in-the-shower se- ing popularity of Star Wars led Walt Disney Studios, who quence, make one of the scariest sounds ever created. had acquired the franchise, to start a new trilogy with Hitchcock, by the way, reportedly helped the actress’ re- Episode VII: The Force Awakens in 2015. action at the crucial moment in that scene when he had The essential conflict of theStar Wars epic is estab- ice water pumped, unannounced, through the plumbing.) lished in Episode I: The Phantom Menace: a group of “33% of the effect ofPsycho was due to the music,” dissident worlds has broken away from the Galactic Re- Hitchcock calculated. public and allied themselves in an attempt to control the universe. The Jedi warriors sworn to protect the Repub- “Adventures on Earth” from E.T. (The Extra-Terrestrial) lic have overcome the Empire by the end of the original Selections from Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens series, but in Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), “The Rebellion Is Reborn” from Star Wars VIII: The set thirty years later, a new enemy has arisen in the First Last Jedi Order. Princess Leia, now General of the Resistance Main Title from Star Wars IV: A New Hope John Williams forces, continues to search for her long-missing brother, Composed in 1982, 1977, 2015 and 2017. the Jedi master Luke Skywalker. Rey, a resourceful scavenger, and Finn, a ex-stormtrooper, find a droid with Director Steven Spielberg’s E.T. (The Extra-Terrestrial) knowledge of Luke’s whereabouts, and they enlist the (1982) is the enchanting story of ten-year-old Elliot help of Han Solo and his furry sidekick Chewbacca, the (played by Henry Thomas), who befriends a gentle, unlikely heroes of the very firstStar Wars episode, to get lovable alien stranded on earth when his space ship it to Leia. The First Order, however, also wants to find hurriedly leaves without him. These two unlikely friends Luke, and the film sets the main characters’ adventures learn to communicate intimately, and they form a close within the clash between the Resistance and their new and very special relationship, which ends poignantly adversaries. John Williams’ music, his fifth Oscar nomi- when E.T.’s ship returns to take him home. E.T. (The Ex- nation for the Star Wars series (he won for the first, in tra-Terrestrial) was nominated for nine Academy Awards, 1978), weaves themes associated with characters seen including Best Picture, and John Williams’ memorable in earlier installments through a brilliant new score. score won both an Oscar and a Golden Globe Award. Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), the second install- The film captured hearts around the world, earning back ment of the franchise’s sequel trilogy and one of the its $10 million dollar budget in its first weekend and half most critically and financially successful entries of the again that amount in the first three days of its re-release entire series, finds Rey trying to recruit the self-exiled in 2002; its total U.S. gross alone is estimated at well Luke Skywalker to join the Rebellion’s struggle against over $400 million dollars. Roger Ebert wrote of E.T., “This the First Order. Luke, at first feeling that the Force can- movie made my heart glad. It is filled with innocence, not overcome the First Order and that the Jedi should hope and good cheer. It is also exciting and wickedly become extinct, is visited by the ghost of Grand Master funny. E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial is a movie like The Wiz- Yoda, who convinces him that Rey should be trained as ard of Oz, that you can grow up with and grow old with, a Jedi. Luke assents. He joins the Rebellion and dies and it won’t let you down.” after a lightsaber duel with Kylo Ren, leader of the First Of the sequence titled Adventure on Earth, Williams Order, but Rey is now prepared to carry on the fight as wrote, “The music was designed to accompany the a Jedi. John Williams received his sixth Star Wars Oscar bicycle chase near the end of the film. As the young nomination for The Last Jedi, which was judged by many cyclists reach escape velocity, E.T.’s theme is heard as to be among his finest work of the epic series. ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

— 30 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 8

Thursday, August 23, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Riana Anthony, Cello Chris Wild, Karen Smuda Emerging Conductor†

ST. PETERSBURG TO MOSCOW II

GLAZUNOV Concert Waltz No. 1 in D major, Op. 47*†

KABALEVSKY Cello Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 77* I. Molto sostenuto — Allegro molto e energico — Cadenza I: Tempo I Rubato — Allegro molto agitato — II. Presto marcato — Cadenza II: L’istesso tempo — Molto sostenuto — III. Andante con moto — Agitato — Molto tranquillo Played without pause

— INTERMISSION —

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV Scheherazade, Op. 35 The Sea and Sinbad’s Ship The Story of the Kalandar Prince The Young Prince and the Young Princess Festival at Baghdad — The Sea — Shipwreck

* first PMF performance

This concert is sponsored by Friends of PMF 2.0. Carl & Judy Jackson, Richard Kozak, Mike & Connie Glowacki and Tom & Linda Weisensel

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 31 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 8 Eighth Symphonies and the atmospheric tone poems The Kremlin and Stenka Razin, occasionally grace con- Concert Waltz No. 1 in D major, Op. 47 cert programs. “Within Russian music, Glazunov has a Alexander Glazunov (1865-1936) significant place because he succeeded in reconciling Composed in 1894. Russianism and Europeanism,” wrote Boris Schwarz. “He was the direct heir of Balakirev’s nationalism but By the turn of the 20th century, Russian music tended more toward Borodin’s epic grandeur. At the had become a mature art. The works of Tchaikovsky, same time he absorbed Rimsky-Korsakov’s orchestral Rimsky-Korsakov, Mussorgsky and Borodin, having virtuosity, the lyricism of Tchaikovsky and the contrapun- been played at home and abroad, established a national tal skill of Taneyev.... He remains a composer of impos- character and tradition that they wanted to see passed ing stature and a stabilizing influence in a time of transi- on to succeeding generations. The most important tion and turmoil.” Russian musical torchbearer of the two decades after The 19th-century mania for the Viennese waltz raged 1900, the time between the deaths of Tchaikovsky and in Russia as virulently as it did in the rest of Europe — his contemporaries and the rise of the modern school of Johann Strauss the Younger spent many summers at Prokofiev and Shostakovich, was Alexander Glazunov. the fashionable resort of Pavlovsk, south of St. Pe- Glazunov was gifted with an exceptional ear and tersburg, after he began touring in 1856 — and left its musical memory (after Borodin’s death, he completely progeny in the concert and stage works of Tchaikovsky, reconstructed the Overture to Prince Igor from recollec- Rachmaninoff, Liadov, Prokofiev, Shostakovich and tions of Borodin’s piano performance of the piece), and other of the nation’s composers. In 1894, Glazunov early demonstrated his gifts in his native St. Petersburg. contributed two fine specimens to the genre of the con- By age nineteen, he had traveled to western Europe for cert waltz, which are based on the Viennese model that a performance of his First Symphony. During the 1890s, strings together several continuous strains of comple- he established a wide reputation as a composer and a mentary character. conductor of his own works, journeying to Paris in 1889 to direct his Second Symphony at the World Exhibition. Cello Concerto No. 2 for in C minor, Op. 77 In 1899, he was engaged as instructor of composition Dmitri Kabalevsky (1904-1987) and orchestration at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. Composed in 1964. When his teacher, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, was dis- Premiered on January 15, 1965 by the Leningrad Philhar- missed from the Conservatory staff in the wake of the monic, conducted by the composer with Daniel Shafran 1905 revolutionary turmoil, Glazunov resigned in protest as soloist. in April and did not return until December 14th, by which time most of the demands by the faculty for the school’s Dmitri Kabalevsky, one of the most prominent figures autonomy had been granted. Two days later he was in Soviet music, was born in St. Petersburg on Decem- elected director of the Conservatory. He worked cease- ber 30, 1904. Though Kabalevsky showed considerable lessly to improve the curriculum and standards of the talent as a self-taught pianist from his earliest years, his Conservatory, and made a successful effort to preserve father, a mathematician in government service, provided the school’s independence after the 1917 Revolution. him with a general rather than a specifically musical In the final years of his tenure, which lasted officially education that also uncovered abilities in painting and until 1930, Glazunov was criticized for his conservatism poetry, activities he continued throughout his life. In (Shostakovich, one of his students, devoted many ad- 1918, the family moved to Moscow, where Kabalevsky miring but frustrated pages to him in his purported mem- furthered his liberal training while studying piano at the oirs, Testimony) and spent much time abroad. In 1929, Scriabin Musical Institute. During the following years, he visited the United States to conduct the orchestras he concentrated on piano by giving lessons, serving as of Boston and Detroit in concerts of his music. When his accompanist, and providing background music for silent health broke, in 1932, he settled with his wife in Paris; he movies. Short etudes he wrote for his pupils ignited his died there in 1936. In 1972, his remains were transferred interest in composition, and he entered the Moscow to Leningrad and reinterred in an honored grave. A re- Conservatory in 1925 as a student of Nikolai Mias- search institute devoted to him in Munich and an archive kovsky. His first important compositions (a piano sonata, in Paris were established in his memory. a string quartet and a piano concerto) date from the late Glazunov’s greatest period of creativity came in the 1920s; they received enough recognition that he gradu- years before his Conservatory duties occupied most ated from the Conservatory in 1930 with special honors. of his time and energy. He produced much music in all After writing articles for the journal Sovremennaya forms except opera — his last major work, the Saxo- Muzika (“Contemporary Music”) beginning in 1927, Ka- phone Concerto of 1934, bears the opus number 109. balevsky became a significant contributor and spokes- His best-known piece is the Violin Concerto, written just person in Russian musical life: he was a charter member before he was installed as director of the Petersburg of the Union of Soviet Composers, a senior editor in Conservatory, but a few other works, notably the bal- the music publishing house Musgiz, principal editor of lets Raymonda and The Seasons, the Fourth, Fifth and Sovetskaya Muzika, professor of composition at the Moscow Conservatory and, in 1956, a cultural represen-

— 32 — tative of his country to the United States. In 1940, he the opera Prince Igor, in a state of unfinished disarray. became a member of the Communist Party; that same Rimsky-Korsakov had taken it upon himself to complete year he was awarded the Order of Merit, and six years the piece, and may well have been inspired by its exotic later received the Stalin Prize. He died in Moscow on setting among the Tartar tribes in 12th-century central February 14, 1987. Kabalevsky’s works, written largely in Asia to undertake his own embodiment of musical Ori- an easily accessible idiom characterized by conventional entalism. The stories on which he based his work were melody, traditional tonal harmony colored with some taken from the Thousand and One Nights, a collection of nose-thumbing, Prokofievian dissonances, and clear, millennium-old fantasy tales from Egypt, Persia and India simple forms, include seven operas (Colas Breugnon is that had been gathered together, translated into French, the best known), four symphonies, numerous indepen- and published in many installments by Antoine Galland dent orchestral scores, six concertos (three for piano, beginning in 1704. They were in large part responsible two for cello and one for violin), various chamber pieces for exciting a fierce passion forturquerie and chinoiserie and songs, many patriotic choral and vocal composi- among the fashionable classes of Europe later in the tions, and much incidental music for stage and film. century, a movement that left its mark on music in the Kabalevsky’s Cello Concerto No. 1 was taken into the form of numerous tintinnabulous “Turkish marches” by Soviet repertory soon after its 1949 premiere, and Daniel Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn and a horde of lesser now- Shafran, one Russia’s leading virtuosos, performed it on faded lights, and in Mozart’s rollicking opera The Abduc- several occasions, including a concert with the com- tion from the Seraglio. The taste for exoticism was never poser conducting in 1954 that so impressed Kabalevsky completely abandoned by musicians (witness Bizet’s he asked the young cellist to record it with him. Their The Pearl Fishers or Puccini’s Madama Butterfly or Tu- collaboration so impressed Kabalevsky that in 1964 he randot or even The Girl of the Golden West; Ravel prided composed the Cello Concerto No. 2 for Shafran and pre- himself on his collection of Oriental artifacts), and proved miered and recorded it with him. The Second Concerto the perfect subject for Rimsky-Korsakov’s talent as an is a work of dark emotional hue, somewhat reminiscent orchestral colorist. Preliminary sketches were made for of Shostakovich’s music during those years but with- the piece in St. Petersburg during the early months of out his frequent bitterness or caustic wit. The Concerto 1888, the score was largely written in June at the com- is in the conventional three movements, though they poser’s country place on Lake Cheryemenyetskoye, near are linked by extended cadenzas and the entire work Luga, and the orchestration completed by early August. played without pause. It begins with a brooding intro- Scheherazade was a success at its premiere in St. duction whose pizzicato cello theme is heard as a motto Petersburg in December, and it has remained one of the throughout the work. Flutes in icy harmonies take over most popular of all symphonic works. the theme as background for a lyrical obbligato line from To refresh the listener’s memory of the ancient leg- the soloist. The bassoon mutters a quick, circling motive ends, Rimsky-Korsakov prefaced the score with these in its low register that the cello borrows as the theme of words: “The sultan Shakriar, convinced of the falsehood the movement’s fast central section. The mood of the and inconstancy of all women, had sworn an oath to put brooding introduction returns with a keening, neighbor- to death each of his wives after the first night. However, ing-note phrase from the cello’s earlier obbligato to lead the sultana Scheherazade saved her life by arousing his to Cadenza I, based on the pizzicato motto that opened interest in the tales she told him during 1,001 nights. the Concerto. The tempo quickens for the Presto, a Driven by curiosity, the sultan postponed her execution muscular scherzo with march-like episodes that use from day to day, and at last abandoned his sanguinary the introduction’s pizzicato theme. The cello continues design. Scheherazade told many miraculous stories to the scherzo’s galloping figurations inCadenza II, into the sultan. For her tales she borrowed verses from the which the timpani boldly intrudes. The finale juxtaposes poets and words from folk-songs combining fairy-tales a long, soulful cello melody with dynamic contrasting with adventures.” To each of the four movements of his sections that return the fast music of the first movement. “symphonic suite” Rimsky gave a title: The Sea and Sin- The Second Concerto comes to a soft, if not quite fully bad’s Ship, The Story of the Kalandar Prince, The Young conclusive, close. Prince and the Young Princess and Festival at Baghdad –The Sea–Shipwreck. At first glance, these titles seem Scheherazade, Op. 35 definite enough to lead the listener to specific nightly Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) chapters of Scheherazade’s soap opera. On closer ex- Composed in 1888. amination, however, they prove too vague to be of much Premiered on December 15, 1888 in St. Petersburg, help. The Kalandar Prince, for instance, could be any conducted by the composer. one of three noblemen who dress as members of the Kalandars, a sect of wandering dervishes, and tell three “In the middle of the winter [of 1888], engrossed different tales. “I meant these hints,” advised the com- as I was in my work on Prince Igor and other things, I poser, “to direct but slightly the hearer’s fancy on the conceived the idea of writing an orchestral composition path which my own fancy had traveled, and leave more on the subject of certain episodes from Scheherazade.” minute and particular conceptions to the will and mood Thus did Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov give the curt explana- of each listener. All I had desired was that the hearer, if tion of the genesis of his most famous work in his auto- he liked my piece, should carry away the impression that biography, My Musical Life. His friend Alexander Borodin it is beyond doubt an Oriental narrative of some numer- had died the year before, leaving his magnum opus, ous and varied fairy-tale wonders.” ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda — 33 — PENINSULA MUSIC FESTIVAL PROGRAM 9

Saturday, August 25, 2018, 7:30 p.m.

Victor Yampolsky, Conductor Spencer Myer, Piano

PRAGUE TO BUDAPEST

DVOŘÁK Czech Suite, Op. 39 Praeludium (Pastorale): Allegro moderato Polka: Allegretto grazioso Menuett (Sousedská): Allegro giusto Romanze: Andante con moto Finale (Furiant): Presto

LISZT Piano Concerto No. 2 in A major, S. 125 Adagio sostenuto assai Allegro agitato assai Allegro moderato Allegro deciso Marziale un poco meno Allegro Allegro animato Played without pause

— INTERMISSION —

BARTÓK Concerto for Orchestra, BB 123 Introduction: Andante non troppo — Allegro vivace Game of the Pairs: Allegretto scherzando Elegy: Andante non troppo Interrupted Intermezzo: Allegretto Finale: Presto

This concert is sponsored by the Egan Family and the Little Rapids Corporation–Egan Family Foundation in memory of Peg Egan.

Spencer Myer is performing on the Esther Browning Piano.

Mr. Myer appears by arrangement with Parker Artists, New York, NY.

Photography and audio recordings of this concert are strictly prohibited. Please, no cell phones during the concert.

— 34 — PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA

Program 9 new work presented Dvořák with a thorny problem. Ac- cording to his recent business agreement, the publica- Czech Suite, Op. 39 tion rights for the Czech Suite should go to Simrock. The Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) composer, however, had some time before promised the Composed in 1879. score to Schlesinger, another Berlin publisher, and was Premiered on May 16, 1879 in Prague, conducted by loath to break his word. He came up with a solution, of Adolf Čech. sorts, by calling the new Suite “Op. 39” rather than by its more accurate opus number, 52, and thus passing it off With the lightning success of his Slavonic Dances of as a composition ante-dating his contract with Simrock. 1878, Antonín Dvořák became one of the day’s most (Several of Dvořák’s biographers, noting his lack of popular — and busiest — composers. Just three years shrewdness in business dealings, credit the inspira- before, when he was in such dire financial straits that tion for this numerical sleight-of-hand to his wife, Anna. the Prague city officials certified his poverty, he entered Richard Strauss’ spouse, Pauline, was also known as a some of his works in a competition in Vienna for strug- real hawk in the musical marketplace.) Turn-about being gling composers. He won, and the distinguished jury fair play, however, several years later Simrock published members, including Johannes Brahms and the critic some of Dvořák’s early works as later (and presumably Eduard Hanslick, took on their young Czech colleague more valuable) pieces: the Op. 38 Symphonic Variations as a protégé. Brahms insisted that his publisher, Fritz were inflated to Op. 78; the F major Symphony was Simrock, issue some of Dvořák’s music, and that he transformed from Op. 24 into Op. 76; and the Op. 27 commission a new work from him. The result of Sim- String Quartet in E major became Op. 80. rock’s order, modeled on Brahms’ Hungarian Dances, As with other of his works of that period (Slavonic was the Slavonic Dances, which, immediately upon Dances, A major String Sextet, E-flat Quartet,Slavonic their publication in August 1878, created a sensation. Rhapsodies, Mazurek for Violin), the Czech Suite is Demands for more of Dvořák’s music came from pub- deeply imbued with the spirit and style of the music of lishers, conductors, chamber music ensembles, choral Dvořák’s native Bohemia. “I am just an ordinary Czech societies and soloists. During a single trip to Berlin in musician,” he insisted, and the roots of his love for the the autumn of 1878, he sold the D minor Serenade, country’s indigenous songs and dances reached into Slavonic Rhapsodies and Bagatelles to Simrock, and the his earliest childhood. His father played violin and zither, Op. 36 Piano Variations and Two Furiants for Piano to sang agreeably, and was a member of the village band Simrock’s competitor Bote & Bock. Those works were in Nelahozeves. He encouraged his son to try the violin, issued in February, as quickly as they could be engraved and soon the boy was entertaining his father’s clients (he and printed, and were sold out within two months. A was an innkeeper and butcher) with local dance tunes. Festival March for the celebration of the Silver Wedding When not playing, young Antonín listened to the Gypsy Anniversary of the Emperor and Empress of Austria at bands or asked the older villagers to sing their timeless the Prague National Theater was written in February; in songs. Indelibly etched in his mind and his heart, the March he finished the E-flat String Quartet (Op. 51); he music of his countryside youth remained a touchstone delivered his setting of the 149th Psalm to the Prague for his art throughout his life. It finds one of its most Choral Society that same month; and the Mazurek for endearing transformations in the Czech Suite. Violin and Orchestra (Op. 49) was premiered in Prague The Suite opens with a movement titled both Prae- on March 29th. Dvořák somehow found time in his fran- ludium and Pastorale, an apt indication of its unruffled tic schedule to again visit Berlin to sell Simrock an entire mood and sylvan sweetness. There follow two national satchel full of songs, chamber pieces, violin works and dances: the first is a wistful realization of thePolka ; even an orchestral overture, and to conclude an agree- the other is given both its Western and Eastern names: ment granting that firm publication rights for all of his Menuett and Sousedská. Following the practice of Mo- future compositions. zart in Eine kleine Nachtmusik and the great K. 361 Gran In April 1879, Dvořák undertook a piece intended Partita for Winds, Dvořák called the slow movement of as a sort of pendant to the two Serenades (E major this work Romanze. The Suite closes with a Furiant, the for Strings and D minor for Winds) and the Slavonic dance type brought so successfully into the orchestral Dances. He at first envisioned the new work in the form realm by Smetana’s splendid nationalist opera, The Bar- of another serenade, and sketched for it a march and a tered Bride, premiered thirteen years before, in 1866. minuet. (Following the Classical tradition, he had begun and ended the D minor Serenade with a march.) He Piano Concerto No. 2 in A major abandoned that idea in favor of an orchestral suite, how- Franz Liszt (1811-1886) ever, and composed its five movements quickly during Composed in 1839 and 1849. the ensuing weeks. The piece, titled Czech Suite, was Premiered on January 7, 1857 in Weimar, conducted by given its first hearing on May 16th by Adolf Čech and the composer with Hans von Bronsart as soloist. the Czech Theater Orchestra, a performance that also included the premiere of the Slavonic Dances in their Liszt sketched his two piano concertos in 1839, but orchestral versions. The evening was a success, but the they lay unfinished until he went to Weimar. He com- pleted the Second Concerto, in A major, in the summer

— 35 — of 1849, but did not get around to having it performed almost total neglect of his compositions by the musical for more than seven years. The procedure on which Liszt community. At the end of 1942 he lamented, “The quasi built this Concerto and other of his orchestral works is boycott of my works by the leading orchestras contin- called “thematic transformation,” or, to use the rather ues; no performances either of old works or new ones. It more jolly phrase of American critic William Foster is a shame — not for me, of course.” It is to the credit of Apthorp, “The Life and Adventures of a Melody.” Basi- ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and cally, the “thematic transformation” process consisted Publishers) that the organization provided money for the of inventing a theme that could be used to create a wide hospital care that enabled Bartók to continue composing variety of moods, tempos, orchestrations and rhythms to to the very end of his life. suggest whatever emotional states were required by the It was at this nadir in his fortunes that the commission different sections of the piece. It is not unlike a single ac- for the Concerto for Orchestra was presented to Bartók. tor changing costumes to play Puck, Bottom the Weaver Phillip Ramey related the circumstances: “By early 1943, and Oberon all in the same production (now that’s an things had gotten so bad that two old friends of Bartók, actor) — recognizably the same at the core, but dressed [violinist] Joseph Szigeti and [conductor] Fritz Reiner, up differently for each scene. suggested to Sergei Koussevitzky [music director of the There are at least six such scenes in Liszt’s Second Boston Symphony] that he commission an orchestral Piano Concerto. The composer provided no specific work in memory of his wife, Natalie. Koussevitzky agreed plot for any of these, but wrote music of such extro- and, one spring day, while Bartók was in a New York verted emotionalism that it is not difficult for imaginative hospital undergoing tests, he appeared unexpectedly listeners to provide their own: languor, storm, love, strife, and startled the composer by offering him a commis- resolve and battle is only one possible sequence. It is a sion for $1,000 on behalf of the Koussevitzky Founda- diverting game to play, and Liszt has invited all to take tion. Bartók, as fastidious as ever, would initially only part. The melody on which this Concerto is based is accept half of that amount because he feared that his presented immediately at the beginning by the clarinet. precarious health might prevent him from fulfilling Kous- It courses through each section, and can most easily be sevitzky’s request.” The commission and an ASCAP- identified by the little half-step sigh at the end of its first sponsored stay at a sanatorium in Saranac Lake in phrase. upstate New York fortified Bartók’s strength enough so that he could work on this new orchestral piece “practi- Concerto for Orchestra, BB 123 cally night and day,” as he wrote to Szigeti. Upon its Béla Bartók (1881-1945) premiere, the Concerto for Orchestra was an instant Composed in 1943. success. It was accepted immediately into the standard Premiered on December 1, 1944 in Boston, conducted repertory and led to a surge of interest in Bartók’s other by Sergei Koussevitzky. works. He died less than a year after this work, the last he completed for orchestra, was first heard, not realizing Béla Bartók came to America in October 1940, sick that he would soon be acclaimed as one of the greatest of body and afflicted of spirit. He had been frail all of composers of the 20th century. his life, and the leukemia that was to cause his death “The title of this symphony-like work is explained by five years later had already begun to erode his health. its tendency to treat single instruments or instrument Adding to the trial of his medical condition was the war groups in a ‘concertant’ or soloistic manner,” wrote raging in Europe, a painful source of torment to one of the composer to clarify the appellation of the score. Bartók’s ardent Hungarian patriotism. Upon leaving his Concerning the overall structure of the Concerto’s five homeland, he not only relinquished the native country movements, he noted, “The general mood of the work so dear to him, but also forfeited the secure financial represents, apart from the jesting second movement, a and professional positions he had earned in Budapest. gradual transition from the sternness of the first move- Compromise in the face of Hitler’s brutal inhumanity, ment and the lugubrious death-song of the third, to the however, was never a possibility for a man of Bartók’s life-assertion of the last one.” The first and last move- adamantine convictions. “He who stays on when he ments, Bartók continued, “are in more or less regular could leave may be said to acquiesce tacitly in every- sonata form,” while “the second consists of a chain thing that is happening here,” he wrote on the eve of his of independent short sections by wind instruments departure. “This journey [to America] is like plunging into introduced in five pairs (bassoons, oboes, clarinets, the unknown from what is known, but unbearable.” Filled flutes and muted trumpets). A kind of ‘trio’ — a short with apprehension, he made the difficult overland trip to chorale for brass instruments and snare drum — fol- Lisbon, then sailed on to New York. lows, after which the five sections are recapitulated in Sad to say, Bartók’s misgivings were justified. His a more elaborate instrumentation.... The form of the financial support from Hungary was, of course, cut off, fourth movement — ‘Interrupted Intermezzo’ — could and money worries aggravated his delicate physical con- be rendered by the symbols ‘A B A — interruption — B dition. He held a modest post as a folk music researcher A.’” The interruption to which Bartók referred is a parody at Columbia University for a number of months, but that of the German march theme from the first movement of ended when funding from a grant ran out. His health de- Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7, “Leningrad,” which clined enough to make public appearances impossible was in turn a mocking phrase based on a song from after 1943. His chief disappointment, however, was the Franz Lehár’s The Merry Widow. ©2018 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

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