Beatrice Rana Robert Schumann
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Invesco Piano Concerts Beatrice Rana Sunday, April 8, 2018 at 3:00pm Pre-concert Talk at 2:00pm This is the 816th concert in Koerner Hall PROGRAM Robert Schumann: Blumenstück in D flat Major, op. 19 Robert Schumann: Symphonic Études, op. 13 Theme Étude I-XI (without the posthumous Études) Finale INTERMISSION Maurice Ravel: Miroirs Noctuelles Oiseaux tristes Une barque sur l’océan Alborada del gracioso La vallée des cloches Igor Stravinsky: The Firebird (arr. Guido Agosti) Danse infernale Berceuse Finale Robert Schumann Born in Zwickau, Saxony, June 8, 1810; died in Endenich, nr. Bonn, July 29, 1856 Blumenstück in D flat Major, op. 19 (1839) Symphonic Études, op. 13 (1834-7) Schumann wrote the short, attractive Blumenstück in D flat Major, op. 19 (literally, Flower Piece) in Vienna in 1839 at the same time as the Arabeske, op. 18 and Humoreske, op. 20. All three share a sectional structure and accessibility for the amateur pianist, something that had been notably absent from much of Schumann’s piano music to date. The Blumenstück has a deceptively simple double theme and variation construction, where the second theme gradually increases in prominence as the piece progresses. Schumann notates the structure precisely in the score as I – II – III – II – IV – V – II – IV – II – Coda. A unifying feature throughout is a little four-note descending figure that appears in each section (and in other music from the time) which Schumann associated with Friedrich Wieck’s daughter, pianist Clara Wieck, whom he now wished to marry. The figure became a subtle form of musical communication between the two at a time that Wieck had forbidden them to speak to one another. What is symphonic in the extended Symphonic Études, op. 13 is the scale and scope of the piano writing and the cumulative impact of the music. Achieving it caused Schumann much grief, not least in the very title of the 25-minute work. Nevertheless, his 1837 publication of 12 technically challenging pieces broadly based on a brooding, pensive theme is one of his most successful large-scale pieces and maintains a place in the repertoire. Schumann rejected the title Études in Orchestral Style by Florestan and Eusebius early on, though the alternating spirit of the fiery Florestan and dreamy Eusebius remains in the character of the music. Along the way, Schumann himself alternated between calling the pieces variations and études. His further thoughts in 1852 carried the title Études in the Form of Variations, though the work continues to be referred to by its earliest title of Symphonic Études or Études Symphoniques. After the opening theme, the two contrasting sides of Schumann’s personality are immediately revealed in a nervously intense march and a restless nocturne. The third étude contrasts staccato right-hand with legato left. The canonic fourth is whimsical; the fifth a feather-light scherzando movement. The sixth is multi-textured and syncopated and the seventh calls for great brilliance and precision between the hands. The elaborately ornamented theme and rhythmic drive of the eighth give it the character of a Baroque prelude or overture. Both Nos. 9 and 10 call for brilliant fingerwork. No. 11 is again nocturnal and reprises the despairing character of the opening theme, now cast as a two- part dialogue with left-hand accompaniment. Schumann’s finale is a jubilant, extended rondo, long enough to be a separate piece. It quotes from a march from an opera by Schumann’s contemporary, Heinrich Marschner. Maurice Ravel Born in Ciboure, France, March 7, 1875; died in Paris, France, December 28, 1937 Miroirs (1904-5) Ravel was a fine pianist, but it was his friendship with the brilliant Catalan pianist Riccardo Viñes that provided the incentive for much of his early piano music. They were friends from childhood. They played music for four hands together. Viñes also introduced the young composer to the Symbolist poets and the stories of Edgar Allen Poe. Miroirs, which Ravel wrote just as he was turning 30, is strongly influenced by the new discoveries of visual and literary artists of the time. He seems to have followed their lead and, in so doing, charted a new path for his own music. “The Miroirs are a collection of pieces for piano that show a rather considerable change in my harmonic evolution, in that they disconcerted those who, up to that point, considered themselves accustomed to my style,“ he wrote a few years later. The collection is made up of five fleeting, dream-like images, each dedicated to one of his circle of literary and musical friends. Noctuelles (Night Moths) immediately enters a world of half-light, impressionism, and transient, fluttering images. The poet Léon-Paul Fargue, to whom Ravel dedicated the piece, writes of “moths which take clumsy flight from barn to barn to tie themselves to other beams.” Oiseaux tristes (Sad Birds), an improvisatory piece based on the song of a blackbird, evokes what Ravel referred to as “birds, lost in the torpor of a very dark forest during the hottest hours of summer.” Une barque sur l’océan (A Boat on the Ocean) is strongly Lisztian, the longest of the set, and the most pianistic in concept. In Alborada del gracioso (The Jester’s Dawn-Song), the fourth of the Miroirs, Ravel asks the soloist to evoke guitar, sultry voice, and brilliant orchestra. The alborada of the title means morning song, or aubade; the gracioso is the jester of classical Spanish comedy. La vallée des cloches (The Valley of Bells) was inspired by the noon hour peeling of bells in Paris. But the world evoked is altogether less tangible and impressionist. This evocative tone poem is one of the most convincing pieces for piano that Ravel was to write. Igor Stravinsky Born in Oranienbaum [now Lomonosov], nr. St. Petersburg, Russia, June 5/17, 1882; died in New York, New York, April 6, 1971 Danse infernale, Berceuse, and Finale from The Firebird (1909-10/pub. 1934) (arr. Guido Agosti; 1901-89) “It was interesting to watch him at the piano; his body seemed to vibrate with his own rhythm.” Prima ballerina Karsavina described working with the young Stravinsky, rehearsing The Firebird – the 1910 ballet that launched a renowned partnership between Stravinsky and the impresario Diaghilev. Stravinsky conducted his ballet score more than one thousand times, to the point where he was once accidentally addressed as ‘Mr. Fireberg.’ Sensing a vivid imagination in the 27-year-old composer’s music, Diaghilev had suggested an exotic and familiar Russian fairy tale, with a storyline and choreography by Michel Fokine, as the subject of the new ballet. Diaghilev would have known that Stravinsky’s teacher was Rimsky-Korsakov, the master of brilliant, descriptive music. What he would not have known is that Stravinsky already wanted to move in other directions, away from the colourful picture postcard world of Rimsky-Korsakov’s orchestration. However, the prospect of a prestigious Diaghilev commission set Stravinsky to work on the story of the Firebird and the ogre Kaschchei. He worked in a dacha belonging to the Rimsky-Korsakov family – and the resulting ballet score was to beat Rimsky-Korsakov at his own game. “Mark him well,” Diaghilev said to the company’s principal dancer Tamara Karsavina. “He is a man on the eve of celebrity.” Stravinsky did make his own piano reduction of the ballet score and, later, three orchestral concert suites and several arrangements for violin and piano. But, for piano, the three-movement concert transcription by the Italian pianist and renowned teacher Guido Agosti (1901-89) captures the visceral energy and raw physicality of the ballet, whose sensational opening was given over a century ago, June 25, 1910 at the Paris Opéra. - Program notes © 2018 Keith Horner Beatrice Rana Piano At only 24 years old, Beatrice Rana is making waves on the international classical music scene, arousing admiration and interest from conductors, critics, and audiences around the world. She collaborates with conductors of the highest level such as Riccardo Chailly, Antonio Pappano, Yannick Nézet- Séguin, Fabio Luisi, James Conlon, Emmanuel Krivine, Jun Märkl, Trevor Pinnock, Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla, Fabien Gabel, Lahav Shani, Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Susanna Mälkki, Leonard Slatkin, and Zubin Mehta. During the 2017-18 season, Rana plays recitals at Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Cologne’s Philharmonie, Lucerne Piano Festival, and Koerner Hall, and tours with Antonio Pappano and Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia to the Enescu Festival, Abu Dhabi Festival, and Rochester, NY. She performs with Temirkanov and the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Krivine with the Orchestre National de France, Vänska with Helsinki Philharmonic, and Mikhail Jurowski with the London Philharmonic. In North America, she makes debuts with Dallas Symphony, Seattle Symphony, and the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa and Montreal. In summer 2017, Rana made notable debuts at the BBC Proms with Sir Andrew Davis and the BBC Symphony, and in New York at Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival with Gianandrea Noseda. She played with the Mariinsky Orchestra under Maestro Noseda’s baton in St. Petersburg and at the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under the direction of Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla. In fall 2018, she will make her debut with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam. An exclusive Warner Classics recording artist, Rana has two recordings which were recently released: Bach’s Goldberg Variations, and Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 2 and Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with Antonio Pappano and Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. Beatrice Rana came to public attention in 2011 after winning First Prize at the Montreal International Competition and in 2013 when she won the Silver Medal and the Audience Award at the 14th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.