concert program viii: Bridging Dvorˇák BEDřICH SMETANA (1824–1884) August 8 and 9 Andantino (Bohemian fantasie) from Z domoviny (From the Homeland), JB 1: 118 (1880) Alexander Sitkovetsky, violin; Anne-Marie McDermott, piano Friday, August 8, 8:00 p.m., Stent Family Hall, Menlo School MS ERNŐ DOHNÁNYI (1877–1960) A Saturday, August 9, 8:00 p.m., The Center for Performing Arts at Menlo-Atherton Serenade in C Major, op. 10 (1902) Marcia Romanza Scherzo Tema con variazioni PROGRAM OVERVIEW Finale: Rondo The 2014 season concludes with a linear perspective on Alexander Sitkovetsky, violin; Paul Neubauer, viola; Narek Hakhnazaryan, cello Dvořák’s art, from the work of Bohemia’s musical patriarch, ERWIN SCHULHOFF (1894–1942) Smetana, to the voices of modern Hungarian and Czech String Sextet (1920–1924) composers. Following Smetana’s evocative Bohemian fantasie, Allegro risoluto the program offers Dohnányi’s dynamic Serenade for String Tranquillo (Andante) Trio. Encouraged by none other than Dvořák as a child, Erwin Burlesca: Allegro molto con spirito Schulhoff would emerge as one of the most original voices of Molto adagio his generation, only to fall victim to the Nazi regime during the Nicolas Dautricourt, Benjamin Beilman, violins; Yura Lee, Paul Neubauer, violas; Dmitri Atapine, CONCERT PROGR CONCERT Second World War. The resolute strains of his haunting and Narek Hakhnazaryan, cellos visceral String Sextet are answered by Dvořák’s transcendent IntermissiON Piano Quintet, one of the most beloved works of the literature. ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK (1841–1904) Piano Quintet no. 2 in A Major, op. 81, B. 155 (1887) Allegro ma non tanto SPECIAL THANKS Dumka: Andante con moto Music@Menlo dedicates these performances to the following Scherzo (Furiant): Molto vivace individuals with gratitude for their generous support: Finale: Allegro August 8: Jeehyun Kim and also to Bill and Lee Perry Anne-Marie McDermott, piano; Benjamin Beilman, Alexander Sitkovetsky, violins; Paul Neubauer, viola; Narek Hakhnazaryan, cello August 9: Mr. Laurance R. Hoagland Jr. and Mrs. Grace M. Hoagland Edgar K. Frank. Pedestrians walk on the fourteenth-century bridge to and from the city. Charles Bridge, Prague, Bohemia, February 2, 1917. NGS Image Collection/ The Art Archive at Art Resource, NY 42 Music@Menlo 2014 Program Notes: Bridging Dvorˇák BEDřICH SMETANA ErnŐ DohnányI (Born March 2, 1824, Litomyšl; died May 12, 1884, Prague) (Born July 27, 1877, Pozsony [now Bratislava]; died February 9, 1960, New York) Andantino (Bohemian fantasie) from Z domoviny (From the Homeland) Serenade in C Major, op. 10 Composed: 1880 Composed: 1902 Published: 1881 Other works from this period: Sonata in b-flat minor for Cello and Piano, Other works from this period: Czech Dances for Piano (1877); String op. 8 (1899); Symphony no. 1 in d minor, op. 9 (1901–1902); String Quartet Quartet no. 1, From My Life (1876); Andante in f minor for Piano (1880); no. 2 in D-flat Major, op. 15 (1906) String Quartet no. 2 in d minor (1882–1883) Approximate duration: 22 minutes Approximate duration: 12 minutes The Opus 10 Serenade arguably represents Dohnányi’s first mature An artistic forebear to Dvořák, Janáček, and others, Smetana was the first work. Although the Opus 1 Piano Quintet (featured on this summer’s of Central Europe’s nationalist composers to explicitly acknowledge and seventh Concert Program) is a masterpiece in its own right, the serenade integrate his cultural heritage into his musical language. Bohemian folk song demonstrates a marked departure from the influence of Schumann served not only as a chief influence but indeed as the foundation of his and Brahms. Still audible is Dohnányi’s Romantic foundation; and the compositional vocabulary. medium—a trio of violin, viola, and cello—represents a repertoire tradition Smetana lived from 1824 to 1884, during which period Bohemia was dating to the Classical period: Haydn wrote twenty-one such pieces, under Austro-Hungarian rule. Austria’s cultural influence over the region Mozart contributed his famous Divertimento to the trio literature, and ensured the primacy of Viennese Classicism in music, and Smetana’s Beethoven produced five before trying his hand at the string quartet. But musical language was consequently rooted in the tradition of Haydn, while the serenade evokes the music of previous eras in its form, the work’s Mozart, and Beethoven. But he was also responsible for bringing Bohemian expressive language ultimately, and emphatically, asserts Dohnányi’s folk music to the attention of the Western musical world. Owing partly to singular compositional voice. this, he is recognized in the Czech Republic today as a national cultural hero, A stately march serves as the serenade’s extroverted curtain raiser. Double- and even triple-stopped chords create the illusion of a larger exceeding even Dvořák. While Dvořák’s music has since received more global MS ensemble than the seemingly modest string trio. recognition, it was Smetana who founded the Bohemian musical idiom built A upon in Dvořák’s works. Furthermore, Smetana made his mark not only as a composer but as a pianist, conductor, and teacher, as well, thus playing a far-reaching role in the establishment of a national musical tradition. Benjamin Britten once remarked, “Smetana’s debt to his own national music was of the best kind, unconscious. He did not, indeed, ‘borrow,’ he carried on an age-long tradition, not of set purpose, but because he could no more avoid speaking his own musical language than he could help breathing his native air.” Smetana went suddenly deaf at the age of fifty; after the loss of his hearing, he created one of his most significant chamber works, his String Quartet no. 1, subtitled From My Life. Despite the creation of this masterpiece, Smetana’s physical and mental health steadily declined. In 1883, he suffered a complete mental breakdown and was admitted into an insane asylum, where he died the following year at the age of sixty. PROGR CONCERT Smetana composed only a few pieces of chamber music, but what Yet even in the puffed-up trappings of a march, Dohnányi’s lyrical chamber scores he did produce are deeply personal. Alongside the gift is in evidence. autobiographical From My Life Quartet, perhaps his best-known chamber work is his Piano Trio, a programmatic and emotionally fraught work lamenting the death of his young daughter. His chamber music catalog is rounded out by an early Fantasy on a Bohemian Song for Violin and Piano; his Second String Quartet, composed near the end of his life; and another work from his later years, Z domoviny (From the Homeland). Z domoviny comprises two short pieces for violin and piano. The music is intimate and deeply felt. Smetana wrote of these pieces, “They are written in a simple style, with a view to being performed in the home rather than at concerts…They are genuinely national in character but with my own melodies.” The second piece, an Andantino in g minor, begins in dramatic fashion. Following a declamatory introduction, a rhapsodic Bohemian fantasy unfolds. The music turns lively, remedying the nostalgic mood with a boisterous peasant dance. Dohnányi crafts the elegant second movement romanza such that —Patrick Castillo each instrument shines equally, playing in the most resonant part of its register and without sacrificing textural clarity. The movement begins with an emotionally stirring viola solo, accompanied by delicate pizzicati in the violin and cello. Subsequently, accompanied by restless viola figurations, the violin and cello offer simultaneous melodic utterances: not quite a duet, but music which Dohnányi fits together superbly. *Bolded terms are defined in the glossary, which begins on page 100. www.musicatmenlo.org 43 The serenade’s third movement is a fiendish scherzo, markedly The second movement is marked Tranquillo, but tranquility is the different in character from the romance but equally impeccable in farthest thing from this music’s expressive character. Accompanied by Dohnányi’s management of instrumental texture. The fourth movement an unsettlingly quiet chromatic ostinato in the violins and first viola, offers a set of variations on a simple, yet deeply expressive theme. The final the second viola and first cello present the bleak and sorrowful theme; variation is particularly affecting, especially so for its economy of means: the Schulhoff instructs the players to play cantando, ma senza espressione— viola thrice utters the theme’s central melodic fragment, but each iteration is singing, but without expression. Later in the movement, this desolate harmonized differently by the violin and cello, unlocking the tune’s startling music intensifies into a mournful wail. The violins present a third musical emotive depth. The serenade concludes with a lively rondo finale, evocative idea—marked, again, senza espressione—above anxiously swaying triplets of the folk character so prevalent in the music of Dohnányi’s countrymen. in the lower strings. This music, set now to the eerie sound of tremolo and —Patrick Castillo sul ponticello—another string technique in which bowing near the bridge produces a thin, nasal timbre—leads the movement to its stony conclusion. After the sardonic, march-like third movement burlesca comes the sextet’s devastating finale, marked Molto adagio. The movement begins ERWIN ScHULHOFF with a somber cello soliloquy. The full ensemble joins in, and the music (Born June 8, 1894, Prague; died August 18, 1942, Wülzburg) attempts to rise up, only to collapse in ruined fragments. A second attempt String Sextet is likewise stopped short, as the music disperses in anxious, chromatic Composed: 1920–1924 whispers. The sextet ultimately ends quietly defeated. Other works from this period: Piano Concerto no. 2 (1923); Five Pieces for —Patrick Castillo String Quartet (1923); String Quartet no. 1 (1924); Ogelala (ballet, 1922– 1924); various works for solo piano Approximate duration: 22 minutes ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK (Born September 8, 1841, Nelahozeves, near Kralupy; died May 1, 1904, The Czech composer and pianist Erwin Schulhoff showed prodigious Prague) musical talent as a child, and in 1901, when he was seven years old, he Piano Quintet no.