SEASON 2020-2021 Jessica GriffinJessica Ax/Mozart Concerto No. 14

October 15, 2020 SEASON 2020-2021 The Philadelphia Thursday, October 15, at 8:00 On the Digital Stage

Yannick Nézet-Séguin Conductor Emanuel Ax Piano

Hunt Climb World premiere—Philadelphia Orchestra commission

Mozart Piano Concerto No. 14 in E-flat major, K. 449 I. Allegro vivace II. Andantino III. Allegro ma non troppo

Brahms  No. 2 in A major, Op. 16 I. Allegro moderato II. : Vivace III. Adagio non troppo IV. Quasi menuetto V. Rondo: Allegro

This program runs approximately 1 hour and will be performed without an intermission.

Philadelphia Orchestra concerts are broadcast on WRTI 90.1 FM on Sunday afternoons at 1 PM, and are repeated on Monday evenings at 7 PM on WRTI HD 2. Visit www.wrti.org to listen live or for more details. Our World

Lead support for the Digital Stage is provided by:

Elaine W. Camarda and A. Morris Williams, Jr. The CHG Charitable Trust The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation Innisfree Foundation Gretchen and M. Roy Jackson Neal W. Krouse John H. McFadden and Lisa D. Kabnick Leslie A. Miller and Richard B. Worley Ralph W. Muller and Beth B. Johnston William Penn Foundation Mr. and Mrs. Peter Shaw Waterman Trust Constance and Sankey Williams Wyncote Foundation SEASON 2020-2021 The Philadelphia Orchestra

Yannick Nézet-Séguin Music Director Walter and Leonore Annenberg Chair

Gabriela Lena Frank Composer-in-Residence

Erina Yashima Assistant Conductor Lina Gonzalez-Granados Conducting Fellow

Frederick R. Haas Artistic Advisor Fred J. Cooper Memorial Organ Experience

First Amy Oshiro-Morales David Kim, Concertmaster Yu-Ting Chen Juliette Kang, First Associate Jeoung-Yin Kim Concertmaster Christine Lim Joseph and Marie Field Chair Marc Rovetti, Assistant Concertmaster Barbara Govatos Choong-Jin Chang, Principal Robert E. Mortensen Chair Ruth and A. Morris Williams Chair Jonathan Beiler Kirsten Johnson, Associate Principal Hirono Oka Kerri Ryan, Assistant Principal Richard Amoroso Judy Geist Robert and Lynne Pollack Chair Renard Edwards Yayoi Numazawa Anna Marie Ahn Petersen Jason DePue Piasecki Family Chair Larry A. Grika Chair David Nicastro Jennifer Haas Burchard Tang Miyo Curnow Che-Hung Chen Elina Kalendarova Rachel Ku Daniel Han Marvin Moon Julia Li Meng Wang William Polk Mei Ching Huang Second Violins Hai-Ye Ni, Principal Priscilla Lee, Associate Principal Kimberly Fisher, Principal Peter A. Benoliel Chair Yumi Kendall, Assistant Principal Paul Roby, Associate Principal Richard Harlow Sandra and David Marshall Chair Gloria dePasquale Dara Morales, Assistant Principal Orton P. and Noël S. Jackson Chair Anne M. Buxton Chair Kathryn Picht Read Philip Kates Robert Cafaro Davyd Booth Volunteer Committees Chair Paul Arnold Ohad Bar-David Joseph Brodo Chair, given by Peter A. Benoliel John Koen Dmitri Levin Derek Barnes Boris Balter Alex Veltman SEASON 2020-2021

Basses Jeffry Kirschen Harold Robinson, Principal Ernesto Tovar Torres Carole and Emilio Gravagno Chair Shelley Showers Joseph Conyers, Acting Associate Principal Tobey and Mark Dichter Chair Nathaniel West, Acting Assistant Principal David Bilger, Principal Marguerite and Gerry Lenfest Chair Michael Shahan Jeffrey Curnow, Associate Principal David Fay Gary and Ruthanne Schlarbaum Chair Duane Rosengard Anthony Prisk Some members of the string sections voluntarily rotate seating on a periodic basis. Nitzan Haroz, Principal Neubauer Family Foundation Chair Jeffrey Khaner, Principal Matthew Vaughn, Co-Principal Paul and Barbara Henkels Chair Blair Bollinger, Bass Patrick Williams, Associate Principal Drs. Bong and Mi Wha Lee Chair Rachelle and Ronald Kaiserman Chair Olivia Staton Erica Peel, Piccolo Carol Jantsch, Principal Lyn and George M. Ross Chair Philippe Tondre, Principal Samuel S. Fels Chair Don S. Liuzzi, Principal Peter Smith, Associate Principal Dwight V. Dowley Chair Jonathan Blumenfeld Angela Zator Nelson, Associate Principal Edwin Tuttle Chair Elizabeth Starr Masoudnia, English Horn Percussion Joanne T. Greenspun Chair Christopher Deviney, Principal Angela Zator Nelson Ricardo Morales, Principal Piano and Celesta Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Chair Kiyoko Takeuti Samuel Caviezel, Associate Principal Sarah and Frank Coulson Chair Keyboards Socrates Villegas Davyd Booth Paul R. Demers, Bass Peter M. Joseph and Susan Rittenhouse Joseph Chair Harp Elizabeth Hainen, Principal Daniel Matsukawa, Principal Librarians Richard M. Klein Chair Nicole Jordan, Principal Mark Gigliotti, Co-Principal Steven K. Glanzmann Angela Anderson Smith Holly Blake, Stage Personnel James J. Sweeney, Jr., Manager Horns Dennis Moore, Jr. Jennifer Montone, Principal Gray Charitable Trust Chair Jeffrey Lang, Associate Principal Hannah L. and J. Welles Henderson Chair Christopher Dwyer SEASON 2020-2021 THE PHILADELPHIA ORCHESTRA

Jessica Griffin

The Philadelphia Orchestra is one of the world’s preeminent . It strives to share the transformative power of music with the widest possible audience, and to create joy, connection, and excitement through music in the Philadelphia region, across the country, and around the world. Through innovative programming, robust educational initiatives, and an ongoing commitment to the communities that it serves, the ensemble is on a path to create an expansive future for classical music, and to further the place of the arts in an open and democratic society.

Yannick Nézet-Séguin is now in his ninth season as the eighth music director of The Philadelphia Orchestra. His connection to the ensemble’s musicians has been praised by both concertgoers and critics, and he is embraced by the musicians of the Orchestra, audiences, and the community.

Your Philadelphia Orchestra takes great pride in its hometown, performing for the people of Philadelphia year-round, from Verizon Hall to community centers, the Mann Center to Penn’s Landing, classrooms to hospitals, and over the airwaves and online. The Orchestra continues to discover new and inventive ways to nurture its relationship with loyal patrons. SEASON 2020-2021 THE PHILADELPHIA ORCHESTRA

In March 2020, in response to the cancellation of concerts due the COVID-19 pandemic, the Orchestra launched the Virtual Philadelphia Orchestra, a portal hosting video and audio of performances, free, on its website and social media platforms. In September 2020 the Orchestra announced Our World NOW, its reimagined fall season of concerts filmed without audiences and presented weekly on its Digital Stage. Our World NOW also includes free offerings: HearTOGETHER, a series on racial and social justice; educational activities; and small ensemble performances from locations throughout the Philadelphia region.

The Philadelphia Orchestra continues the tradition of educational and community engagement for listeners of all ages. It launched its HEAR initiative in 2016 to become a major force for good in every community that it serves. HEAR is a portfolio of integrated initiatives that promotes Health, champions music Education, enables broad Access to Orchestra performances, and maximizes impact through Research. The Orchestra’s award-winning education and community initiatives engage over 50,000 students, families, and community members through programs such as PlayINs, side-by-sides, PopUP concerts, Free Neighborhood Concerts, School Concerts, sensory-friendly concerts, the School Partnership Program and School Ensemble Program, and All City Orchestra Fellowships.

Through concerts, tours, residencies, and recordings, the Orchestra is a global ambassador. It performs annually at Carnegie Hall, the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, and the Bravo! Vail Music Festival. The Orchestra also has a rich history of touring, having first performed outside Philadelphia in the earliest days of its founding. It was the first American orchestra to perform in the People’s Republic of China in 1973, launching a now-five-decade commitment of people-to-people exchange.

The Orchestra also makes live recordings available on popular digital music services and as part of the Orchestra on Demand section of its website. Under Yannick’s leadership, the Orchestra returned to recording, with seven celebrated CDs on the prestigious Deutsche Grammophon label. The Orchestra also reaches thousands of radio listeners with weekly broadcasts on WRTI-FM and SiriusXM.

For more information, please visit philorch.org. SEASON 2020-2021 MUSIC DIRECTOR

Jessica Griffin

Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin will lead The Philadelphia Orchestra through at least the 2025–26 season, a significant long-term commitment. Additionally, he became the third music director of New York’s Metropolitan in 2018. Yannick, who holds the Walter and Leonore Annenberg Chair, is an inspired leader of The Philadelphia Orchestra. His intensely collaborative style, deeply rooted musical curiosity, and boundless enthusiasm have been heralded by critics and audiences alike. The New York Times has called him “phenomenal,” adding that “the ensemble, famous for its glowing strings and homogenous richness, has never sounded better.”

Yannick has established himself as a musical leader of the highest caliber and one of the most thrilling talents of his generation. He has been artistic director and principal conductor of Montreal’s Orchestre Métropolitain since 2000, and in 2017 he became an honorary member of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. He was music director of the Rotterdam Philharmonic from 2008 to 2018 (he is now honorary conductor) and was principal guest conductor of the London Philharmonic from 2008 to 2014. He has made wildly successful appearances with the world’s SEASON 2020-2021 MUSIC DIRECTOR

most revered ensembles and at many of the leading opera houses. Yannick signed an exclusive recording contract with Deutsche Grammophon in 2018. Under his leadership The Philadelphia Orchestra returned to recording with seven CDs on that label. His upcoming recordings will include projects with the Philadelphians, the Metropolitan Opera, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and the Orchestre Métropolitain, with which he will also continue to record for ATMA Classique.

A native of Montreal, Yannick studied piano, conducting, composition, and chamber music at Montreal’s Conservatory of Music and continued his studies with renowned conductor Carlo Maria Giulini; he also studied choral conducting with Joseph Flummerfelt at Westminster College. Among Yannick’s honors are an appointment as Companion of the Order of Canada; an Officer of the Order of Montreal; Musical America’s 2016 Artist of the Year; and honorary doctorates from the University of Quebec, the Curtis Institute of Music, Westminster Choir College of Rider University, McGill University, the University of Montreal, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Todd Rosenberg SEASON 2020-2021 SOLOIST

Lisa-Marie Mazzucco

Born in modern-day Lvov, Poland, pianist Emanuel Ax moved to Winnipeg, Canada, with his family when he was a young boy. His studies at the Juilliard School were supported by the sponsorship of the Epstein Scholarship Program of the Boys Clubs of America; he subsequently won the Young Concert Artists Award and also attended Columbia University, where he majored in French. Mr. Ax captured public attention in 1974 when he won the first Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition in Tel Aviv. He won the Michaels Award of Young Concert Artists in 1975, the same year he made his Philadelphia Orchestra debut. Four years later he was awarded the coveted Avery Fisher Prize.

Mr. Ax’s recent performance highlights have included appearances with violinist Leonidas Kavakos and cellist Yo-Yo Ma; performances in , , and London; and returns to the orchestras of Philadelphia, Cleveland, Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Detroit, Pittsburgh, Munich, Amsterdam, , Rome, Vienna, and London, and to Carnegie Hall for a recital. Always a committed exponent of contemporary SEASON 2020-2021 SOLOIST

composers, with works written for him by , Christopher Rouse, Krzysztof Penderecki, Bright Sheng, and Melinda Wagner already in his repertoire, he has recently added HK Gruber’s Piano Concerto and Samuel Adams’s Impromptus.

Mr. Ax is a Grammy-winning recording artist exclusive to Sony Classical since 1987. His recent releases include the Brahms trios with Mr. Kavakos and Mr. Ma, Mendelssohn trios with Mr. Ma and violinist Itzhak Perlman, Strauss’s Enoch Arden narrated by Patrick Stewart, and discs of two-piano music by Brahms and Rachmaninoff with Yefim Bronfman. In 2015 Deutsche Grammophon released a duo recording with Mr. Perlman performing sonatas by Fauré and Strauss. Mr. Ax’s other recordings include the concertos of Liszt and Schoenberg, three solo Brahms albums, an album of tangos by Astor Piazzolla, and the premiere recording of John Adams’s Century Rolls with the Cleveland Orchestra for Nonesuch. Mr. Ax is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and holds honorary doctorates of music from Skidmore College and Yale and Columbia universities. He resides in New York City with his wife, pianist Yoko Nozaki; they have two children. For more information please visit www.emanuelax.com. SEASON 2020-2021 FRAMING THE PROGRAM

The Philadelphia Orchestra commissioned Jessica Hunt’s Climb as part of the celebration of Beethoven’s 250th anniversary to be performed alongside his Second and Third symphonies. The world premiere, which had to be cancelled last spring, opens this concert. Hunt was inspired by Beethoven’s confrontation with adversity as she deals with her own challenges living with a chronic illness. The metaphor of the difficulty she experiences climbing steps led her to write what she calls “a letter-through-time to Beethoven to express my gratitude for his work and to express our silent kinship.” She named the piece “to represent the challenge of living with any invisible illness or obstacle: Some of us cannot simply walk up a flight of stairs, instead, we must climb.”

Between 1784 and 1786, at the peak of his performing career, Mozart composed a dozen piano concertos that elevated the genre to new stature. The Concerto in E-flat we hear today was the first of the series. It is one of two concertos he wrote for his talented student Barbara von Ployer to play.

On what proved to be a long path of more than two decades to finish a first symphony, Johannes Brahms composed various “symphonies in disguise,” to use his mentor Robert Schumann’s phrase. Two early serenades, of which we hear the second today, marvelously complement his four great symphonies. The Serenade No. 2 in A major has unusual instrumentation, omitting the violins entirely, as well as trumpets and timpani.

The Philadelphia Orchestra is the only orchestra in the world with three weekly broadcasts on SiriusXM’s Symphony Hall, Channel 76, on Mondays at 7 PM, Thursdays at 12 AM, and Saturdays at 4 PM. SEASON 2020-2021 PARALLEL EVENTS

1784 Mozart Piano Concerto No. 14 Music Salieri Les Danaïdes Literature Kant “What Is Enlightenment?” Art David Oath of the Horatii History Treaty of Constantinople

1859 Brahms Serenade No. 2 Music Balakirev King Lear Overture Literature Dickens A Tale of Two Cities Art Whistler At the Piano History Suez Canal begun SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

Climb

Jessica Hunt Born in Deep Springs Valley, California December 16, 1987 Now living in Baltimore

Born on a small cattle ranch in the desert mountains of eastern California during a blizzard, Jessica Hunt earned a Bachelor of Music in composition and piano performance from Columbia College Chicago, a Master of Music in composition from DePaul University, and a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Michigan. She has composed for large orchestras and chamber ensembles, the operatic stage, theater and film, electronic media, chorus, and instrumental and vocal solos and duos. A fellow in Gabriela Lena Frank’s Creative Academy of Music and instructor in music theory at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University, Hunt’s current projects include Thurso’s Landing, a new opera incorporating a libretto adapted from the poetry of early- 20th-century American poet Robinson Jeffers.

Climb was commissioned by The Philadelphia Orchestra, honoring Beethoven’s 250th birthday by performing his symphonies in dialogue with music by composers of today. The work was to have received its world premiere in March 2020, on a program with Beethoven’s Second and Third symphonies, but those concerts were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

A Shared Struggle with Beethoven For her “dialogue” with Beethoven, Hunt looked not just to the composer’s Second and Third symphonies, but also to the space between the works—one of great suffering for Beethoven. In the fall of 1802, Beethoven wrote his “Heiligenstadt Testament”—his account of despondency over ever-increasing hearing loss and frustration at overcoming physical and emotional infirmities. As Hunt writes: “The first time I read that document, Beethoven’s isolation, fear, and diminishing hope leapt off the page and SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

pierced my heart. I recognized those fears—that anguish—they resonate deeply within my own chronically ill body.”

Currently living with the chronic autonomic nervous disorder dysautonomia, Hunt found a deep and personal connection with the despair and anxiety with which Beethoven lived. Just as deafness permeated every aspect of his life, Hunt notes that “every single one of my body’s autonomic functions” are affected by her condition. Climbing stairs has become a particular challenge; she describes the experience as “terrifyingly dangerous. My heart races, my vision darkens, my ears ring, it feels like gravity is pulling me backwards. It is in these moments that I must make an active choice to keep fighting, to claw my way up, until I can triumphantly rest at the top.” Connecting with Beethoven’s mourning his loss of hearing and accepting a “new normal,” Hunt claims that in reaching the top of the stairs, her “new reality is confirmed, but is also changed by the previous triumph and joy. The title is chosen to represent the challenge of living with any invisible illness or obstacle: Some of us cannot simply walk up a flight of stairs, instead, we must climb.”

A Closer Look Scored for the same instrumentation as the Second and Third symphonies, Climb is partly autobiographical, exploring aural representations of the physical sensations that are part of Hunt’s daily life with dysautonomia. As she describes: “The piece opens with a frantic burst of adrenaline that soon surrenders to the sensation of stomach-dropping nausea and tinnitus.” The opening orchestral gesture establishes the musical metaphors of adrenaline rush, dizziness, panic, tinnitus, and nausea with a heartbeat motif leading to a “tachycardia/racing heart” section. The piece reaches for the key of E flat (the same as the “Eroica” Symphony), but the gravity of the key of D pulls the music back. Optimism surfaces but is then overwhelmed by the glissandos of dizziness and transitions into violent palpitations leading to exhaustion. Punctuated by brassy flashes of pain, the orchestra-body steels itself with determination, even optimism, before a violent attack of palpitations shatters its progress, melting into mourning for a wholeness that will never come again. After the last pitch, the inhales together and performs an up-bow gesture without touching the string, seemingly an upbeat to a final resolution that never comes, hinting at one last measure that Hunt asks the audience to imagine—a balance of SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

hope, hopelessness, and uncertainty.

Climb is Hunt’s “letter-through-time” to Beethoven, expressing gratitude for his work and acknowledging their silent kinship. She writes: “Every single person has a struggle that feels monumental to them. Many of our struggles are invisible, but we can find community when we share our experiences. I hope that inviting the audience to embody, for five minutes, what it feels like to live with this chronic illness will help to raise awareness and empathy for others. If it were possible for Beethoven to hear this message, I hope he would know that he has inspired so many of us to persevere, but more importantly, that he wasn’t alone. None of us are.”

—Nancy Plum

Climb was composed in 2019.

This is the world premiere performance of the piece and the first time the Orchestra has performed any work by the composer.

The score calls for pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons; three horns; two trumpets; timpani; and strings.

Performance time is approximately five minutes. SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

Piano Concerto No. 14, K. 449

Wolfgang Amadè Mozart Born in Salzburg, January 27, 1756 Died in Vienna, December 5, 1791

The piano concerto we hear on this program initiated an astounding series of 12 mature works Mozart composed in the genre between 1784 and 1786, when he was at the summit of his career. Recently married to singer Constanze Weber, finally freed—for the most part—from the domination of his father in Salzburg, and soon to be a father himself, Mozart was enjoying new kinds of professional success as a mature musician, one whose gifts clearly went much deeper than his earlier miraculous exploits as a child prodigy.

Mozart and the Piano Concerto Mozart’s piano concertos best allowed him to display the scope of those gifts to the Viennese public. He usually performed as the keyboard soloist when the works were premiered, which gave him the chance to shine in the dual roles of composer and pianist. Concertos became his star vehicles as Mozart sought fame in Vienna during the 1780s and as he presented them at concerts for which he took personal financial responsibility in the hopes of supporting himself and his growing family.

Occasionally Mozart composed piano concertos for use by others, as is the case with the Concerto in E flat (K. 449), written in February 1784 for Barbara (Babette) von Ployer. The marvelous G-major Concerto (K. 453), which dates from a few months later, was also composed for her. The daughter of a Salzburg official posted in Vienna, Barbara studied piano with Mozart. He clearly thought highly of her gifts, as later did , who dedicated a set of variations to her after Mozart’s death.

The Concerto in E flat has long been overshadowed by more SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

famous, if not necessarily greater, neighbors that date from the same years. The shortest of Mozart’s mature piano concertos, it is quite modestly scored for pairs of oboes, horns, and strings. Indeed, Mozart stated in a letter to his father that the work can be performed à quattro, that is as chamber music with piano and strings alone, which is how it is being played on this concert.

The middle 1780s were the years of Mozart’s three great Italian , those written to texts by Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte. The spirit of these phenomenal works, filled with intrigue, drama, playfulness, and character, often found instrumental expression in the piano concertos of the time. The first movement of the E-flat Concerto contains such moments, when one can almost imagine the soloist bursting into vocal virtuosity rather than exercising digital dexterity.

A Closer Look When Mozart performed his own concertos, he would improvise cadenzas—the flashy solo sections that occur near the end of some movements—and therefore had little need to write them down. As no cadenzas survive for many of his concertos, Beethoven, as well as countless other composers and performers, have provided their own. But because the Concerto we hear today was written for someone else, Mozart felt called upon to provide a brief cadenza in the first movement (Allegro vivace). Furthermore, some of the elaborate figuration in the second movement Andantino is notated more specifically than one usually finds in Mozart concertos, which may give some indication of what the composer added spontaneously in performance. The tempo should not be too slow for this delicate movement; as Mozart remarked in a letter to his father, “Please tell my sister that there is no adagio in any of these concertos—only andantes.”

The third movement (Allegro ma non troppo) is a contrapuntal tour-de-force. We know that Constanze liked and urged her husband to write them, while at this time Mozart had opportunities to encounter more and more of the music of Bach and Handel at music-making gatherings in the home of Baron Gottfried van Swieten. These interests are abundantly evident in this brilliant finale, which is intellectually stunning, as well as emotionally delightful.

—Christopher H. Gibbs SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

Mozart composed his E-flat major Concerto in 1784.

Rudolf Serkin was the soloist in the first Philadelphia Orchestra performance of the Piano Concerto No. 14, on January 19, 1946, with Eugene Ormandy conducting. The work has been heard on only one other occasion until now, on subscription concerts (and a run-out to Baltimore) in October 1959, with pianist John Browning and Ormandy.

Mozart’s score calls for two oboes, two horns, strings, and solo piano, but in this performance it will be played by strings and piano only.

The Piano Concerto No. 14 runs approximately 20 minutes in performance. SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

Serenade No. 2

Johannes Brahms Born in Hamburg, May 7, 1833 Died in Vienna, April 3, 1897

While Robert Schumann, Felix Mendelssohn, and other early Romantics struggled with the legacy of Beethoven’s symphonies, Johannes Brahms, a generation younger, faced somewhat different challenges and enjoyed new opportunities. One of his greatest challenges was unintentionally created by Schumann, whom the 20-year-old Brahms first met in 1853. The older composer’s mental health had been declining for some time and the next year he attempted suicide by throwing himself in the Rhine River. He would live in a sanatorium for the remaining two-and-a-half years of his life. He only saw his wife, Clara, once, a few days before he died, although Brahms visited regularly.

“New Paths” Before these sad events, Robert and Clara took the young composer into their home and hearts. Robert, who had been a brilliant and powerful music critic years before, came out of journalistic retirement and submitted a brief review, his last, to the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, the prominent periodical he had helped start nearly 20 years earlier.

Shumann’s article, “Neue Bahnen” (New Paths), hailed Brahms as the musical the world had been awaiting since Beethoven’s death a quarter century earlier. It was a dream review, especially from the pen of one of the leading critics and composers of the era, but also one that created expectations that put severe pressure on the 20-year-old Brahms. Schumann in fact based his praise on relatively few works, mainly ones for piano. The piano sonatas already were “like disguised symphonies,” Schumann wrote, and gave hope for greater things to come. Although not the only reason, the pressure to live up to these hopes was surely a contributing factor in Brahms not completing his First Symphony until the age of SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

43, when it was immediately welcomed as “Beethoven’s Tenth.” But there were many false starts along the way.

Disguised Symphonies Brahms’s path to writing a symphony worthy of Beethoven’s heritage was littered with musical materials that he diverted to other projects, as well as to what might be considered other “symphonies in disguise.” The mighty orchestral opening of his Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor was at one time intended for a symphony, as were parts of A German and other compositions. The closest Brahms got in his 20s to composing an actual symphony are two orchestral serenades that were performed and published in 1860. The First Serenade in D major, Op. 11, for a time even bore the title “Symphony-Serenade.”

Brahms wrote the serenades during the years when he was splitting his time between Hamburg and the Court of Lippe-Detmold, where he taught piano, gave concerts, composed, and served as a choral conductor. The First Serenade was originally written as a chamber work for wind and string instruments, partly in the tradition of similar instrumental combinations by Beethoven, Schubert, Spohr, Hummel, and others. Allegedly at Clara’s suggestion, Brahms expanded this four-movement chamber work (now lost) to a six-movement composition for large orchestra. While working on the piece he began the five-movement Second Serenade in A major, Op. 16, we hear on this program, a work scored for a smaller ensemble lacking trumpets, timpani, and, more unusually, violins. (The piccolo, however, is used to delightful effect in the final movement.)

Seeking Clara’s Suggestions As Brahms did throughout his life—but especially in these earlier years—he sent the work-in-progress to Clara for her candid opinion (she gave no other kind). It was she, in fact, who complained that even one of Mozart’s greatest serenades lacked variety in its instrumental color. This may have posed a challenge that Brahms’s unusual instrumentation and interaction of winds, brass, and lower strings were meant to address. Although he dispatched the opening movement to Clara in late 1858, she had to wait, notwithstanding repeated requests, for the next three movements to arrive on her 39th birthday in September of the next year. Brahms asked if the slow movement was “worth all the trouble I have taken with it.”

Within a week he got his answer. Clara wrote, “What shall I say about the Adagio? ... I cannot find the words to express the joy it SEASON 2020-2021 THE MUSIC

has given me and yet you want me to write at length! It is difficult for me to analyze what I feel; it impels me to something which gives me pleasure, as though I were to gaze at each filament of a wondrous flower. It is most beautiful! … The whole movement has a spiritual atmosphere; it might almost be an Eleison [from a ]. Dear Johannes, you must know that I feel it better than express it in words. The Minuet has great charm (a trifle Haydnish), and the in the Trio is delightful. … The first movement gave me the same pleasure all over again; one or two things perhaps do not please me in it but they are quite minor details in a beautiful whole.” Brahms conducted the first performance in Hamburg on February 10, 1860, about three weeks before the premiere of the orchestral version of the First Serenade. A few months later he crafted a four-hand piano arrangement. As he did so, the intensely self-critical composer commented, “I have seldom written music with greater delight. It seemed to sound so beautiful that I was overjoyed.”

—Christopher H. Gibbs

Brahms composed the Second Serenade from 1858 to 1859 and revised it in 1875.

The first Philadelphia Orchestra performances of the work were with Fritz Reiner in January 1932. The complete work has been programmed only four times on subscription since: in December 1979 and March 1985, both with William Smith; in January/February 2003, with Wolfgang Sawallisch; and in February 2016, with Michael Tilson Thomas. Eugene Ormandy programmed the work twice on subscription, in December 1938 and March 1953, but omitted the fourth movement.

The Philadelphia Orchestra recorded the work in 1955 with Ormandy for CBS.

Brahms’s score calls for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, and strings (minus violins).

The Serenade runs approximately 30 minutes in performance.

Program notes © 2020. All rights reserved. Program notes may not be reprinted without written permission from The Philadelphia Orchestra Association and/or Nancy Plum. SEASON 2020-2021 MUSICAL TERMS

GENERAL TERMS

Cadence: The conclusion to a phrase, movement, or piece based on a recognizable melodic formula, harmonic progression, or dissonance resolution

Cadenza: A passage or section in a style of brilliant improvisation, usually inserted near the end of a movement or composition

Chord: The simultaneous sounding of three or more tones

Contrapuntal: See

Counterpoint: The combination of simultaneously sounding musical lines

Dissonance: A combination of two or more tones requiring resolution

Fugue: A piece of music in which a short melody is stated by one voice and then imitated by the other voices in succession, reappearing throughout the entire piece in all the voices at different places

Glissando: A glide from one note to the next

Harmonic: Pertaining to chords and to the theory and practice of harmony

Harmony: The combination of simultaneously sounded musical notes to produce chords and chord progressions

K.: Abbreviation for Köchel, the chronological list of all the works of Mozart made by Ludwig von Köchel

Meter: The symmetrical grouping of musical rhythms

Minuet: A dance in triple time commonly used up to the beginning of the 19th century as the lightest movement of a symphony

Op.: Abbreviation for opus, a term used to indicate the chronological position of a composition within a composer’s output. Opus numbers are not always reliable because they are often applied in the order of publication rather than composition. SEASON 2020-2021 MUSICAL TERMS

Rondo: A form frequently used in symphonies and concertos for the final movement. It consists of a main section that alternates with a variety of contrasting sections (A-B-A-C-A etc.).

Scherzo: Literally “a joke.” Usually the third movement of symphonies and quartets that was introduced by Beethoven to replace the minuet. The scherzo is followed by a gentler section called a trio, after which the scherzo is repeated. Its characteristics are a rapid tempo in triple time, vigorous rhythm, and humorous contrasts. Also an instrumental piece of a light, piquant, humorous character.

Serenade: An instrumental composition written for a small ensemble and having characteristics of the suite and the sonata

Sonata: An instrumental composition in three or four extended movements contrasted in theme, tempo, and mood, usually for a solo instrument

Suite: During the Baroque period, an instrumental genre consisting of several movements in the same key, some or all of which were based on the forms and styles of dance music

Trio: See scherzo

THE SPEED OF MUSIC (Tempo)

Adagio: Leisurely, slow Allegro: Bright, fast Andante: Walking speed Andantino: Slightly quicker than walking speed Menuetto: A minuet Moderato: A moderate tempo, neither fast nor slow Vivace: Lively

TEMPO MODIFIERS

Ma non troppo: But not too much Quasi: Almost