TuAPRILn 12, 2014 eUp! Welcome to the Young People’s Concerts®! ohannes Brahms grew up playing the piano, so when he came up with some powerful musical ideas, at the age of 21, he tried to compose them into a big piece for piano. The grand piano J was just achieving its modern form, capable of projecting huge sound. But even that was not enough for the young Brahms – he needed all the heft and the colors of the orchestra too. It took five years, but finally he finished his Piano Concerto No. 1, using a form that pits a solitary soloist against a huge orchestra. His ideas propelled the concerto form itself into new territory. Today, we’ll learn how piano and orchestra can work together – or in competition – and how Brahms overcame challenge after challenge to create his first masterpiece. THE PROGRAM JOSHUA WEILERSTEIN conductor JOHANNES BRAHMS Hungarian Dance No. 1 THEODORE WIPRUD host for orchestra (arr. Brahms) PAUL LEWIS piano for piano four-hands TOM DULACK scriptwriter and director Eric Huebner, Steven Beck CLARA NEUBAUER actor MANUEL DE FALLA Ritual Fire Dance from El Amor Brujo LUCIA TU actor JOHANNES BRAHMS Selections from Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 GETTING INTO THE PIANO Paul Lewis There are about 12,000 PARTS in a concert-size grand piano. Most of them are part of the ACTION, which includes A hefty CAST IRON FRAME 88 keys (52 white and 36 black) connected to resists all that tension and keeps 88 hammers that hit 243 strings the piano rock-solid. (1 for each low note, 2 for middle notes, 3 for high notes) stretched to 18 tons of tension; most are equipped 2 BRIDGES connect the strings to the with dampers that silence the strings SOUNDBOARD, which converts the strings’ when they’re not being played. vibrations to sound waves, which enter our ears as music. Finally – a beautiful WOODEN CASE to hold it all. 3 PEDALS can “undamp” some or all of the strings, or make the piano’s sound softer. In all, concert grands weigh more than 1,000 pounds! ABOUT THE ARTISTS 100 CONCERTO JOSHUA WEILERSTEIN became a New York Philharmonic Assistant Conductor in May 2011 after The word concerto has roots completing his graduate studies in conducting and violin HAMMERED in a Latin word meaning both at the New England Conservatory. He has conducted “to contend or dispute” and “to numerous internationally acclaimed orchestras in the DULCIMER JOHANNES BRAHMS United States and abroad. During the 2013–14 season, (BORN 1833 IN HAMBURG, GERMANY; work together” – polar opposites! Mr. Weilerstein makes his U.S. debut with the symphony It’s a great word for a musical form orchestras of Baltimore, Fort Worth, and New Mexico. DIED 1897 IN VIENNA, AUSTRIA) that is a sometimes harmonious and In Europe, he will debut with orchestras in France, Switzerland, sometimes heated dialogue between England, Norway, Belgium, France and Austria. Mr. Weilerstein has been awarded the Robert J. Harth Conductor Prize and the Aspen Johannes Brahms was the last in the trio of titanic German composers, along with Bach and a lone, powerful soloist, and a mighty, Conducting Prize. In 2007, the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of accompanying orchestra. Concertos Venezuela (SBYO) engaged Mr. Weilerstein as a violin soloist, and in s Beethoven who came to be known as the “three B’s.” Brahms was a Romantic, a leader in a generation of showcase the brilliant playing January 2010 he made his guest conducting debut with the SBYO. composers who were bursting out of classical bounds to make music that was more directly emotional. of virtuosos – musicians But while some Romantic composers thought music should be used to tell stories, Brahms believed that music PAUL LEWIS’s recent cycles of Beethoven and Schubert’s who are masters of their core piano works received acclaim worldwide. He has 1400 shouldn’t be about anything -- that it was powerful enough to stand on its own. instruments. appeared with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Seattle, CLAVICHORD Boston, and Chicago symphony orchestras. He is a Brahms was also a perfectionist. He destroyed many of his early scores, and refused to publish others. Restless and frequent guest at festivals including Lucerne, Mostly Mozart, Tanglewood, Salzburg, and BBC Proms. His recital career unsatisfied, it took him five years to write his Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor. He started it when he was only 21, and had takes him to Wigmore Hall, Royal Festival Hall, Alice Tully Hall, 92nd Street Y, Vienna’s Musikverein and Konzerthaus, just been introduced to the respected composer Robert Schumann, who became his friend and mentor and announced to the Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, the Berlin Philharmonie and world that Brahms would be the next great composer of his time. Nothing like a little pressure! Konzerthaus, Zurich’s Tonhalle, and the Sydney Opera House. His multi-award winning discography for Harmonia Mundi includes the complete Beethoven piano sonatas, concertos, and Diabelli Variations; Being a pianist, Brahms first thought he’d write a piece for two pianos. But he was so ambitious and had such huge musical ideas Liszt’s B-minor Sonata and other late works; and Schubert’s late piano s that he decided he needed a whole orchestra to realize his vision. More months of hard work, and he was still struggling; even works. Awards include the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Instrumentalist of the Year, South Bank Show Classical Music Award, and three the orchestra wasn’t enough! Back came the piano, but this time as a solo instrument, injecting a whole new dimension of drama RONDO Gramophone awards. Along with his wife, cellist Bjørg Lewis, he is artistic between the pianist and the orchestra. director of Midsummer Music. 1500 A classical musical form used most often — THEODORE WIPRUD, Vice President, Education, Brahms’s first-ever concerto is BIG in every way – long, tumultuous, teeming with emotion. The first movement expresses as Brahms did – in the The Sue B. Mercy Chair, has overseen the New York HARPSICHORD the pain Brahms experienced as he watched Schumann struggle with mental illness. The second movement is just as Philharmonic’s wide range of in-school programs, last movement of a piece, educational concerts, adult programs, and online emotional – in a totally different way: Mr. Brahms called it a “tender portrait” of Robert’s wife, Clara, whom he loved. a rondo has one main offerings since 2004. He hosts both the School Day By the time he got to the third movement, Brahms retreated to more traditional, perhaps safer, territory, modelling it theme that keeps coming Concerts and the Philharmonic’s Young People’s Concerts. Previous to his tenure at the New York Philharmonic, on one of Beethoven’s piano concertos, and writing in a structured form called a rondo. back, with different, Mr. Wiprud created educational and community-based contrasting themes programs at the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Orchestra of The concerto’s premiere in 1859, with Brahms at the piano, was a disaster. The audience responded in between. St. Luke’s, and the American Composers Orchestra and worked s CONNECTIONS as a teaching artist and resident composer in a number of New York first with silence, and then began to hiss. One critic wrote, “It has nothing to offer but waste, barren City schools. An active composer, Mr. Wiprud holds degrees from Harvard and Boston universities and studied at Cambridge University dreariness.” This failure haunted Brahms for a long time, though he tried to find a silver lining, as a visiting scholar. 1700 writing in letter to a friend, “I believe it is the best thing that could have happened to me; TOM DULACK has been the writer and director of the it makes one pull one’s thoughts together and raises one’s courage.” Young People’s Concerts since 2005. An award-winning FORTEPIANO In fact, Brahms lived to see his concerto become accepted, even playwright, he is the author of the hit plays Breaking Legs, BRAHMS, Incommunicado, and Friends Like These. He also wrote admired, and in time it came to be recognized as a AKA the novel The Stigmata of Dr. Constantine and a theater masterpiece. memoir, In Love With Shakespeare. Author of the libretto for a new one-act opera based on Robert Browning’s JOHANNES poem “My Last Duchess” which premiered in April 2012, KREISLER, JUNIOR he is currently at work on a symphonic drama about Vivaldi. He is Professor of English at the University of Connecticut, where MANUEL As a teenager, Brahms adopted an alter he teaches Shakespeare and theater-related literature courses. CADENZA ego based on a character from a famous Twelve-year old CLARA NEUBAUER is a 7th grader at s DE FALLA novel, who was passionate, dreamy and The Dalton School, and has been playing violin since (1876-1946) Near the end of a poetic. He called this “other” self Johannes she was 3. In 2013, she made her Lincoln Center KEYBOARD KEYBOARD debut at The Chamber Music Society’s Young Ensembles concerto movement there’s Kreisler, Junior, and actually signed Concert. Since 2012, Clara has been a Young Performer 1800 Manuel de Falla is one of the most often a cadenza, when the some of his more Romantic pieces with at Music@Menlo. She has performed at many other soloist gets to play all alone and festivals, including an appearance as soloist with the important Spanish composers of the that name. He once wrote to Clara National Repertory Orchestra at the Bravo! Vail festival. 20th century – and yet, frustrated with his really show off.