570895bk RStrauss US:557541bk Kelemen 3+3 3/8/09 8:42 PM Page 1 Antoni Wit Staatskapelle Weimar Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied conducting with Founded in 1491, the Staatskapelle Weimar is one of the oldest orchestras in the world, its reputation inextricably linked Richard Henryk Czyz˙ and composition with Krzysztof Penderecki at the Academy of Music in to some of the greatest works and musicians of all time. Franz Liszt, court music director in the mid-nineteenth Kraków, subsequently continuing his studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also century, helped the orchestra gain international recognition with premières that included Wagner’s Lohengrin in graduated in law at the Jagellonian University in Kraków. Immediately after completing 1850. As Weimar’s second music director, Richard Strauss conducted first performances of Guntram and STRAUSS his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel. The orchestra was also the first to perform Strauss’s Don Juan, Macbeth and Death Witold Rowicki and was later appointed conductor of the Poznan´ Philharmonic. He and Transfiguration. After World War II Hermann Abendroth did much to restore the orchestra’s former status and Symphonia domestica collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from 1974 to 1977 was artistic director quality, ultimately establishing it as one of Germany’s leading orchestras. The Staatskapelle Weimar cultivates its of the Pomeranian Philharmonic, before his appointment as director of the Polish Radio historic tradition today, while exploring innovative techniques and wider repertoire, as reflected in its many recordings. Photo by Krzysztof Niesporek and Television Orchestra and Chorus in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 The orchestra regularly collaborates with world-renowned soloists and conductors, and, in addition to international Metamorphosen he was the director of the National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, and concert-tours, continues to cultivate the great operatic tradition in Weimar, especially of the late Romantic period. from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief conductor and then first guest conductor of Orquesta For more information, visit: www.nationaltheater-weimar.de Filarmónica de Gran Canaria. In 2002 he became General and Artistic Director of the Staatskapelle Weimar • Antoni Wit Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra. His international career has brought engagements with major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far East. He has made nearly a hundred records, including an acclaimed release for Naxos of the piano concertos of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle Académie du Disque. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Messiaen (8.554478-79) was awarded the Cannes Classical Award in MIDEM Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet Award and was nominated for a Grammy for his Naxos recording of Penderecki’s St Luke Passion (8.557149), with a further nomination in 2005 for Penderecki’s Polish Requiem (8.557386-87). Antoni Wit is a professor at the F. Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw. Photo by Lutz Edelhoff C M Y K 5 8.572009 6 8.572009 570895bk RStrauss US:557541bk Kelemen 3+3 3/8/09 8:42 PM Page 2 Richard Strauss (1864–1949) d’amore, cor anglais, D and A clarinets, two B flat draws him away from the cradle. seemed that the world he had known had been destroyed. theme heard, prefixed by the words In Memoriam, from Symphonia domestica, Op. 53, TrV 209 clarinets, bass clarinet, four saxophones, four bassoons, Strauss gave the title Schaffen und Schauen (Creating It was from his reading of Goethe that Strauss drew the lower strings in the closing bars of the work. The viola Metamorphosen, TrV 290 double bassoon, eight horns, four trumpets, three and Looking) to the Adagio. The thematic material is taken inspiration for Metamorphosen, its title an allusion to theme seems about to be repeated, but instead a new theme trombones, bass tuba, timpani, glockenspiel, triangle, from the motifs of the father and mother, while the child, Goethe’s Die Metamorphose der Pflanzen and Die is introduced by the first and second violas with the first The German composer and conductor Richard Strauss staged at the Court Opera in Dresden in 1911, followed by cymbals, bass drum, two harps and strings. The first series now asleep, is not heard. For the father this should be a Metamorphose der Tieren, his German answer to the De cello. A change to G major allows the appearance of a represents a remarkable extension of the work of Liszt ten further operas, ending only with Capriccio, mounted of motifs making up the first theme represents different time of creative work, while his wife interrupts. The whole rerum natura of Lucretius. It has been suggested that new theme, marked etwas fliessender. These themes, with and Wagner in the symphonic poems of his early career at the Staatsoper in Munich in 1942. It was unfortunate elements in the character of Papa, Strauss himself, by turns section represents a musical development of the two Metamorphosen, not in the Lisztean sense of the other motifs, variously treated, provide the substance of the and in his operas shows an equally remarkable use of late that, in the eyes of some, Strauss was compromised by gemächlich (easy-going - cello), träumerisch (dreamy - thematic groups and his wife’s return marks the beginning metamorphosis of a theme, arose from the idea of setting work. The opening Adagio is heard again in a form of romantic orchestral idiom. Born in Munich, the son of a his seeming acquiescence under the National Socialist oboe), mürrisch (sulky - clarinet), feurig (ardent - violins) of the Liebesszene (Scene of Love), with suggestions of a late poem by Goethe, whose works Strauss was reading recapitulation, followed by the principal motto theme and distinguished horn-player, he had a sound general Government that came to power in 1933. After 1945 he and lustig (cheerful - trumpet). The group of motifs that erotic element soon to find expression in Salome.The again, taken from Zahme Xenien, fourteen lines starting the theme that followed from it. The third theme, education in Munich, while studying music under teachers withdrew for a time to Switzerland, returning to his own associated with Pauline Strauss constituting the second couple sleep, dreams and worries put aside as the clock Niemand wird sich Selber kennen / Sich von seinem Selbst- allmählich etwas fliessender, returns, but breaks off. After of obvious distinction. Before he left school in 1882 he house at Garmisch only four months before his death in theme include grazioso (flutes and violins), gefühlvoll strikes seven. Ich trennen (No one can know himself / separate himself a silence, the opening material starts the coda, leading had already enjoyed some success as a composer, 1949. (tender - solo violin and clarinet and zornig (angry). Her In the Finale the boy wakes up and a variant of his from his very self). Metamorphosen starts with the cellos finally to the motto theme, accompanied by the Eroica continued during his brief period at Munich University Strauss made the first sketches for his Symphonia anger is deflected by Papa, and the two converse before the theme provides the first subject of a double fugue, and basses before the fourth and fifth violas announce the theme, molto lento, ending the major achievement of with the composition of concertos for violin and for domestica in 1902 and 1903, completing the work in the appearance of their son, known as Bubi in the family, his entrusted to four bassoons, answered by clarinets and theme, a reminiscence of his reworked Trauer um Strauss’s old age. French horn and a sonata for cello and piano. By the age latter year. It was first performed under the composer’s theme, the third, given to the oboe d’amore, accompanied horns, with father’s motifs used in the fugal exposition. München (Lament over Munich) and a clear reference to of 21 he had been appointed assistant conductor to the direction at Carnegie Hall in New York on 21st March first by tremolo divided second violins. The child wakes The second fugal subject is introduced by the violins, the Funeral March from Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony, a Keith Anderson well-known orchestra at Meiningen under Hans von 1904. He had completed Ein Heldenleben five years and cries out loudly, and mother and father make him answered by violas and cellos, while the child’s theme Bülow, whom he succeeded in the following year. before and had been occupied in the intervening years in ready to be shown to his relations. The aunts think him just makes its return. The motifs of father and mother provide In 1886 Strauss resigned from Meiningen and began the composition of his second opera, Feuersnot. The like his father (muted trumpets and clarinets), while the the movement with its figurative element as cheerful the series of tone-poems that seemed to extend to the period brought, as always, a number of songs, and Strauss uncles think him just like his mother (trombones, horns quarrel and reconciliation. The latter seems to be marked utmost limit the extra-musical content of the form. The was heavily engaged in his duties as a conductor. In 1897 and oboes). by the yielding of the father. Eventually the three voices first of these works, Aus Italien (From Italy), was followed his son Franz had been born and the Symphonia domestica In a continuing synthesis of symphony and symphonic come together in a simple folk-like passage for woodwind. by Macbeth, Don Juan, Tod und Verklärung (Death and was dedicated to him and to Strauss’s formidable wife poem, a Scherzo follows, with a variant of the son’s theme Father and mother unite and to them is added the child’s Transfiguration) and, after a gap of a few years, Till Pauline.