Classics 1 Program Notes Roman Carnival, Op
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Classics 1 Program Notes Roman Carnival, op. 9 Hector Berlioz Born in La Côte-Saint-André, Isère, December 11, 1803; died in Paris, March 8, 1869 In 1844 Berlioz composed the Roman Carnival overture using themes from his opera Benvenuto Cellini, first performed in 1838 without public success. Berlioz wrote in his Memoirs: It is fourteen years since I was stretched on the rack at the Opéra. I have just re- read my poor score [Benvenuto Cellini] carefully and with the strictest impartiality, and I cannot help recognizing that it contains a variety of ideas, an energy and exuberance and a brilliance of color such as I may perhaps never find again, and which deserved a better fate. Berlioz most likely composed the Roman Carnival to popularize the opera’s content or as a brilliant prologue to Act II, but not as a replacement for the Benvenuto Cellini Overture. Although the opera was never popular during Berlioz’s lifetime, there were successful performances, particularly those under Liszt’s direction at Weimar. Both overtures met with a better fate: they were instantly successful as separate concert pieces and have remained so. The “exuberance” and “brilliance of color” that Berlioz mentioned in connection with the opera are abundant in the Roman Carnival. A brief “teaser” introduction is characteristic of most of Berlioz’s overtures, and this Overture springs to life with an energetic preview of the main section before the “real” slow introduction begins. The English horn “sings” the main theme of the introduction, derived from Benvenuto’s aria in Act I, and even before that from a cantata that Berlioz wrote in 1829—clearly he was partial to it. The saltarello (sprightly dance) theme of the Overture’s main body is an expanded treatment of the “Carnival Chorus” in Act II; into this texture the slow theme from the introduction eventually appears in ingenious counterpoint. It is interesting that Berlioz originally wrote the fast section in 3/8 time in the fashion of a scherzo, and only later rewrote it in 6/8. Although the music is for the most part simplified by this revision, certain sections that would have had 9-bar phrases now contain phrases of the unusual length of 4 1/2 bars. Berlioz was not only an inspired composer, but one of the wittiest and most articulate writers on music—his Evenings with the Orchestra and his Memoirs make highly entertaining reading. He recounts the following anecdote about the Roman Carnival in his Memoirs: In Austria the Roman Carnival overture was for long the most popular of my compositions. It was played everywhere. One evening Haslinger, the music publisher, gave a soirée at which the pieces to be performed included this overture, arranged for two pianos (eight hands) and physharmonica [a kind of harmonium]. When its turn came, I was near the door which opened onto the room where the five performers were seated. They began the first allegro much too slowly. The andante was passable; but the moment the allegro was resumed, at an even more dragging pace than before, I turned scarlet, the blood rushed to my head and, unable to contain my impatience, I shouted out: “This is the carnival, not Lent. You make it sound like Good Friday in Rome.” The hilarity of the audience at this outburst may be imagined. It was impossible to restore the silence, and the rest of the overture was performed in a buzz of laughter and conversation, amid which my five interpreters pursued their placid course imperturbably to the end. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Scored for 2 flutes, 2nd doubling piccolo, 2 oboes, 2nd doubling English horn, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 cornets, 3 trombones, timpani, 2 tambourines, cymbals, triangle, and strings Concerto for Violin and Cello in A minor, op. 102, “Double” Johannes Brahms Born in Hamburg, May 7, 1833; died in Vienna, April 3, 1897 In the summer of 1887 at Lake Thun in Switzerland, Brahms composed his last orchestral composition, the Double Concerto, as a gesture of reconciliation toward violinist Joseph Joachim. Seven years earlier Joachim had severed all personal relations with his friend of thirty years (though he continued to perform his music) when Brahms supported Joachim’s wife in a marital dispute. Brahms first approached Joachim with a typically diffident postcard: “I should like to send you some news of an artistic nature which I heartily hope might more or less interest you.” Relieved by Joachim’s prompt reply—“I hope you are going to tell me about a new work, for I have read and played your latest works with real delight”—Brahms wrote on July 24: Your friendly message makes my confession all the more pleasant! But be prepared for a little shock. I have been unable to resist the ideas that have been occurring to me for a concerto for violin and cello, much as I have tried to talk myself out of it. Would you consider trying the work over somewhere with Hausmann [the great cellist of the Joachim String Quartet] and me at the piano, and later, in whatever town you prefer, with an orchestra and ourselves? The friendliness of their letters increased and Joachim took on the same role he had with the Violin Concerto, making practical musical suggestions. Brahms’s manuscript shows that he accepted Joachim’s criticisms but preferred his own solutions. In some cases the printed version offers even further alteration. Most of the revisions actually made the solo parts more brilliant and difficult, in keeping with Brahms’s stated desire to write a true concerto, rather than a symphony in disguise. Though there is no dedication in the published score, Brahms gave a printed copy to Joachim inscribed: “to him, for whom it is written.” Brahms, Joachim, and Hausmann arranged a private first reading with Brahms taking the orchestral accompaniment at the piano on September 21, 1887, in Baden-Baden and a trial the following day with Brahms conducting the municipal orchestra. The first public performance was given in Cologne on October 18, and the same three performers presented the work soon after in Wiesbaden, Frankfurt, and Basel. Reception was mixed: audiences were generally enthusiastic, but the problem of two protagonists bothered some critics and characteristic charges of “symphony-concerto” were leveled by others. Despite Brahms’s attempts to make the solo parts more brilliant, it went against his principles to write a “showcase” concerto. Whatever the inner conflict in Brahms’s mind between symphony and concerto, the outcome was a work as beautiful as it was unusual. Brahms returned to the more traditional three-movement design for the Double Concerto after the “symphonic” four he had adopted for his Second Piano Concerto. The introduction of the first movement contains recitative-like anticipations of the first and second themes by the cello and violin, respectively. The following extended solo passage for the two instruments leads to a complete exposition by the orchestra. This movement’s concentrated sonata form in Brahms’s most mature symphonic style is rich in subtly related themes and the kind of thematic development at which he was unequaled. An example can be seen in the impassioned syncopated theme before the second subject, which just before the recapitulation becomes tender and sublime, and in another guise begins the coda. As a token of friendship to Joachim, the second theme refers to Viotti’s A minor Violin Concerto, of which both had been fond for many years. The Andante, a simple ternary form with coda, was responsible for winning the Concerto many of its initial supporters. The movement is dominated by its plaintively beautiful main theme, played by the violin and cello doubled at the octave. The two ascending fourths of the theme— related to the descending fourths outlined in the first movement’s opening—are previewed at the outset by the horns and winds. The return of the main theme, played again by the two soloists, is ingeniously extended by imitations in the winds. For his finale Brahms would probably have turned to a Hungarian rondo with sonata-form elements even if he had not had his Hungarian-born friend in mind; it was especially fitting in this case. It is the cellist, however, who leads as in the first movement. Brahms let his sense of humor show through in the interplay between the soloists, as in the passages leading to the first episode (or second subject). His touching side is also displayed, particularly in the delicately scored section near the end of the movement before the triumphal conclusion. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Scored for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings Rainbow Thea Musgrave Born in Barnton, Midlothian, Scotland, May 27, 1928 It is a measure of her talent and determination that Thea Musgrave became greatly respected as a composer and conductor when these were rather uncommon professions for a woman. Her typical response to frequent interviews and questions about being a “woman” composer has been: “Yes, I am a woman; and I am a composer. But rarely at the same time.” Musgrave’s powerful, dramatic music has been heard at numerous opera halls, on frequent broadcasts, and at festivals and concert halls across the globe. Her operas The Voice of Ariadne (1973), Mary Queen of Scots (1977), Harriet, the Woman Called Moses (1984), and Simon Bolivar (1993) brought especially widespread recognition. Her newest opera, Pontalba (2003), also deals with a main character in a larger historic context, in this case Micaela Almonester, Baroness de Pontalba, and events surrounding the Louisiana Purchase.