Juilliard Orchestra Commencement Concert Matthias Pintscher, Conductor Hang Zhong, Piano
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Thursday Evening, May 23, 2019, at 6:00 The Juilliard School presents Juilliard Orchestra Commencement Concert Matthias Pintscher, Conductor Hang Zhong, Piano MAURICE RAVEL (1875–1937) La Valse RAVEL Piano Concerto in G major Allegramente Adagio assai Presto HANG ZHONG, Piano RAVEL Daphnis et Chloé, Suite No. 2 Lever de jour Pantomime Baptismus Danse générale Performance time: approximately one hour, with no intermission The Juilliard School thanks Musical America for donating its “International Directory of the Performing Arts” to our students. The taking of photographs and the use of recording equipment are not permitted in this auditorium. Information regarding gifts to the school may be obtained from the Juilliard School Development Office, 60 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-6588; (212) 799-5000, ext. 278 (juilliard.edu/giving). Alice Tully Hall Please make certain that all electronic devices are turned off during the performance. new freedom of musical expression but his Notes on the Program own music remained grounded in tradition- by David Crean al (if heavily embellished) harmonic ideals. This radical openness also extended to his MAURICE RAVEL well-known reluctance to accept students, Born March 7, 1875, Ciboure, France as he disliked the idea of imposing his own Died December 28, 1937, Paris, France views on others. In a famous (but possi- bly specious) anecdote, he is supposed to From an early age, Maurice Ravel seemed have refused to teach George Gershwin on immune to criticism. This characteristic, ap- the grounds that Gershwin would end up parently genuine and not assumed, served writing “bad Ravel and lose his great gift of him very well in a time when intense trib- melody and spontaneity.” In the absence alism and competing musical ideologies of an easy stylistic label, critics have often left little room for his highly individual and focused on craftsmanship as the defining idiosyncratic approach to composing. Early characteristic of Ravel’s music. He was a in his career he developed a reputation as slow, painstaking worker, especially after a radical—he was twice expelled from the the war, and this approach is reflected in Paris Conservatoire and fielded five un- a relatively small body of work of partic- successful applications for the prestigious ular refinement and elegance. Tonight’s Prix de Rome. The nepotism involved in program features a trio of his best-known this last rejection provoked a famous na- and most important works, about equally tional scandal. Ravel, however, followed spaced over a period of some 20 years a different path than other musical trail- blazers, and classification of his works La Valse has long proved elusive. Unlike many of La Valse is most often heard as a concert his contemporaries, he never became an work but was originally intended to be a ideologue—rather, he maintained a re- ballet performed by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballet ceptive and open-minded approach that Russes. Upon hearing the work, however, allowed him to absorb numerous and di- verse influences into his style without Diaghilev remarked to Ravel that it was compromising his unique voice. “not a ballet, but a portrait of ballet!” and refused to stage it. Impassive as ever, This reluctance to align himself with a Ravel made no protest but completely broader (or inflexible) artistic movement severed all ties with the famous impresa- manifested itself throughout his career. rio. Their only subsequent meeting nearly Ravel admired—and, for a time, befriend- ended in a duel. Ravel had long been fasci- ed—his older contemporary Debussy but nated with the Viennese waltz—in a 1906 bristled at being classified with him as an letter to a friend he remarked that “you “impressionist.” He was sufficiently patri- know of my deep sympathy for these won- otic to join the French army at the outbreak derful rhythms ... I value the joie de vivre of World War I (despite being almost 40 expressed by the dance.” Valses nobles et and of fragile constitution) but had no inter- sentimentales, a collection of eight waltzes est in joining the chauvinistic group Ligue Nationale pour la Defense de la Musique influenced by Schubert, followed five years Française, which sought to ban the per- later. If this earlier collection had been formance of German music in France. He a tribute to the waltz, then La Valse is a maintained a deep interest in the music of caricature—the waltz reflected in a fun- the 17th and 18th centuries but generally house mirror, or perhaps filtered through rejected the Neoclassicism of the 1920s the anxiety and cynicism of the immediate and 1930s. He acknowledged Arnold postwar years. Ravel described his unset- Schoenberg’s importance in promoting a tling work as “a sort of apotheosis of the Viennese waltz” and provided this laconic remuneration eventually changed his mind. note to accompany the score: Although Paris had already experienced something of a jazz craze, Ravel’s sojourn Through breaks in the swirling clouds, in America was his first exposure to the au- waltzing couples may be glimpsed. thentic American idiom, and he was imme- Little by little they disperse, one makes diately enamored of its “rich and diverting out (A) an immense hall filled with a rhythm.” In the G major concerto, begun whirling crowd. The stage is illuminated the year after his tour, he was able to in- gradually. The light of the chandeliers corporate the melodic inventiveness and peaks at the fortissimo (B). An Imperial rhythmic diversity of jazz into one of the Court, about 1855. most venerable classical forms. Although Ravel insisted that this was not Jazz was not the only influence on Ravel’s the case, many listeners have interpreted concerto. Its formal clarity, relative conci- his work as symbolic of the destruction sion, economical scoring, and upbeat tone of European high culture in World War I. recall 18th-century concertos and reflect His protestations to the contrary notwith- Ravel’s belief that “a concerto should be a standing, La Valse strikes an ominous tone divertissement” rather than a pathos-laden from the outset, with murky, indistinct emotional outpouring. This clever marriage rumblings in the double basses. The other of freedom and structure is nowhere more instruments tentatively enter, playing snip- evident than in the opening movement, pets of melody as if heard from afar or which manages to fulfil many of the conven- partly remembered. Eventually a series of tions of classical sonata form while giving the short waltz melodies does emerge, each impression of a seamless tapestry of spon- with a distinct character, but the constantly taneous melody. The piano is involved from shifting harmonies and unusual phrase struc- the beginning, accompanying the energetic ture give them an air of tragic parody rather and angular primary theme in the winds, than joie de vivre. About midway through but it falls silent as the melody is picked up the piece, the opening rumblings return, and by the full orchestra. It returns for a series from that point the dance begins to disinte- of transitional, bluesy themes in a slow- grate. The short themes from the first half, er tempo, and introduces the traditionally already unusual, are now further distorted lyrical secondary theme shortly thereafter. by jarring cross-rhythms that destabilize the The development begins with a return to the traditional waltz patterns. As the waltz spins opening tempo, as driving rhythms in the out of control, the themes are freely atom- piano accompany fragmentary statements ized, recombined, and juxtaposed until the of the initial theme. The bluesy transitional whole piece ultimately collapses. theme also makes a reappearance before a long piano scale leads to the beginning of Piano Concerto in G major the recapitulation. Ravel takes a brief detour Ravel’s first term at the Paris Conserva- into a slow, dreamlike section dominated by toire was in the piano class, but he never the harp before the piano cadenza returns regarded himself as a dazzling virtuoso. to the secondary theme. An energetic coda When American supporters invited him concludes the first movement. to undertake an extended concert tour of North America, he initially demurred, but a Ravel was explicit regarding the influence of combination of curiosity regarding Ameri- Mozart on the slow movement, in particular can music and the possibility of substantial his Clarinet Quintet. The main theme of this ABA form combines a 6/8 accompaniment but Ravel never allows the sound to become with a tender 3/4 melody to create a subtle thick or oppressive, expertly maintaining a tension that undergirds the entire move- lightness of touch in the most complex tex- ment. Although it sounds quasi-improvised, tures. Ravel even includes wordless music Ravel wrote, “I worked over it bar by bar! for a chorus, almost unheard of in a ballet It nearly killed me!” After nearly three min- score, and apparently viewed by Diaghilev as utes of solo piano, the winds tentatively dispensable. Ravel’s displeasure at its elim- enter to pick up the theme accompanied ination was a prelude to their later rift over by shimmering strings. The music slowly La Valse. rises to a fleeting climax before the English horn restates the opening, now accom- The popular second suite comprises music panied by delicate scalar passages in the from the ballet’s third part: Lever du jour piano. The rollicking presto begins with (Sunrise), Pantomime, and the concluding toccata-like figures in the piano against a Danse générale, often referred to as a Bac- jagged theme in the winds. New themes chanale. The work opens with a constant follow quickly one after another, with the stream of rapid arpeggios that are subtly piano taking center stage throughout.