sign in sign up
<<
Home , Leonard Bernstein

UGA Symphony Orchestra

The University of Georgia Program Notes

By Steven Ledbetter Symphony Orchestra Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990)

Three Dance Episodes from Friday Leonard Bernstein was born in Lawrence, November 10 2017 Massachusetts, on , 1918, and 8:00 p.m. died in New York on December 2, 1990. He composed On the Town in 1944. The show conductor opened in Boston on December 13, 1944; its Mark Cedel New York opening, at the Adelphi Theater assistant Jean Gómez took place on December 28. The three dance episodes call for flute (doubling piccolo), oboe guest conductor Cynthia Johnston Turner (doubling English horn,) two clarinets (first doubling E-flat clarinet, second doubling Ozzie each sets out with his own plan to en- guitar Daniel Bolshoy ), two horns, three trumpets, joy their first visit to New York and to get a three , tuba, alto , tim- girl. But ultimately it is Gabey’s wishes that pani and percussion (snare drum, bass drum, determine the course of the story. He falls in PROGRAM drum set, suspended cymbal, triangle, wood love at first sight with the photo of a girl on block, xylophone), piano, and strings. Perfor- a subway poster, “Miss Turnstiles,” and he Bernstein Three Dance Episodes from On the Town mance time is approximately eleven minutes. enlists the aid of his friends in locating her. Cynthia Johnston Turner, Guest Conductor At the beginning of 1944, the twenty- The songs capture equally the bustle and Rodrigo Concierto de Aranjuez five-year-old Leonard Bernstein was a new energy of New York and the loneliness of a celebrity, having shortly before made a dra- stranger in the big city. And, unlike most Allegro con spirito matic stand-in for an ailing Broadway , who turn the compo- Adagio to conduct a concert of the New York Phil- sition of the “ballet ” entirely over to Allegro gentile harmonic that was broadcast nationwide. an assistant, Bernstein composed brilliantly By the end of that year, he was known as a conceived, elaborate dance numbers. Daniel Bolshoy, Guitar singularly successful of unusually wide range. In January, his Jeremiah Sym- In On the Town, the hectic pace is wonder- phony was premiered in Pittsburgh; the bal- fully captured in the first of the three Dance INTERMISSION let opened in New York in April, Episodes, depicting “The Great Lover” and by the end of the year, his first Broad- searching for that perfect girl. One of Ber- way show, On the Town, was playing on nstein’s most beautiful and poignant melo- Sibelius Symphony No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 39 Broadway, sparking the careers of a series dies, “Lonely Town,” underlies the pas de Andante, ma non troppo – Allegro energico of brilliant newcomers to the theater: Ber- deux. The lively depiction of Times Square Andante (ma non troppo lento) nstein himself; and Adolph that ends the three dance episodes was also Scherzo: Allegro Green, who wrote the words and music; and the finale of the show’s first act (and it brief- choreographer . ly quotes the most famous song in the show, Finale (quasi una Fantasia) Andante – Allegro molto “New York, New York,” where “the Bronx is The plot of On the Town came from the up and the Battery’s down.” In this concert scenario already developed for Fancy Free, version, the dance episodes are dedicated a light hearted romp tracing the experi- to the three women who played the princi- ences of some sailors on leave for twenty pal roles in the original show: , HODGSON CONCERT HALL four hours in . Gabey, Chip, and Betty Comden, and Nancy Walker.

50 Performance UGA October November 2017 51 UGA Symphony Orchestra

Joaquin Rodrigo (1901-1999) After that, Rodrigo’s style remained essen- It was here, in 1808, that Charles IV was (1865-1957) tially the same. His music was shaped by his forced to abdicate, in favor of his son Fer- Concierto de Aranjuez French teacher Dukas and by the Spanish nando VII. Carlos later repudiated his abdi- Symphony No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 39 nationalist composers. His works are filled cation, appealing to Napoleon for help – and Joaquin Rodrigo was born in Sagunto, Valen- with Spanish ambience and attractive tunes. this led ultimately to the horrors of the war Jean Julius Christian Sibelius was born in cia, Spain, on November 22, 1901, and died of 1808-1814, depicted to terrifying effect Hämeenlinna (then known by the Swedish in Madrid on July 6, 1999. He composed the It would probably be safe to say that the by Goya in paintings and drawings. Rodrigo name Tavastehus), Finland, on December 8, Concierto de Aranjuez in 1939. In addition Concierto de Aranjuez has become the evokes earlier happier images of Aranjuez as 1865, and died in Jarvenpää, near Helsinki, to the solo guitar, the score calls for two flutes single most popular composed in high points of Spanish history and culture. on September 20, 1957. He took the gallicized (second doubling piccolo), two oboes (sec- the 20th century. Part of its popularity, of form of his first name (which had originally ond doubling English horn), two clarinets, course, stems from the fact that the guitar The concerto has no explicit program, but been Johan) in emulation of an uncle. He two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, and won constantly new adherents through- it is filled with musical gestures that recall composed his First Symphony in 1898 and strings. Performance time is approximately out the century because of the decades of the Golden Age of Spain, starting immedi- 1899 and conducted its first performance in twenty-one minutes. superb musicianship of Andrés Segovia, ately with the strummed guitar chords in Helsinki on April 26 of the latter year. The both in his own right and as a teacher and alternating 6/8 and 3/4 time, probably the symphony is scored for two flutes (doubling The Spanish composer Joaquin Rodrigo, inspiration for at least two generations of single most fundamental “Spanish” musi- piccolos), two oboes, two clarinets, two bas- though blind from the age of three, began fine players after him. Actually the Con- cal gesture in music. After this figure vamps soons, four horns, three trumpets, three trom- early music lessons in his native Valencia. cierto de Aranjuez was not composed for for a time through the orchestra, the violins bones and tuba, , bass drum, cym- By the time he was twenty-three, the lo- Segovia, but for another Spanish guitar- enter with the principal theme of equally bals, triangle, harp, and strings. Performance cal orchestra had played a work of his. In ist named Regino Sainz de la Maza. But Spanish character. time is approximately thirty-eight minutes. 1927, he entered the Schola Cantorum for most audiences of the current genera- in Paris, where he was a pupil of Dukas; tion, the modern history of the guitar as The slow movement is the longest part of It always comes as a surprise to learn that a here he encountered Manuel de Falla, the a concert instrument begins with Segovia. the concerto (fully half its length) recalls composer renowned as a nationalistic hero leading Spanish composer of the day, who Rodrigo did write a concerto for him – the the saeta, a song performed by the women in his homeland was not a native speaker of offered him encouragement. In the mid Fantasia para un gentilhombre (Fantasy for of Seville from their balconies during an the language. Sibelius was born to a Swedish- 1930s he also studied musicology at the a Gentleman) in 1954. annual religious procession through the speaking family in a small town in south Sorbonne. He lived in Paris and in Ger- streets. They sing in a gently sustained, na- central Finland and only began to speak many during the Spanish Civil War, re- The title Concierto de Aranjuez refers to the sal, high-pitched style that is imitated in some Finnish from the age of eight. He en- turning to his homeland only in 1939. The locale, twenty-nine miles south of Madrid, the concerto by the English horn, a mod- tered a Finnish-language school at eleven, following year the premiere of his most where, over the centuries, the Spanish ern equivalent of the Renaissance shawm but not until he was a young man did he feel popular work, the Concierto de Aranjuez, kings built and elaborated several royal res- that would have been known to the original completely at home in the language. (In this led Rodrigo to be hailed as a significant idences, the last of which included a build- singers of this kind of song. The guitar takes respect he was not alone; Austrian cultural new light in Spanish music. ing inspired by the Trianons at Versailles. up this melody and decorates it sensitively domination of Czechoslovakia and Hun- and lavishly. Eventually the guitar begins an gary in the nineteenth century meant that extended cadenza, to which the orchestra Smetana was more fluent in German than responds loudly, though the solo then calms in Bohemian, and Liszt, though proud to be the ensemble and leads to the tranquil close. regarded as a Hungarian composer, barely spoke the language at all.) The poignancy of this melody comes from personal tragedy. Rodrigo composed it dur- Musical studies began with the violin, and ing sleepless nights spent in anguish after soon he aimed at a career as a professional the stillborn birth of his first child and his virtuoso. But in 1885, after an abortive at- wife’s dangerous illness. He was recalling tempt at legal studies, he undertook to their honeymoon in the gardens of Aran- pursue composition with Martin Wegelius juez, and filled the music with all the ex- in Helsinki. Further study in Berlin intro- pression of love and of loss. duced him to the newest music, including Strauss’s Don Juan at its premiere. He was The last movement is a lively dance alter- usually in debt, apparently unable to avoid nating 2/4 and 3/4 time, and concentrating financial extravagance in the German capi- on showing off the soloist with the greatest tal, and already drinking heavily, a habit possible virtuosity and brilliance. that remained with him. After his return to

52 Performance UGA October November 2017 53 UGA Symphony Orchestra

Finland in 1891, he composed the choral a pair of hovering alternating notes in a The rambunctious third movement has symphony Kullervo, which was so success- characteristic rhythm leads seamlessly to some of the earthiness of Bruckner’s sym- ful at its premiere in April, 1892, that he was a fortissimo restatement for full orches- phonic scherzos, the headlong rhythmic immediately established as a leading figure tra of the main E-minor theme. A bright drive of the pizzicato strings at the open- in Finnish music, a position that was never tremolo in the strings, joined by the harp, ing reinforced by the vigor of the timpani seriously challenged thereafter. brings in the woodwinds with a dancelike and the most important thematic motive transitional idea derived possibly from the in the strings, which has a modal, folklike The following seven years saw the com- opening clarinet line. An extraordinarily character. The Trio is a shade slower and position of a series of scores for dramatic long pedal point – a note held in the bass altogether more lyrical, even pastoral in production, a failed operatic attempt, and – without changing – underlies the second feeling, evoking dreams of the country- most important – a group of purely orches- theme material, which appears in expres- side driven out by the sudden return of tral scores, En saga and the four symphonic sive dialogues between the woodwind in- the scherzo. poems about Lemminkäinen, a character struments over a hushed rumbling in the from the Finnish national epic Kalevala. strings. The exposition ends with a unison At the beginning of the Finale, the strings These culminated in his first symphony, pizzicato in the strings, twice repeated. give out in unison an expansive, passion- composed evidently in part as a musical ate version of the hesitating clarinet melody response to Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique Sym- The musical argument of the development heard at the very opening of the symphony, phony, which had already been performed further intertwines the musical ideas al- now harmonized by the brasses. A certain in Helsinki in 1894 and again in 1897. ready heard, but with a tendency to grow degree of questioning in the woodwinds, progressively more chromatic. A momen- eventually answered by the strings, leads By the autumn of 1898, Sibelius was totally ab- tary lyric interlude (with two solo violins into the dramatically charged Allegro theme sorbed in the work at a time of great political in dialogue) turns into more dramatic that runs through the bulk of the movement, tension in Finland and of personal concern as stuff with the climax of downward-moving except for the striking moments of contrast well. A diary entry of September 9 reflects his chromatic scales in the woodwinds against provided by the wonderful singing theme mood: “Autumn sun and bitter thoughts. . . . upward-rushing chromatic figures (at twice on the violins’ G string, bringing a chorale- How willingly I would have sacrificed some the speed) in the lower strings. Suddenly, like dignity into the heart of the activity. The of the financial support I have received if I against all this activity, the upper strings symphony closes with an echo of the pizzi- only had some sympathy and understanding sing the melody from early in the move- cato chords that ended the first movement. of my art – if someone loved my work. O, you ment that preceded the fortissimo state- © Steven Ledbetter (www.stevenledbetter.com) slave of your moods, their plaything.” These dramatic character of much of the music in ment of the first theme. Sibelius works this feelings may be reflected in the autumnal the symphony, some critics claimed to find a around to G major (where we first heard it) colors of much of the score, and especially in literary program in the music, every theme and plunges us into the heart of the reca- its lonely opening, a solitary clarinet bravely functioning like a Wagnerian leitmotiv for pitulation, omitting the first main theme singing its lament over the chill background a character or event. But Sibelius emphati- statement, since the fortissimo repetition is thunder of a long roll on the timpani. cally denied that there was any connection about to return full force. The recapitulation whatever; his symphony (by implication) is is a condensed intensification of the begin- But although he complained of misunder- ning, ending in darkly muttering strings. standing and lack of sympathy, his art was a purely abstract musical structure, how- ever characterful its content. still rooted in the nineteenth century both The slow movement is often cited as the part harmonically and thematically. His Second The clarinet solo that opens the symphony of the symphony most strikingly influenced Symphony in 1904 was received with gener- dies away on a sustained G, the preced- by Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique. It is a kind of al incomprehension in Boston, for example, ing melodic phrase hinting that the piece poignant rondo, its C-minor melody alter- even by such future prominent proponents will be in G minor. But just as the clarinet nating with other ideas based on the same of his music as critic Olin Downes. But the settles on its last note, the second violins rhythms and phrase structure, sometimes First offered fewer knotty problems, and begin a tremulous sextuplet figure consist- inverted from a falling to a rising theme. once it achieved performance, it was gener- ing of the notes G and B, which thus hint Except for a few woodwind interludes, the ally accorded favor with audiences both in at G major. We are in fact listening to the colors are predominantly dark. The sadness Finland and elsewhere. home key coalesce out of the very ether, sometimes explodes in an outburst which eventually dies away in the return of the Because of Sibelius’s keen interest in the the tonic of E minor appearing clearly only after the first violins begin their muscu- main theme. Sibelius’s country home, Ainola, where he lived for Kalevala, not to mention the passionately more than fifty years beginning in 1904. lar statement. A contrasting idea built on 54 Performance UGA October November 2017 55 The University of Georgia Symphony Orchestra About the Soloist conductor Mark Cedel Daniel Bolshoy conducting assistant Jean Gómez Daniel Bolshoy has recently been appointed to the faculty of the Hugh Hodgson School VIOLIN I Elitsa Atanasova, FLUTE Deborah Caldwell of Music where he directs the guitar pro- JP Brien-Slack, Co-Principal Emily Zirlin, Shengduo Chen gram. One of Canada’s leading concert art- Co-Concertmaster Kuan Huah Chen Principal Joel Garcia ists, he has performed as a soloist with more Anastasia Petrunina, Wesley Hamilton Rachel Anders than sixty orchestras internationally includ- Co-Concertmaster John Cooper Shana Stone ing the Mexico City Philharmonic, Israel Teresa Grynia Seonkyu Kim Joel Clevenger, Chamber, Volgograd Symphony (Russia), Alexander Ambartsumian Claudia Malchow OBOE Principal and the symphony orchestras of New Mex- Serena Scibelli Ava Cosman Remy Kepler, Andrew Taylor ico, Vancouver, Toronto, Edmonton, Cal- Lourenço De Nardin Budó Sean Askin Principal Jordan Stone, bass gary, Kingston, Victoria, Okanagan, Saska- Yeasol Kang Nic Kanipe toon, Nova Scotia, as well as the Manitoba Joy Hsieh RJ Gary Will Ruff William Jones TUBA Chamber Orchestra, the Ottawa Chamber, Caroline Dorr and many others. Trey Golden Elvis Yang Monica Corliss CLARINET An active chamber musician, he has per- Sarah Ewing CELLO Greg Hamilton, Timpani formed at numerous chamber music festi- Erin Lollar Adriana Ceia, Co-Principal Taylor Lents vals and concert series throughout North Principal Pedro Alliprandini, America, Europe, Russia, Asia, and the VIOLIN II Andrew Short Co-Principal Percussion Middle East. He appears on seven commer- Sahada Buckley, Valentina Ignjic Caleb Rucker Keller Steinson cial recordings and two documentary films Principal Justin Jeon Nathan Tingler on the Bravo! TV network. His recordings Vivian Cheng Jasmine Rhee BASSOON and live performances are often broadcast Audrey Butler Stephen Wu Felisha Jones, Harp on CBC Radio, NPR, and various classical Nicole Valerioti Michael Marra Co-Principal Laura Hemerlein music stations. He has recently completed Savena Tseng Jamie Mancuso Jennifer Grubbs, a tour of concerts and master classes in Rebecca Huong Ian Connolly Co-Principal Library

China, including a residency at the Beijing Sam Ferguson Sujay Sreenivasan Nahee Song,

Central Conservatory. Catherine Cook HORN Jordi Lara Head Librarian Ian Chen Julia Chun Addison Whitney, Bolshoy has adjudicated many interna- Gabriella Davis Principal tional music competitions, including the Personnel Ian Jones Rachel Gadra, Manager Guitar Foundation of America, Guitar- BASS Meghan O’Keefe Assistant Principal Adriana Ceia Gems festival in Israel, the Tabula Rasa Nahee Song, Kellie Shaw Principal Nathan Dial festival in Russia, and the National Finals Stefan Williams of the Canadian Federation of Music Fes- Olivia Curtis Mattia Beccari PRODUCTION Murphy Pulliam tivals. Bolshoy holds a D.M. Degree from Claudia Amaral Seonkyu Kim the at Indiana Uni- VIOLA Leonard Ligon JP Brien-Slack versity. His students have won awards in Nicholas Lindell, Quentin Smith TRUMPET competitions, and scholarships to leading Co-Principal Shaun Branam,

Universities and Conservatories, includ- Principal ing awards in the Federation of Canadian Music Festival, The Northwest, The Guitar Foundation of America, the Parkening, Daniel Bolshoy is a D’Addario Strings Gold å and the Alessandria (Italy) International Performing Artist. For more information Guitar competitions. please visit www.danielbolshoy.com.

56 Performance UGA October November 2017 57