carte blanche concert v: Cello Evolutions II: Laurence Lesser, cello JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (1685–1750) August 4 Suite no. 1 in G Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1007 (ca. 1720) Prélude Sarabande Sunday, August 4, 10:30 a.m., Stent Family Hall, Menlo School Allemande Menuet 1 and 2 Courante Gigue PROGRAM OVERVIEW PAUL HINDEMITH (1895–1963) Distinguished cellist Laurence Lesser, renowned for his probing Sonata for Solo Cello, op. 25, no. 3 (1923) explorations of the Bach Suites in concert and on recordings, Lebhaft, sehr markiert Lebhafte Viertel completes this summer’s cycle of Bach’s Cello Suites in a pro- Mässig schnell, gemächlich Mässig schnell vocative program. The concert pairs the iconic First Suite with Langsam German composer Paul Hindemith’s Sonata for Solo Cello, an GEORGE CRUMB (b. 1929) essay in bold modernism and instrumental fluency. Bach’s glo- Sonata for Solo Cello (1955) rious Fourth Suite serves as the program’s centerpiece. The Fantasia: Andante espressivo e con molto rubato Tema pastorale con variazioni final set bookends Italian master Luigi Dallapiccola’s Ciaccona, Toccata: Largo e drammatico – Allegro vivace Intermezzo, and Adagio with the severe Second Suite and the thrilling Sixth Suite. BRIEF INTERMISSION Carte Blanche Concert V features a lunch-break intermission. A JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (ca. 1720) gourmet boxed lunch may be purchased for $18. Suite no. 4 in E-flat Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1010 Prélude Sarabande Allemande Bourrée 1 and 2 Courante Gigue SPECIAL THANKS LUNCH INTERMISSION CARTE BLANCHE CONCERTS CARTE Music@Menlo dedicates this performance to JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH William F. Meehan III with gratitude for his generous support. Suite no. 2 in d minor for Solo Cello, BWV 1008 (ca. 1720) Prélude Sarabande Allemande Menuet 1 and 2 Courante Gigue LUIGI DALLAPICCOLA (1904–1975) Ciaccona, Intermezzo, and Adagio (1945) Ciaccona, intermezza e adagio Intermezzo – Allegro, con espressione drastica Adagio JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH Suite no. 6 in D Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1012 (ca. 1720) Prélude Sarabande Allemande Gavotte 1 and 2 Courante Gigue Laurence Lesser, cello Music@Menlo 2013 Program Notes: Cello Evolutions II The Cello Suite in G Major of Bach is generally regarded as the alpha of all Leopold hired Johann Sebastian Bach, then organist and Kapellmeister music for solo cello, even though some earlier pieces exist from other com- at Weimar, as his Director of Music. Inspired by the high quality of the posers. That Bach created a medium with full works of just single lines, mostly musicians in his charge and by the prince’s praise of his creative work, Bach devoid of chords, is already remarkable—but to realize that his inventive insight produced much of his greatest instrumental music during the six years of and profound message in the group of six would remain, after three centu- his tenure at Cöthen, including the Brandenburg Concerti, the orchestral ries, the standard by which to measure all future attempts is nothing short of suites, the violin concerti, The Well-Tempered Clavier, many chamber and astounding. keyboard compositions, and the works for unaccompanied violin and cello. Four of these masterworks, Bach’s Cello Suites, are the solid framework in The six Suites for Solo Cello were apparently written for either Christian which I embed other solo works I have admired over many years of performing. Ferdinand Abel (whose son Carl Friedrich became the partner of Sebas- Bach’s fellow German Paul Hindemith wisely avoided creating a dance suite tian Bach’s son Johann Christian in an important London concert venture in and rather opted for five character pieces, each different from the other. He the 1760s) or Christian Bernhard Linigke, both master cellists in the Cöthen goes through moods that are strong, tipsy, profoundly sad, ephemeral, and court orchestra. muscular—all short and all complete statements. The cello in Bach’s time was still an instrument of relatively recent origin. Young American George Crumb, under the influence of Bartók in the It was the Cremonese craftsman Andrea Amati who first brought the violin, post–World War II era, gives us an early glimpse of the magical sounds which viola, and cello to their modern configurations around 1560 as the successors became his signature, but he also adds a bit of “swing” to the finale. to the old softer-voiced family of viols. (The modern double bass, with its Luigi Dallapiccola, a very devoted follower of Alban Berg, wrote for solo tuning in fourths and its sloping shape—compare its profile with the square cello using twelve-tone technique, but he was at the same time, like Berg, a ser- shoulders of the other orchestral strings—is the only survivor of that noble vant of the dramatic and lyrical, characteristically so with the voice of his native breed of earlier instruments.) For the first century of its existence, the cello was Italy. An obvious reference to Bach is the title of the first movement, ciaccona. strictly confined to playing the bass line in concerted works; any solo passages But another indirect link is the third movement’s opening series of fifths, related in its register were entrusted to the viola da gamba. The earliest solo works to the Berg Violin Concerto. Berg’s tone row itself, built on a rising series of fifths, known to have been written specifically for the instrument, from the 1680s, are ends with four whole steps, the start of the Bach chorale “Es ist genug.” And at by Domenico Gabrieli, a cellist in the orchestra of San Petronio in Bologna the end of the piece Dallapiccola writes, “Deo gratias,” just as J. S. often did. (unrelated to the Venetian Gabrielis); notable among them are his Ricercare Words like those above can be helpful as a guide into music. But, as for Unaccompanied Cello of 1689. The first concerto for cello seems to be Mendelssohn famously wrote in response to a query about the meanings of his that composed by Giuseppe Jacchini in 1701. The instrument gained steadily “Songs without Words,” “The thoughts that are expressed to me by music that I in popularity as it displaced the older gamba, a circumstance evidenced by love are not too indefinite to be put into words but, on the contrary, too definite. the many works for it by Antonio Vivaldi and other early eighteenth-century And so I find in every effort to express such thoughts in words that something is Italian composers. When Bach proposed to write music for unaccompanied right but, at the same time, that something is lacking in all of them.” cello sometime around 1720, however, there were few precedents for such So be it—I hope today’s performances will speak to you in that direct pieces. The examples with which he was most familiar were by a tiny enclave manner. of composers (Westhof, Biber, Walther, Pisendel) centered around Dresden —Laurence Lesser who had dabbled in compositions for solo violin, and it was probably upon their models that Bach built his six Sonatas and Partitas for Violin and the half-dozen Suites for Cello. In comparing these two series of Bach’s works, Philipp Spitta wrote, “The passionate and penetrating energy, the inner fire JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH and warmth which often grew to be painful in its intensity [in the violin works], (Born March 21, 1685, Eisenach; died July 28, 1750, Leipzig) is here softened down to a quieter beauty and a generally serene grandeur, as Suite no. 1 in G Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1007 was to be expected from the deeper pitch and fuller tone of the cello.” Suite no. 4 in E-flat Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1010 Bach’s Solo Cello Suites, like his contemporaneous English Suites BLANCHE CONCERTS CARTE Suite no. 2 in d minor for Solo Cello, BWV 1008 for Harpsichord (BWV 806–811), follow the traditional form of the Ger- Suite no. 6 in D Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1012 man instrumental suite—an elaborate prelude followed by a fixed series of dances: allemande, courante, sarabande, and gigue. Between the last two Composed: ca. 1720 movements of the cello works are inserted additional pairs of minuets Other works from this period: Sonata no. 3 in C Major for Solo Violin, (Suites nos. 1 and 2), bourrées (nos. 3 and 4), or gavottes (nos. 5 and 6). BWV 1005 (ca. 1720); Partita for Flute in a minor, BWV 1013 (1723); Bran- denburg Concerti, BWV 1046–1051 (1721); Violin Concerto in E Major, Suite no. 1 in G Major for Solo Cello, BWV 1007 BWV 1042 (ca. 1723) The First Suite (G major) opens with a fantasia-like prelude whose steady Approximate duration: 16 minutes; 18 minutes; 22 minutes; 28 minutes rhythmic motion and breadth of harmonic inflection generate a sweeping grandeur that culminates magnificently in the heroic gestures of the closing In 1713, the frugal Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia dismissed his household measures. The ensuing movements follow the old custom of pairing a slow musical establishment in Berlin. The young, cultured Prince Leopold dance with a fast one: an allemande (here marked by wide-ranging figura- of Anhalt-Cöthen took the opportunity to engage some of the finest of tions and swiftly flowing rhythms) is complemented by a courante, a dance Friedrich’s musicians and provided them with excellent instruments and type originally accompanied by jumping motions; a stately sarabande is established a library for their regular court performances. In December 1717, balanced by a pair of minuets (the second of which, in g minor, exhibits a delicious, haunted languor) and a spirited gigue of vibrant character. www.musicatmenlo.org Suite no.