HighNotes is brought to you by the Evanston Symphony Orchestra, Evanston’s own community orchestra. Much of this booklet of musical notes and activities for seniors is based on the ESO’s KidNotes, which we write for middle and high school kids for each of our concerts – but many adults also like them for their different, less formal approach to the concert materials than that of our Musical Notes and Activities for Seniors excellent traditional classical music program notes. from the Evanston Symphony Orchestra HighNotes always has articles on a specific musical theme plus a variety of puzzles and some really bad jokes and puns. For this issue we’re focusing on “scary music” - quite appropriate for Wagner The Flying Dutchman Overture 2 October! Sit back and listen to lively musical tales of ghost ships, Saint-Saëns Danse Macabre dancing skeletons, a wild mountain, a troll king’s lair, and an 4 apprentice who didn’t follow orders. You might want to turn on the lights, though – or even turn them off if you dare! Mussorgsky Night on Bald Mountain 5 Our “Bygones” features are for those of us who are “of a certain age” and can relate to objects that were big in our childhoods, Grieg In the Hall of the Mountain King 6 but have now all but disappeared. This month we’re highlighting machines – cameras, hair-dryers, typewriters and the coolest car Dukas The Sorcerer’s Apprentice 7 ever from the 60s. Good discussion starters!. We also have some “tangential” features, articles relating to the Ghost Ships 8 theme of the month or to a piece of music, but not necessarily musical in and of themselves. This month we have an article on Bygones, Puzzles, famous ghost ships plus a bit of fun with a Leroy Anderson piece. And, just because the World Series is in October, we absolutely Jokes & Other Amusements 10 had to talk a bit about baseball! This time it’s the Cubs. Maybe next time the Sox…We hope you enjoy this edition of HighNotes! Anderson The Typewriter 13 Vol. 1, No. 4 HighNotes October 2020 Editor ..............................................................................................Kelly Brest van Kempen Technical Advisor..................................................................................................David Ellis October 2020 Puzzle & Maze Checkers …………………………..Connor, Addison, Ryan, Calli, Ciara & Gus HighNotes© - Copyright 2020 - ESOA (except for original authors’ copyrights) ESOA makes no claim to copyrights held by others and uses such materials for educational purposes only under the “fair use” exception to copyright law. xxX X The stranger meets Captain Daland and, learning that he has a daughter, Senta, offers a treasure chest in exchange for her hand in marriage. Daland yields to the temptation and agrees. The When Richard Wagner (1813-1883) storm subsides and both ships set sail for Daland’s home port. was just nine years old, his parents took him to see an opera in the Meanwhile, Senta and her girlfriends are spinning thriving German city of Dresden. He and singing. But Senta is also daydreaming about was hooked on opera from then on. a gorgeous picture of the legendary Dutchman that Wagner was extremely intelligent; hangs on the wall of the room. She tells his sad tale when he was just 13, he translated to her friends and vows to save him. Enter Erik the 12 volumes of Homer’s Odyssey Huntsman, Senta’s old boyfriend, who warns her from ancient Greek and also began that he had a dream in which her father returned with a mysterious work on a tragedy in five acts. With stranger who carried her off to sea. Senta is delighted. Erik is not. all of these talents, however, there Daland and the stranger arrive. Senta and the stranger have eyes was one thing that he wasn’t good at: piano. Even though he only for one another. Later that evening, the girlfriends bring food studied piano for many years, he never learned to play it well, an and drink and invite the crew of the stranger’s ship to join the fun. unusual failing in a composer. Despite that weakness, he became Understandably, the crew decline. Suddenly ghostly figures appear arguably the greatest of Germany’s composers of opera. at work on the ship, now revealed as The Flying Dutchman. The most ambitious of Wagner’s operas is the famous Ring of Erik chastises Senta for deserting him, the Niebelung, which is filled with Nordic gods and goddesses claiming she had said she loved him. The and takes 18 hours to perform; obviously, it is presented over a stranger overhears Erik and despairs, period of several days! Most of his operas, however, were much certain he is forever cursed. He tells Senta shorter. One of his earliest operas is The Flying Dutchman, an the truth and sets sail. She, however, is amalgamation of various tales of the 1600s ghost ship and its ill- true to her word and casts herself into the fated captain and crew. It premiered in Dresden in 1843. sea, pledging to be faithful to him unto In Wagner’s version, a Captain Daland sails his ship into a death. “This is his salvation. The spectral Norwegian port because of a fierce storm. When Daland and his ship disappears, and Senta and the Dutchman are seen ascend- crew are asleep, a ghostly vessel rams the ing to heaven.” [The End.] stern of Daland’s ship and grappling irons The ESO has played the Overture to The Flying Dutchman a hold the two ships together. “Invisible hands number of times over its 75-year history. Part of the charm of furl the sails.” A pale man dressed in black overtures is that they give you a taste of what’s to come, the and with a thick black beard steps on shore, operatic equivalent of the “coming attractions” trailers at the lamenting his fate: he once invoked Satan and movies. And, just like the movies, if you want to know what hap- is therefore cursed to sail the seas forever. pens, you have to sit through the whole thing! Most overtures use However, an angel intervened, telling him that leitmotif, a theme that occurs over and over again in an opera every seven years he may go ashore and, if he finds true love, and is the “theme song” for each of the main characters. This the curse will be lifted. This is a seventh year, one of many over technique was perfected by Wagner himself and is prominent in his two centuries with no reprieve. operas. You can listen for the various leitmotif in the recordings. 2X 3X Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) was The family of Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky not an ordinary child; he was, in fact, a (1839-1881) were wealthy nobles who could prodigy of extraordinary talents. He give their children every advantage. His could read and write at two, started mother was a trained pianist and began giving piano lessons at two-and-a-half, and him lessons when he was six. He was quite had composed his first work at three. talented and at nine was playing complicated At seven he started the formal study of works for family and friends. When he was composition and at ten he gave a ten, he and his brother were enrolled in the concert that included piano works by elite St. Peter’s School in St. Petersburg. He Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Handel and continued his piano studies there and at 12 others. He was also a whiz at school; published a piano piece called “The Standard- he learned languages and math very Bearer Polka.” easily and also had a lifelong interest in geology and astronomy. The title of this piece would seem to herald a Saint-Saëns was just as talented as a composer and wrote all new period in young Mussorgsky’s life: at types of music: operas, symphonies, concertos, songs as well 13, he continued a family tradition by entering as choral, solo piano and chamber music. He was also the first the Cadet School of the Imperial Guard. composer to write music specifically for the movies. Despite the rigorous program, he was able to continue his music The ESO has played Saint-Saëns’ Danse Macabre (“Dance of studies and often entertained fellow cadets with dance music Death”) several times over its 75-year history, the last and his own improvisations. At age 17, he became an officer in time in 2013. At that time we remarked in KidNotes the most prestigious regiment of the Russian Imperial Guard. that the piece “will make you think more of scary After a few years, however, he resigned from the Guard to devote Halloween than sunny June!” so it seems himself to music. appropriate to highlight it now, in October. Many Russian composers of the time based their music on West- According to legend, "Death" appears at midnight ern European models, and Mussorgsky’s early works reflect this every year on Halloween. He calls forth the dead style. Then came an eye-opening trip to Moscow, after which he from their graves to dance for him while he plays his produced a uniquely Russian sound. Many of fiddle. The piece opens with the harp playing the his works were inspired by Russian history and same note 12 times to signal midnight. Then the solo folklore, including the “tone poem” Night on Bald violin plays as Death’s fiddle. The other instruments Mountain. Unfortunately for Mussorgsky, his join in, all in a minor key, and the dance becomes wilder. At the purely Russian style was not much appreciated halfway point another melody is added in a major key, church during his lifetime; the Tsar even crossed his music to signal the approach of All Saints’ Day.