Programnotes Clyne Beethove
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PROGRAM ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FOURTH SEASON Chicago Symphony Orchestra Riccardo Muti Zell Music Director Pierre Boulez Helen Regenstein Conductor Emeritus Yo-Yo Ma Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant Global Sponsor of the CSO Thursday, May 28, 2015, at 8:00 Saturday, May 30, 2015, at 8:00 Ludovic Morlot Conductor Jennifer Koh Violin Berlioz Les francs-juges Overture, Op. 3 Clyne The Seamstress JENNIFER KOH World premiere CSO commission INTERMISSION Beethoven Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Major, Op. 55 (Eroica) Allegro con brio Marcia funebre: Adagio assai Scherzo: Allegro vivace Finale: Allegro molto These violin concerto performances have been enabled by the Paul Ricker Judy Fund. This program is partially supported by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts. PROGRAM ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FOURTH SEASON Chicago Symphony Orchestra Riccardo Muti Zell Music Director Pierre Boulez Helen Regenstein Conductor Emeritus Yo-Yo Ma Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant Global Sponsor of the CSO Tuesday, June 2, 2015, at 6:30 Afterwork Masterworks Ludovic Morlot Conductor Jennifer Koh Violin Clyne The Seamstress JENNIFER KOH World premiere CSO commission Beethoven Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Major, Op. 55 (Eroica) Allegro con brio Marcia funebre: Adagio assai Scherzo: Allegro vivace Finale: Allegro molto There will be no intermission. This violin concerto performance has been enabled by the Paul Ricker Judy Fund. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is grateful to WBBM Newsradio 780 and 105.9FM for its generous support as a media sponsor of the Afterwork Masterwork series. This program is partially supported by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts. 2 COMMENTS by Phillip Huscher Hector Berlioz Born December 11, 1803, La Côte-Saint-André, Isère, France. Died March 8, 1869, Paris, France. Les francs-juges Overture, Op. 3 Berlioz introduced his Les rejected it, one after another. Even once Berlioz francs-juges overture at a revised the score in 1829 and 1833—by then his concert he put together in was a name to reckon with—he still failed to stir order to win the admira- up any enthusiasm for producing it. Berlioz ulti- tion of the actress Harriet mately gave up on Les francs-juges. He recycled Smithson, with whom he portions—most famously turning a brassy march had fallen in love—and into the hair-raising March to the Scaffold in the who would be the subject Symphonie fantastique—and salvaged only the of his blockbuster overture, which he published independently as a Symphonie fantastique in concert piece. He destroyed the rest of the score. another two years. Neither their romance nor Berlioz’s first opera, Les francs-juges, would erlioz’s overtures were the first of his works survive, but the overture quickly became a to reach a large public. They were published popular success, and it is still often played. It is early in his career and widely performed, the only part of the opera Berlioz saved intact Beven when his larger compositions were slow to and published—the first orchestral work by a catch on. Within a decade of its composition, the composer who would quickly transform the overture to Les francs-juges was played not only in history of instrumental music. France, but also in London, Berlin, Vienna, and Berlioz set his sights on the opera stage early Saint Petersburg. Berlioz conducted it often on his in his career. It was his close friend, Humbert own concerts and on tour. From the majestic brass Ferrand, who suggested the subject and wrote statements at the opening to the urgent fast music the text for Les francs-juges (often rendered as that follows, the overture is quirky, distinctive, “the judges of the secret court,” but more usefully cheeky—Berlioz dares to combine the fast and translated as “the self-appointed judges”). Like slow portions near the climax—and quite like other so-called rescue operas in vogue at the anything known in music at the time. If it were time, Ferrand’s libretto is a medieval tale, set not done with such assurance, technical skill, deep in the dark forests, of a political prisoner and orchestral wizardry, it might be dismissed as who is saved from a chamber of secret judges by the work of a fearless newcomer, which, in fact, his fiancée. Berlioz wrote the opera quickly in the Berlioz was at the time. Written scarcely a year summer and early autumn of 1826. Then, to his after Beethoven’s death, Les francs-juges suggests dismay, major opera theaters throughout Europe that a new chapter in music had already begun. COMPOSED MOST RECENT and contrabassoon, four horns, two September 1826 CSO PERFORMANCES trumpets and three cornets, three April 26, 1974, Orchestra Hall. trombones, two tubas, timpani, FIRST PERFORMANCE Sir Georg Solti conducting cymbals, bass drum, strings May 26, 1828; Paris, France. The May 3, 1974, Kennedy Center. composer conducting APPROXIMATE Sir Georg Solti conducting PERFORMANCE TIME FIRST CSO PERFORMANCES July 30, 1993, Ravinia Festival. Carlo 13 minutes October 26 & 27, 1894, Rizzi conducting Auditorium Theatre. Theodore CSO RECORDING Thomas conducting INSTRUMENTATION 1973–74. Sir Georg Solti. London two flutes and two piccolos, two July 8, 1972, Ravinia Festival. István oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons Kertész conducting 3 Anna Clyne Born March 9, 1980, London, England. The Seamstress, for Violin and Orchestra In 2008, Anna Clyne Dufallo and Amy Kauffman by offering to write spotted an old violin in a a violin duet for them to play. Then, as a way of dusty case, leaning up remembering her mother, Clyne decided to write against a pile of vinyl six more violin pieces; she composed one each records in the basement of evening leading up to the day of the first anniver- a thrift shop in Oxford, sary of her mother’s death. (Something she could England. A European not have foreseen at the time: The Seamstress was baroque-style instrument, finished on the sixth anniversary, to the day.) dating from the late In 2010, after having been picked by Riccardo 1800s, with an elaborate Muti as one of the Chicago Symphony’s new hand-carved lion’s head scroll, it was a bargain at resident composers, Clyne moved to Chicago £5.99 (about $9), and Clyne snapped it up. and eventually rented a studio in the Fine Arts Clyne’s mother had just recently died at the time. Building, where she composed a number of new In ways that are both personal and musical, the works, including Night Ferry, her first commis- violin has accompanied Clyne ever since. The sion from the CSO. While exploring the city, she Seamstress, her new violin concerto that is being discovered the Old Town School of Folk Music, premiered this week—the latest product of her and she began to take old-time fiddle classes five years as the Chicago Symphony’s Mead there, and, later, Irish fiddle classes. “There’s Composer-in-Residence—marks the end of a something about folk music that resonates deeply journey, a stretch of six years writing a large body within me,” Clyne recently said. “Perhaps it’s of music for the violin. Chicago audiences have from my combination of English, Irish, and already heard Prince of Clouds, performed here in Polish roots, and also growing up in a home December of 2012, a double violin concerto that where the music heard was predominantly folk pays homage to the teacher-student lineage of music of that time, along with artists such as The the soloists for whom it was composed (Jaime Beatles, Pink Floyd, and Fleetwood Mac.” Laredo and this week’s soloist, Jennifer Koh), and at the same time to Bach’s famous concerto he solo violin melody that opens The for two violins. This past September, Clyne Seamstress came to Clyne as she played released The Violin, a DVD collaboration with her violin, trying out different ideas visual artist Josh Dorman that is a suite of pieces untilT she found this tune, as unassuming as for solo, duet, and multitrack violins. The a folk song. Even though she explored other Seamstress, the biggest work in this chapter of ways of starting the piece, she kept returning to Clyne’s career, is the capstone. this music, which lays the groundwork for the Clyne’s violin journey has taken her from whole concerto. “In beginning with this simple England, where her friend, violin maker Bruno melody—the violinist alone on the stage—I Guastalla, restored her new instrument in also came back to an idea I had several years exchange for composition lessons, to Brooklyn, previously,” Clyne says, “The Seamstress, a one-act where she bartered for violin lessons from Neil ballet that would open with a seamstress alone COMPOSED INSTRUMENTATION suspended sizzle cymbal, crotales, 2015 solo violin, two flutes and piccolo, two bass drum, tam-tam, glockenspiel, oboes and english horn, two clarinets laptop, harp, strings Commissioned by the Chicago and bass clarinet, two bassoons and Symphony Orchestra contrabassoon, four horns, three APPROXIMATE These are the world trumpets, three trombones, tuba, PERFORMANCE TIME premiere performances. timpani, vibraphone, snare drum, 25 minutes 4 Anna Clyne on The Seamstress I MADE my song a coat Covered with embroideries Out of old mythologies From heel to throat; But the fools caught it, Wore it in the world’s eyes As though they’d wrought it. Song, let them take it, For there’s more enterprise In walking naked. —William Butler Yeats he Seamstress is an imaginary one-act ballet. Alone on the stage, the seamstress is seated, unraveling threads from a beautiful cloth laid gently over her lap.