Susan Graham, Mezzo-Soprano Malcolm Martineau, Piano Frauenliebe Und -Leben: Variations
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Sunday, March 1, 2015, 3pm Hertz Hall Susan Graham, mezzo-soprano Malcolm Martineau, piano Frauenliebe und -leben: Variations PROGRAM I. Robert Schumann ( 1810–1856 ) Seit ich ihn gesehen, from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 1 (1840) Edvard Grieg ( 1843–1907 ) Møte, from Haugtussa , Op. 67, No. 4 (1895) Richard Strauss (1864–1949) Seitdem dein Aug’ in meines schaute, from Sechs Lieder , Op. 17, No. 1 (1885–1887) II. Schumann Er, der herrlichste von Allen , from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 2 (1840) John Dankworth (1927–2010) Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? ( 1964) Gabriel Fauré (1845–1924) Chanson d’amour, Op. 27, No. 1 (1882) Ture Rangström (1884–1947) Melodi , from Fem dikter (1917 ) III. Schumann Ich kann’s nicht fassen , from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 3 (1840) Grieg Jeg elsker dig, from Hjertets Melodier , Op. 5, No. 3 (1864) Fauré Au bord de l’eau, Op. 8, No. 1 (1875) IV. Schumann Du Ring an meinem Finger , from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 4 (1840) Gustav Mahler (1860–1911) Rheinlegendchen, from Das Knaben Wunderhorn (1893) Joaquín Turina (1882–1949) Los dos miedos, from Poema en forma de canciones , Op. 19, No. 4 (1917) V. Schumann Helft mir, ihr Schwestern , from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 5 (1840) CAL PERFORMANCES 15 PROGRAM Schumann Mutter, Mutter! Glaube nicht, from Myrten , Op. 25, No. 11 (1840) Schumann Lass mich ihm am Busen hangen, from Myrten , Op. 25, No. 12 (1840) Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) Tout gai!, from Cinq mélodies populaires grecques (1904–1906) INTERMISSION VI. Henri Duparc (1848–1933) Phidylé (1882) Claude Debussy (1862–1918) La Chevelure, from Chansons de Bilitis (1897 ) Schumann Süsser Freund, du blickest mich verwundert an , from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 6 (1840) VII. Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky ( 1821–1897 ) Cradle Song, from Six Romances , Op. 16, No. 1 (1875) Francis Poulenc ( 1899–1978 ) Le Carafon, from La courte paille (1960 ) Strauss Wiegenliedchen, from Fünf Lieder , Op. 41, No. 1 (1899) Schumann An meinem Herzen, an meiner Brust , from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 7 (1840) VIII. Hector Berlioz (1803–1869) Absence, from Les nuits d’été , O p. 7, No. 4 (1841) Roger Quilter (1877–1953) How should I your true love know?, from Four Shakespeare Songs , Op. 30, No. 3 (1933) Enrique Granados Campiña (1867–1916) ¡Oh, muerte cruel!, from Tonadillas en un estilo antiquo , H. 136 (1912) Schumann Nun hast du mir den ersten Schmerz getan , from from Frauenliebe und -leben , Op. 42, No. 8 (1840) Funded, in part, by the Koret Foundation, this performance is part of Cal Performances’ – Koret Recital Series, which brings world-class artists to our community. This performance is made possible, in part, by Patron Sponsors Annette Campbell-White and Ruediger Naumann-Etienne. Hamburg Steinway piano provided by Steinway & Sons, San Francisco. Cal Performances’ – season is sponsored by Wells Fargo. PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES Prelude I. Seit ich ihn gesehen : “Love comes in at the eye” ONGS are bite-sized commentaries on and Sreflections of human existence. Whatever “And love comes in at the eye,” wrote William their purely musical attributes (and their great - Butler Yeats: in this first group of three songs, ness, or not, is dependent upon the composer’s lovers look at the beloved and are helpless to re - compositional profundity), they participate in sist such beauty. In the “Amen”-chords at the the “big things” of life: birth, death, love, hate, start of Schumann’s Seit ich ihn gesehen , we hear isolation, friendship, Time, and more. the nameless woman’s reverence for the man Schumann knew this: in the year of his battle she loves but believes is beyond her reach, hence for Clara Wieck’s hand in marriage, he clearly the slight tinge of darkness and sadness in this thought long and hard about the vicissitudes music. Schumann had a passion for Bach, and of love and translated those thoughts into he channels Baroque tradition in this sara - songs written for her, among them Frauenliebe bande-song (the “sarabande” was a Baroque und -leben : a tale of married love at its loveli - dance in triple meter with the second and third est, from its beginnings in humble abnegation beats often tied, usually grave in nature). through fulfillment to the inevitable ending in Love not yet admitted, much less acknowl - one partner’s death. Other composers in other edged, in Schumann’s first song is taken sev - countries have also sung of love, courtship, eral steps farther in Møte from Edvard Grieg’s marriage, birth, and grief; what tonight’s artists famous Haugtussa cycle. In the first half of have done is to compile small anthologies of Arne Garborg’s poetic cycle, the clairvoyant diverse songs on the rites of passage given us at heroine Veslemøy—called “ Haugtussa ,” or “hill each stage of Schumann’s cycle. sprite” for her ability to commune with “Man’s love is of man’s life a thing apart,/’Tis Nature—falls in love with the “wild boy” Jon. woman’s whole existence,” said Byron in Don As she dreams of him on a hilltop, he appears, Juan . The poetic cycle Frauenliebe und -leben and she gazes at him entranced before they fall by the French aristocrat Louis Charles into one another’s arms. Her desire for him at Adeläide de Chamisso de Boncourt, or the start, the music saturated with chromatic Adelbert von Chamisso—when he was nine, motion in the inner voices (a traditional trope his family fled the French Revolution for for desire), is consummated at the end in their Prussia—might seem at first glance in accord first tryst; we hear climax and the “dying- with that peculiarly masculine view of women. away” aftermath of lovemaking at the end. According to some, the “female” poetic voice “Since your eyes gazed in mine…what in this cycle is actually male, and the work is more could I ask of life?” the lover in Richard meant to teach women how the paterfamilias Strauss’s Seitdem dein Aug’ in meines schaute of the day wished to be worshipped by his wife. asks. Strauss begins without a piano intro - According to others (present company in - duction, the directness very moving, and sin - cluded), the poems are actually in sympathy gles out the word at the heart of it all— liebe , or with the emerging women’s movement be - “love”—by a vault upwards for the singer, un - cause it is the woman, not the husband, who is derscored by the first tonic chord of the song. the narrator; Chamisso was hailed in his time The throbbing syncopated patterns, the as a champion of women. While listeners will crescendo of rising passion that builds make up their own minds, it is undeniable that throughout, and the rhythmic elongation of Schumann saw in these words the occasion for ganzes Leben (my whole life) are all transfor - great musical beauty. We hear a portrait in mations of passion into song. tones of a loving, tender, generous-hearted creature anyone would be proud to love and to be loved by. CAL PERFORMANCES PROGRAM NOTES II. Er, der herrlichste von Allen : man has declared his love for her, and she is In praise of the beloved overwhelmed. We hear her come to the real - ization that this wonder is true in the course of In the second song of Frauenliebe , the woman this song, with its shifting moods and chang - in love catalogues her beloved’s wonderful at - ing tempi; the astonishment at the start is suc - tributes—his lips, eyes, mind, and courage— ceeded by the somewhat slower, thoughtful and then resolves to rejoice in her beloved’s repetition of his words. “I can hardly grasp it, fantasized marriage to someone else as long as hardly believe it,” she repeats over and over; he is happy. Trying to do the right thing, she the final statement is preceded by a remark - nonetheless finds it incredibly painful and able little piano interlude, rocking back and weeps in private. Schumann was prone to in - forth between different levels as if to say, “He vent wordless extensions of poetic meaning in loves me, he loves me not” before at last ac - his piano postludes, and this one is exquisite: cepting that love is hers. in the contrapuntal strands that drift down - In Grieg’s Jeg elsker dig , to words by Hans wards from the high treble register, we hear Christian Andersen, a lover swears to love the wistful dissolution of her dream of love. only the beloved through all eternity; the song The persona of Shakespeare’s 18th sonnet, was composed for the composer’s cousin Nina “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?,” de - Hagerup in the year of their engagement. Each clares that as long as this poem shall exist, his of the two stanzas culminates in a threefold beloved will “live,” defying time and death. proclamation of love that rises ecstatically by Shakespeare and jazz: one might not expect stages. Somehow it seems appropriate that the the combination, but the great British jazzman song is in C major (representing the ultimate John Dankworth composed a wonderfully clarity and purity of love) but is shot through evocative setting of this sonnet for his wife, the with chromatic color and feeling, as in the jazz and pop singer Cleo Laine. lovely introduction. Chanson d’amour is in “madrigal style,” with In Au bord de l’eau , another poet also de - its accompaniment that suggests the strum - clares that his love will endure for eternity, but ming of a lute or guitar and its time-traveling Fauré’s music, like Time itself, flows ever on - aura of an older era.