08-09 Ancient Music_Gp 3.qxt 7/27/15 8:56 AM Page 1 Sunday Afternoon, August 9, 2015, at 3:00 m a r Academy of Ancient Music M|M g Edward Gardner , Conductor o r Alina Ibragimova , Violin P e ALL-MENDELSSOHN PROGRAM h The Hebrides (“Fingal’s Cave”) (1830/32) T Violin Concerto in E minor (1844) Allegro molto appassionato— Andante— Allegretto non troppo—Allegro molto vivace Ms. Ibragimova will perform Mendelssohn’s cadenza. Intermission Symphony No. 3 in A minor (“Scottish”) (1842) Andante con moto—Allegro un poco agitato Vivace non troppo Adagio Allegro vivacissimo—Allegro maestoso assai M|M Mostly Mozart debut Please make certain all your electronic devices are switched off. This performance is made possible in part by the Josie Robertson Fund for Lincoln Center. Alice Tully Hall , Starr Theater Adrienne Arsht Stage 08-09 Ancient Music_Gp 3.qxt 7/27/15 8:56 AM Page 2 Mostly Mozart Festival The Mostly Mozart Festival is made possible by Sarah Billinghurst Solomon and Howard Solomon, Rita E. and Gustave M. Hauser, Chris and Bruce Crawford, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Inc., Charles E. Culpeper Foundation, S.H. and Helen R. Scheuer Family Foundation, and Friends of Mostly Mozart. Public support is provided by the New York State Council on the Arts. Artist Catering provided by Zabar’s and zabars.com MetLife is the National Sponsor of Lincoln Center United Airlines is a Supporter of Lincoln Center WABC-TV is a Supporter of Lincoln Center “Summer at Lincoln Center” is supported by Diet Pepsi Time Out New York is a Media Partner of Summer at Lincoln Center UPCOMING MOSTLY MOZART FESTIVAL EVENTS: Tuesday and Thursday Evenings, August 11 and 13, at 7:30 Saturday Afternoon, August 15, at 3:00 in the David H. Koch Theater Written on Skin (U.S. stage premiere) George Benjamin , Composer Martin Crimp , Text for Music Mahler Chamber Orchestra M|M Alan Gilbert , Conductor M|M Christopher Purves , The Protector M|M Barbara Hannigan , Agnès M|M Tim Mead , Angel 1/Boy M|M Victoria Simmonds , Angel 2/Marie M|M Robert Murray , Angel 3/John M|M Katie Mitchell , Director M|M Sung in English with English supertitles Presented in collaboration with the New York Philharmonic. Written on Skin is a production of the Aix-en-Provence Festival, in co-production with the Nederlandse Opera, Amsterdam, Théâtre du Capitole, Toulouse, and The Royal Opera, London. Used by arrangement with European American Music Distributors Company, U.S. and Canadian agent for Faber Music Ltd., London, publisher and copyright owner M|M Mostly Mozart debut For tickets, call (212) 721-6500 or visit MostlyMozart.org. Call the Lincoln Center Info Request Line at (212) 875-5766 to learn about program cancellations or request a Mostly Mozart brochure. Visit MostlyMozart.org for full festival listings. Join the conversation: #LCMozart We would like to remind you that the sound of coughing and rustling paper might distract the performers and your fellow audience members. In consideration of the performing artists and members of the audience, those who must leave before the end of the performance are asked to do so between pieces. The taking of photographs and the use of recording equipment are not allowed in the building. 08-09 Ancient Music_Gp 3.qxt 7/27/15 8:56 AM Page 3 Mostly Mozart Festival Welcome to Mostly Mozart I am pleased to welcome you to the 49th Mostly Mozart Festival, our annual celebration of the innovative and inspiring spirit of our namesake composer. This summer, in addition to a stellar roster of guest conductors and soloists, we are joined by composer-in-residence George Benjamin, a leading contemporary voice whose celebrated opera Written on Skin makes its U.S. stage premiere. This landmark event continues our tradition of hearing Mozart afresh in the context of the great music of our time. Under the inspired baton of Renée and Robert Belfer Music Director Louis Langrée, the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra delights this year with the Classical repertoire that is its specialty, in addition to Beethoven’s joyous Seventh Symphony and Haydn’s triumphant Creation. Guest appearances include maestro Cornelius Meister making his New York debut; Edward Gardner, who also leads the Academy of Ancient Music in a Mendelssohn program on period instruments; and Andrew Manze with violin - ist Joshua Bell in an evening of Bach, Mozart, and Schumann. Other preemi - nent soloists include Emanuel Ax, Matthias Goerne, and festival newcomers Sol Gabetta and Alina Ibragimova, who also perform intimate recitals in our expanded Little Night Music series. And don’t miss returning favorite Emerson String Quartet and the International Contemporary Ensemble, our artists-in- residence, as well as invigorating pre-concert recitals and lectures, a panel discussion, and a film on Haydn. With so much to choose from, we invite you to make the most of this rich and splendid festival. I look forward to seeing you often. Jane Moss Ehrenkranz Artistic Director 08-09 Ancient Music_Gp 3.qxt 7/27/15 8:56 AM Page 4 Mostly Mozart Festival I Words and Music Seaweed (Excerpts) By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow When descends on the Atlantic The gigantic Storm-wind of the equinox, Landward in his wrath he scourges The toiling surges, Laden with seaweed from the rocks: … From the tumbling surf, that buries The Orkneyan skerries, Answering the hoarse Hebrides; And from wrecks of ships, and drifting Spars, uplifting On the desolate, rainy seas; — Ever drifting, drifting, drifting On the shifting Currents of the restless main; Till in sheltered coves, and reaches Of sandy beaches, All have found repose again. So when storms of wild emotion Strike the ocean Of the poet’s soul, erelong From each cave and rocky fastness, In its vastness, Floats some fragment of a song: From the far-off isles enchanted, Heaven has planted With the golden fruit of Truth; … From the strong Will, and the Endeavor That forever Wrestle with the tides of Fate; From the wreck of Hopes far-scattered, Tempest-shattered, Floating waste and desolate; — Ever drifting, drifting, drifting On the shifting Currents of the restless heart; Till at length in books recorded, They, like hoarded Household words, no more depart. For poetry comments and suggestions, please write to [email protected]. 08-09 Ancient Music_Gp 3.qxt 7/27/15 8:56 AM Page 5 Mostly Mozart Festival By Don Anderson t o Mendelssohn ranks second only to Mozart among child prodigies h in music. He also displayed astonishing versatility, winning inter - s national renown as composer, conductor, pianist, organist, and musical administrator. As a conductor, he selflessly championed p many other composers’ music, not just such personal friends as a Schumann, but masters of the past like Bach. He premiered n Schubert’s Ninth Symphony in 1839, 11 years after Schubert’s death. All this activity took its toll on a never-robust artist. A series S of strokes led to his death at 38. Mendelssohn’s career spanned a period of significant transition in music. The purity of expression and the widespread use of the forms established by the great figures of the Classical period— Haydn, Mozart, and the young Beethoven—were giving way to the more emotional, varied, and brightly colored Romantic style of Berlioz, Weber, Chopin, and Schumann. His particular gift was to stake out a middle ground between these two schools, combining them into a style distinctively his own. Each of the compositions on this program demonstrates his unique personality in full flower. —Copyright © 2015 by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc. 08-09 Ancient Music_Gp 3.qxt 7/27/15 8:56 AM Page 6 Mostly Mozart Festival I Notes on the Program By Don Anderson m The Hebrides , Op. 26 (“Fingal’s Cave”) (1830/32) a FELIX MENDELSSOHN r Born February 3, 1809, in Hamburg g Died November 4, 1847, in Leipzig o r Approximate length: 10 minutes P A young, early 19th-century man of means could expect a “grand tour” of Europe as part of his education. Mendelssohn had already visited several e countries when his father, a wealthy banker, sent him off on a further expe - h dition in April 1829. He and his traveling companion, Karl Klingemann, t stopped in England before heading north to Scotland. They journeyed to the Hebrides, the widely scattered group of islands located off Scotland’s north - n west coast. According to Mendelssohn scholar R. Larry Todd, Mendelssohn o wrote to his sister, Fanny: s “In order to make you understand how extraordinarily the Hebrides e affected me, the following came to my mind there.” “The following” was t a draft in piano score of the opening of the Hebrides Overture, complete o with orchestral cues and dynamics and in nearly final form. N Reaching the island of Staffa the following day, the travelers paid a visit by rowboat to its most famous attraction. The flooded grotto known as Fingal’s Cave was named after a hero of Gaelic mythology. “A greener roar of waves surely never surged into a stranger cavern,” Klingemann wrote. “Its many pillars make it look like the inside of an immense organ, black and resonant, utterly without purpose, completely isolated.” Mendelssohn turned his impressions of the Hebrides into a concert overture. After completing a first draft in 1830, the hypercritical composer revised it several times. His changes extended to the title—for a time it bore the names Overture to the Solitary Island and The Isles of Fingal —before it reached its final form and name. Despite what might be heard as portrayals of wind, waves, and fog, The Hebrides is first and foremost an evocation of atmosphere, not a story told in music.