Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Special Concert July 25, 2014 LAWRENCE J LOH, CONDUCTOR OLGA KERN, PIANO ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK Carnival Overture, Opus 92 JOHANNES BRAHMS Symphony No. 3 in F major, Opus 90 I. Allegro con brio II. Andante III. Poco allegretto IV. Allegro Intermission SERGEI RACHMANINOFF Concerto No. 2 in C minor for Piano and Orchestra, Opus 18 I. Moderato II. Adagio sostenuto III. Allegro scherzando Ms. Kern July 25, 2014, page 1 PROGRAM NOTES BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK Born 8 September 1841 in Nelahozeves, Bohemia (now Czech Republic); died 1 May 1904 in Prague. Carnival Overture, Opus 92 (1891-1892) PREMIERE OF WORK: Prague, 28 April 1892; Rudolfinum; National Theater Orchestra; Antonín Dvořák, conductor PSO PREMIERE: 6 January 1898; Carnegie Music Hall; Frederic Archer, conductor APPROXIMATE DURATION: 9 minutes INSTRUMENTATION: woodwinds in pairs plus piccolo and English horn, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp and strings. Like almost every musician of the late 19th century, Antonín Dvořák had to come to grips with the astounding phenomenon of Richard Wagner and his music dramas. Around 1890, he undertook a study of this grandiloquent music as well as that of Wagner’s stylistic ally (and father-in-law) Franz Liszt, and he was rewarded with a heightened awareness of the expressive possibilities of orchestral program music. Several important scores from Dvořák’s last years seem to bear the influence of his study of this so-called “Music of the Future”: the five tone poems of 1896-1897 (The Water Goblin, The Noon Witch, The Golden Spinning Wheel, The Wild Dove and Heroic Song), Silent Woods for Cello and Orchestra, Poetic Tone Pictures for Solo Piano, and the 1892 cycle of three concert overtures: In Nature’s Realm, Carnival and Othello. In his study of the composer, John Clapham indicated that Dvořák intended the triptych of overtures to represent “three aspects of the life-force’s manifestations, a force the composer designated ‘Nature,’ and which not only served to create and sustain life, but also, in its negative phase, could destroy it.” More specifically, Otakar Šourek noted that they depicted “the solemn silence of a summer night, a gay whirl of life and living, and the passion of great love.” Dvořák himself said that the Carnival Overture was meant to depict “a lonely, contemplative wanderer reaching at twilight a city where a festival is in full swing. On every side is heard the clangor of instruments, mingled with shouts of joy and the unrestrained hilarity of the people giving vent to their feelings in songs and dances.” Dvořák evoked this scene with brilliant music given in the most rousing sonorities of the orchestra. Into the basic sonata plan of the piece, he inserted, at the beginning of the development section, a haunting and wistful paragraph led by the English horn and flute to portray, he said, “a pair of straying lovers,” the wanderer apparently having found a companion. Following this tender, contrasting episode, the festive music returns and mounts to a spirited coda to conclude this joyous, evergreen overture. JOHANNES BRAHMS Born 7 May 1833 in Hamburg; died 3 April 1897 in Vienna. Symphony No. 3 in F major, Opus 90 (1883) PREMIERE OF WORK: Vienna, 2 December 1883; Musikvereinsaal; Vienna Philharmonic; Hans Richter, conductor PSO PREMIERE: 8 December 1905; Carnegie Music Hall; Emil Paur, conductor APPROXIMATE DURATION: 33 minutes INSTRUMENTATION: woodwinds in pairs plus contrabassoon, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani and strings. Six years passed after Brahms had completed the Second Symphony before he began its successor, when he was nearly fifty and recovering from a spell of feeling that he was “too old” for creative work. It seems likely — though such matters always remained in the shadows where Brahms was concerned — July 25, 2014, page 2 that his creative juices were stirred anew by a sudden infatuation with “a pretty Rhineland girl.” This was Hermine Spiess, a talented contralto who was 26 when Brahms first met her in January 1883. A cordial, admiring friendship sprang up between the two, but that affair, like every other one in Brahms’ life in which a respectable woman was involved, never grew any deeper. He used to declare, perhaps only half in jest, that he lived his life by two principles, “and one of them is never to attempt either an opera or a marriage.” Perhaps what he really needed was a muse rather than a wife. At any rate, Brahms spent the summer of 1883 not at his usual haunts in the Austrian hills and lakes but at the German spa of Wiesbaden, which just happened to be the home of Hermine. Work went well on the new symphony, and it was completed before he returned to Vienna in October. The two bold opening chords that begin the Symphony juxtapose bright F major and a somber chromatic harmony in the opposing moods of light and shadow that course throughout the work. The main theme comes from the strings “like a bolt from Jove,” according to Olin Downes; the pastoral second subject is sung softly by the clarinet. The development section is brief but includes elaborations of most of the motives from the exposition before the movement is rounded out by a full recapitulation of the earlier materials and a long coda based on the main theme. A folk-like theme appears in the rich colors of the low woodwinds and low strings to open the Andante; the central section is a Slavic-sounding plaint intoned by clarinet and bassoon. The ternary-form third movement (A–B–A) utilizes the warmest tone colors of the orchestra. The finale begins with a sinuous theme of brooding character. A chant-like processional derived from the Slavic theme of the second movement provides contrast. Further thematic material is introduced (one theme is arch-shaped; the other, more rhythmically vigorous) and well examined. The central section fuses the functions of development and recapitulation. There is a sense of struggle passed as the Symphony draws to its close, and the work ends with the ghost of the opening movement’s main theme infused with a sunset glow. SERGEI RACHMANINOFF Born 1 April 1873 in Oneg (near Novgorod), Russia; died 28 March 1943 in Beverly Hills, California. Concerto No. 2 in C minor for Piano and Orchestra, Opus 18 (1900-1901) PREMIERE OF WORK: Moscow, 14 October 1901; Moscow Philharmonic Society Orchestra; Alexander Siloti, conductor; Sergei Rachmaninoff, soloist PSO PREMIERE: 18 March 1934; Syria Mosque; Antonio Modarelli, conductor; Walter Gieseking, soloist APPROXIMATE DURATION: 32 minutes INSTRUMENTATION: woodwinds in pairs plus piccolo, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp and strings When he was old and as mellow as he would ever get, Rachmaninoff wrote these words about his early years: “Although I had to fight for recognition, as most younger men must, although I have experienced all the troubles and sorrow which precede success, and although I know how important it is for an artist to be spared such troubles, I realize, when I look back on my early life, that it was enjoyable, in spite of all its vexations and bitterness.” The greatest “bitterness” of Rachmaninoff’s career was the total failure of the Symphony No. 1 at its premiere in 1897, a traumatic disappointment that thrust him into such a mental depression that he suffered a complete nervous collapse. An aunt of Rachmaninoff, Varvara Satina, had recently been successfully treated for an emotional disturbance by a certain Dr. Nicholas Dahl, a Moscow physician who was familiar with the latest psychiatric discoveries in France and Vienna, and it was arranged that Rachmaninoff would visit him. Years later, in his memoirs, the composer recalled the malady and the treatment: “[Following the performance of the First Symphony] something within me snapped. A paralyzing apathy possessed me. I did nothing at all and found no pleasure in anything. Half my days were spent on a couch sighing over my ruined life. My only occupation consisted in giving a few piano lessons to keep myself alive.” For more than a year, Rachmaninoff’s condition persisted. He began his daily visits to Dr. Dahl in January 1900. “My relatives had informed Dr. Dahl that he must by all means cure me of my apathetic condition and bring about such results that I would again be able to compose. Dahl had inquired what kind of composition was desired of me, and he was informed ‘a concerto for pianoforte.’ In consequence, I heard repeated, day after day, the same hypnotic formula, as I lay half somnolent in an armchair in Dr. Dahl’s July 25, 2014, page 3 consulting room: ‘You will start to compose a concerto — You will work with the greatest of ease — The composition will be of excellent quality.’ Always it was the same, without interruption.... Although it may seem impossible to believe,” Rachmaninoff continued, “this treatment really helped me. I started to compose again at the beginning of the summer.” In gratitude, he dedicated the new Concerto to Dr. Dahl. The C minor Concerto begins with eight bell-tone chords from the solo piano that herald the surging main theme, announced by the strings. A climax is achieved before a sudden drop in intensity makes way for the arching second theme, initiated by the soloist. The development, concerned largely with the first theme, is propelled by a martial rhythm that continues with undiminished energy into the recapitulation. The second theme returns in the horn before the martial mood is re-established to close the movement. The Adagio is a long-limbed nocturne with a running commentary of sweeping figurations from the piano.