NEW SEASON Toronto Symphony Orchestra Just Announced! Sir Andrew Davis, Interim Artistic Director Wednesday, February 19, 2020 at 8:00pm Beethoven Pastoral with OSM Kent Nagano, conductor SUBSCRIBE NOW to save up to GUSTAVO Olivier Latry, OSM organist emeritus 40% OFF Orchestre symphonique de Montréal this dynamic inaugural GIMENO season! MUSIC DIRECTOR Hector Berlioz “Royal Hunt and Storm” from Les Troyens (concert version) Pascal Dusapin Waves, Duo for Organ and Orchestra (Co-commissioned by the OSM, Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, Philharmonie de Paris, Orchestre philharmonique de Radio-France, Orchestre du Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels, and Orchestre de la Suisse romande in Geneva.) Intermission Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No. 6 in F Major, Op. 68 “Pastoral” I. Awakening of cheerful feelings on arriving in the country: Allegro ma non troppo II. Scene by the brook: Andante molto mosso III. Merry assembly of country folk: Allegro IV. Thunderstorm: Allegro V. Shepherd’s Song – Happy, grateful feelings after the storm: Allegretto The OSM dedicates this concert to the memory of the late L. Jacques Ménard, President Emeritus of BMO Financial Group Québec and a great philanthropist. Among his many accomplishments, we salute his commitment to young people and his important role in the OSM’s development as a member of its Executive Committee and as Treasurer for more than ten years. The Orchestre symphonique de Montréal is presented by Hydro-Québec. The OSM thanks the Conseil des RIGOLETTO OPERA IN CONCERT / HOLST THE PLANETS / GIMENO + THE RITE OF SPRING arts et des lettres du Québec, the Canada Council for the Arts, the Gouvernement du Québec, the Conseil MAHLER 1 / DVOŘÁK’S NEW WORLD / BACH’S BRANDENBURG des arts de Montréal, OSM Foundation, BMO, Bombardier, and Saputo for their precious contributions. As a courtesy to musicians, guest artists, and fellow concertgoers, please put your phone away and on silent during the performance. TSO.CA/Subscribe 416.598.3375 FEBRUARY 19, 2020 9 ABOUT THE WORKS Introductory Note Nature and natural phenomena constitute the theme of tonight’s program. In Berlioz’s “Royal Hunt and Storm”, the composer depicts in graphic terms an elaborate ballet scene that incorporates wood nymphs, fauns, and satyrs dancing about, a brook that grows from a trickle to a torrent, waterfalls, lightning striking trees that burst into flame, and more. Dusapin’s Waves does not attempt to create a visual portrayal, but rather uses the motion of waves as a point of departure for the interaction of organ and orchestra. Beethoven’s love of nature is well-known, and the time he spent in the Vienna Woods were among his most treasured memories, which he translated into sound. A violent storm figures prominently in both Berlioz’s and Beethoven’s works. Hector Berlioz Acts III and IV occurs the approximately ten- “Royal Hunt and Storm” minute orchestral interlude known as the Les Troyens “Royal Hunt and Storm”. Although ostensibly from a musical depiction of Dido’s subjects chasing Born: La Côte-Saint-André wild animals to the accompaniment of (nr. Grenoble), Dec 11, 1803 meteorological phenomena, it is on a deeper Died: Paris, Mar 8, 1869 level a symbolic representation of the growth Composed: 1856–1858 9 and consummation of the love affair between min Dido and Aeneas. Virgil covers the event in just a few lines of text; Berlioz expands it into an entire symphonic poem. Of all the grand operas written in the 19th century, Berlioz’s Les Troyens (The Trojans) is probably the grandest. There are few Pascal Dusapin contenders for this place of honour, and Waves, Duo for Organ and certainly none that surpass Les Troyens in epic (OSM Co-commision) sweep, historical grandeur, and the sense Orchestra of destiny pursued and attained. Donald Born: Nancy, France, May 29, 1955 Grout, in his rather long A Short History of Now living in Paris Opera, has written: “Les Troyens is the most Composed: 2019 25 important French opera of the 19th century, min the masterpiece of one of France’s greatest composers, the Latin counterpart of Wagner’s Teutonic Ring.” The first complete Pascal Dusapin’s wide-ranging studies in Paris performance anywhere, given as Berlioz during the 1970s included various arts and conceived it and in French, waited, almost sciences, as well as absorbing ideas from music incredibly, until 1969, exactly a century after seminars given by avant-garde composers the composer’s death, when it was produced Iannis Xenakis and Franco Donatoni. Edgar at the Royal Opera House in London. Varèse is another of Dusapin’s spiritual fathers. Part II of Les Troyens takes place in Carthage, Dusapin also trained as an organist. He served the city in North Africa (present-day Tunisia) as composer-in-residence to the Orchestre founded by Dido, a princess from Tyre. Between national de Lyon from 1993–1994, and later to 10 TORONTO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA the Orchestre national des Pays de la Loire from Ludwig van Beethoven 2014–2016. His music is marked by microtonality, Symphony No. 6 in F Major, tension, and energy. Dusapin’s large catalogue of works includes much solo instrumental, Op. 68 “Pastoral” chamber, and orchestral music, as well as nine Baptized: Bonn, Germany, Dec 16, 1770 operas—the first being Romeo and Juliet (1988), Died: Vienna, Austria, Mar 26, 1827 and the most recent, Macbeth, which premièred Composed: 1802–1808 40 last year in Brussels. In 2007 Dusapin shared min with conductor Zubin Mehta the $1-million (USD) Dan David Prize in the category of “Contemporary Music”—a prize given annually The dividing line between program music and for “innovative and interdisciplinary research.” absolute music is a thin one, but Beethoven proved himself a master of both in his Sixth Waves was commissioned by a consortium Symphony. Although the work has been of five orchestras: the OSM, Elbphilharmonie produced with scenery, with characters who Hamburg, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, move about on stage, and as part of the cinema La Monnaie/De Munt, and the Philharmonie classic Fantasia, Beethoven took care to advise de Paris. Kent Nagano conducted the world that the symphony is “more an expression of première with the Elbphilharmonie and soloist feeling than painting.” Each listener should let Iveta Apkalna just a few weeks ago in Hamburg, his or her imagination work its own spell. After on January 26. all, wrote Beethoven, “composing is thinking in Dusapin notes that in composing Waves, sounds.” Hence, he continues, the “Pastoral” he faced a novel challenge: to write a Symphony is “no picture, but something in composition in which the organ and the which the emotions aroused by the pleasures orchestra each seeks to become the other, of the country are expressed, or something in and in the end become one. In Waves, Dusapin which some feelings of country life are set forth.” was inspired by the motion of waves to create Beethoven’s own love for the pleasures of a work in which organ and orchestra interact the country is well-known. In a life of almost in similar manner. “The organ part is absorbed constant turmoil, anxiety, and stormy into the orchestral writing, and vice versa,” he relationships, the periods he spent in the writes. “The two collide, retract and fall over woods outside Vienna offered his tortured each other, dodging about in a constant flux of soul precious solace and peace of mind. To energy until they resemble each other in their quote the composer again: “How glad I am to respective but confused harmonic worlds.” be able to roam in wood and thicket, among Two bugles are positioned away from the the trees and flowers and rocks. No one can orchestra to create reverberating effects love the country as I do…. My bad hearing with the organ, sounding like the organ’s does not trouble me here…. In the woods there trumpet stop but also “playing” with the is enchantment which expresses all things.” organ’s lines at a distance—anticipating or Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony received otherwise indicating different directions to its first performance in Vienna as part of that the ensemble. “My intent was to create a dual incredible marathon concert of December 22, 1808 soundscape between organ and orchestra, at the Theater an der Wien, an all-Beethoven creating masks in the manner of harmonic concert that also included the Fifth Symphony, hide and seek, and creating situations of Fourth Piano Concerto, Choral Fantasy and potential confusion between soloist and some vocal and choral music. It is dedicated orchestra using the metaphor of waves rolling to two of Beethoven’s most ardent patrons, forward, then backward, then breaking.” Prince Lobkowitz and Count Razumovsky. FEBRUARY 19, 2020 11 ABOUT THE WORKS The symphony’s opening places us format. The remaining three movements are immediately in relaxed, beatific surroundings. played without interruption. Rough, peasant The day is sunny, warm, and abounding in merry-making and dancing are portrayed, but nature’s fragrances and gentle breezes. But the boisterous festivities suddenly stop when aside from conjuring nature imagery, the intimations of an approaching storm are heard. music is remarkable for its motivic writing: There is not much time to take cover; a few virtually the entire movement is built from tiny isolated raindrops fall, and then the heavens musical cells found in the first two bars. Entire burst open. Timpani, piccolo, and trombones, phrases and sentences are often formed from hitherto silent in the symphony, now make their these motivic ideas repeated again and again. entrances. With the tempest over, a shepherd’s The second movement invites contemplation. pipe is heard in a song of thanksgiving for the To musicologist Donald Francis Tovey, this is renewed freshness and beauty of nature.