JAC VAN STEEN CONDUCTS FAURÉ Wednesday 14 and Thursday 15 November 2018 7.30pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Jac van Steen conductor Wei-Ting Wu violin Charlotte Bowden soprano James Atkinson baritone RCM Symphony Orchestra RCM Chorus MORE MUSIC INVESTING IN THE FUTURE OF MUSIC Our More Music development is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform our campus. New state-of-the-art facilities at the heart of our building will complement our existing spaces and heritage. Our plans include: two new performance spaces additional practice rooms for students a new Royal College of Music Museum a new café/ restaurant and courtyard area with improved access a new organ Over the next few months, some instruments and equipment may be visible on the Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall stage and access routes around the College may vary. Wayfinding signage will be regularly updated to reflect changes. We ask for your patience and understanding as we transform our campus. To find out more or to help us realise our vision please visit www.rcm.ac.uk/moremusic If you have any questions please contact [email protected] JAC VAN STEEN CONDUCTS FAURÉ Wednesday 14 and Thursday 15 November 2018, 7.30pm Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Jac van Steen conductor Wei-Ting Wu violin Charlotte Bowden soprano James Atkinson baritone RCM Symphony Orchestra RCM Chorus Lucy Griffiths chorus director Franck Les Éolides (10’) (1822–1890) L Boulanger D'un soir triste (11’) (1893–1918) Dutilleux Sur le même accord (10’) (1916– 2013) INTERVAL Fauré Requiem (36’) (1845–1924) i Introit et Kyrie ii Offertory iii Sanctus iv Pie Jesu v Agnus Dei vi Libera me vii In Paradisum Our evening of French music begins with Les Éolides, a symphonic poem based on Greek classical mythology. Aeolus is the Greek god of the wind and the Éolides are the breezes which are sent by Poseidon to aid Odysseus in his return voyage. Marking 100 years since the death of Lili Boulanger, the first woman to win the Prix de Rome composition prize, D'un soir triste was written in 1918, shortly before her death at age 24. Sur le même accord was commissioned for the London Philharmonic Orchestra and premiered in 2002. The piece is built around a six-note chord played by solo violin. Finally, the gentle yet powerful Requiem by Fauré, brings together RCM instrumentalists and chorus in combination for this most moving masterpiece. Watch the concert on Thursday 15 November at www.rcm.ac.uk/live Franck Les Éolides op 26 Franck’s symphonic poem was inspired by Leconte de Lisle’s poem about the daughters of Aeolus, the wind god. It was premiered on 13 May 1877 at a concert organised by the Société Nationale de Musique, an organisation which had been founded in 1870 specifically to promote French music. Though Franck was Belgian by birth, he was a highly influential and much-loved figure on the Parisian music scene, both as a composer and as a teacher of composition and organ. Les Éolides is a descriptive orchestral work of a type popular in the second half of the 19th century: Liszt influenced many other European composers, including Saint-Saëns and Franck, to compose instrumental music inspired by a work in another art form. Franck’s characteristic chromatic restlessness and reiterated melodies is ideally suited to an imaginative portrayal of eternally shifting breezes. L Boulanger D’un soir triste D’un soir triste (‘Of a Sad Evening’) was conceived as a sombre pendant to the lively D’un matin de printemps. The principal themes of the two works resemble each other in their melodic shape and use of dotted rhythms, and they are both in predominantly minor-ish modes, though Boulanger shows how similar musical material can convey very different moods in different contexts. In common with many Boulanger instrumental works, D’un soir triste exists in several versions: for orchestra, cello and piano and piano trio. The orchestral manuscript is in Nadia Boulanger’s hand, following indications left by her sister in the piano trio score. It is likely the publisher Ricordi encouraged these transcriptions for different potential markets, and they probably provided the descriptive title. Like many of Boulanger’s works in slow tempo, D’un soir triste features a measured procession of chords underpinned by sustained or reiterated pitches. Occasionally, the melody is preceded by an upwardly swooping gesture reminiscent of the Baroque French overture. The piece is most notable for its orchestration, initially based on the central register of the string section, often joined by the harp (an instrument the composer herself played). The first climax, after about four minutes, leads to powerful drum strokes and muted brass, marked funèbre, douloureux (funereal, painful), a section that recalls Boulanger’s short choral piece Pour les funérailles d’un soldat (‘For the Burial of a Soldier’, 1912). Given that D’un soir triste was composed during the First World War, this reminiscence is surely deliberate. A fuzzy passage with predominant violas, celesta and harp leads to a reprise of the opening material, and the concluding ascending violin line does not entirely dispel the sombre mood of the piece. Dutilleux Sur le même accord, Nocturne pour violon et orchestre Sur le même accord was commissioned by the London Philharmonic Orchestra and premiered at the Royal Festival Hall, London on 28 April 2002. Written for Anne-Sophie Mutter, the piece is built around a six-note chord first presented as a single line, which repeats and builds using double stopping. As the motif expands through the orchestra, it is heard as a chord in various inversions. It does not form the entire musical material of the piece, but its characteristic intervals and frequent reappearance at its original pitch ensures that it is easily recognisable whenever it does appear. Dutilleux had previously composed a violin concerto, L’arbre des songes (‘The Tree of Dreams’; 1979–85) and he was prompted to write a second violin and orchestra work by Mutter, whom he got to know well through the Swiss philanthropist and conductor Paul Sacher. Sur le même accord shares its conception – and almost its title – with a piano study, Sur un même accord (1976). More broadly, the notion of a focal chord or set of pitches which act as a quasi-tonal centre is one of Dutilleux’s fingerprints. Its subtitle, ‘Nocturne for violin and orchestra’, also uses a title of which the composer was fond, as he had previously used it for two movements of his string quartet Ainsi la nuit (1973–6). Sur le même accord is around ten minutes long and moves quickly through a wide variety of moods which often change abruptly. His mercurial orchestral writing includes a typically elaborate part for timpani, and the piece’s lively wit makes it stand out in Dutilleux’s oeuvre. Fauré Requiem Gabriel Fauré ended his career as one of France’s most respected composers and Director of the Paris Conservatoire, but he himself was from a non-musical family from southwest France and was not a Conservatoire graduate. Rather, from the age of nine he studied at the Ecole Niedermeyer, a small church music-oriented school. Church modes combined with tonality inflected his music from his earliest works, such as Cantique de Jean Racine (1864–5), which won a school composition competition. Camille Saint-Saëns, his piano teacher at the Ecole Niedermeyer, was a lifelong mentor and friend. Fauré originally wrote his Requiem for a funeral service at the Madeleine, the church very near the Place de la Concorde for which he was principal organist. This first version had only five movements (the Introit and Kyrie, Sanctus, Pie Jesu, Sanctus and In Paradisum), the Offertoire and Libera me being added at a later date. (This sequence of movements was also used by Maurice Duruflé in his 1948 Requiem.) It was composed for an unusual orchestra with a solo violin but no other violins. The upper choral parts and Pie Jesu solo movement were sung by boys for its original ecclesiastical performance, though Fauré preferred female singers for concert performances. He reworked the score again at the turn of the 20th century for full orchestra, and this is the version we are hearing tonight. The touching simplicity and melodic appeal of Fauré’s Requiem are coupled with a unique harmonic language that effortlessly fuses tonality and modality and incorporates unusual substitute chords. Fauré once said that he composed his Requiem ‘for pleasure.’ Its mood is a world away from that of other popular 19th- century Requiems such as Verdi’s; rather than present the listener with a fear- inducing image of the Last Judgement, Fauré prefers to console and comfort the living. © Caroline Potter, 2018 Introit and Kyrie Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine, Grant them eternal rest, Lord, et lux perpetua luceat eis. and let perpetual light shine upon them. Te decet hymnus, Deus in Sion: To you God, hymns of praise are sung in Sion: et tibi reddetur votum in Jerusalem. and a vow shall be paid to you in Jerusalem. exaudi orationem meam, Lord, hear my prayer, ad te omnis caro veniet. all flesh shall come to you. Kyrie eleison. Lord, have mercy upon us. Christe eleison. Christ, have mercy upon us. Offertory O Domine Jesu Christe, Rex gloriae, O Lord Jesus Christ, King of glory, libera animas defunctorum deliver the souls of the dead de poenis inferni from the pains of hell et de profundo lacu. and from the deep pit. de ore leonis, ne absorbeat tartarus, from the lion’s mouth, ne cadant in obscurum.