BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA FOUNDED IN I88I BY HENRY LEE HIGGINSON SEASON Carnegie Hall, New York Boston Symphony Orchestra (Seventy-fifth Season, 1955-1956) CHARLES MUNCH, Music Director RICHARD BURGIN, Associate Conductor PERSONNEL Violins Violas Bassoons Richard Burgin Joseph de Pasquale Sherman Walt Concert-master Jean Cauhape Ernst Panenka Alfred Krips Eugen Lehner Theodore Brewster George Zazofsky Albert Bernard Contra-Bassoon Roll and Tapley George Humphrey Richard Plaster Norbert Lauga Jerome Lipson Robert Karol Vladimir ResnikofiE Horns Harry Dickson Reuben Green James Stagliano Gottfried Wilfinger Bernard Kadinoff Charles Yancich Einar Hansen Vincent Mauricci Harry Shapiro Joseph Leibovici John Fiasca Harold Meek Emil Kornsand Violoncellos Paul Keaney Roger Shermont Osbourne McConathy Samuel Mayes Minot Beale Alfred Zighera Herman Silberman Trumpets Jacobus Langendoen Roger Voisin Stanley Benson Mischa Nieland Leo Panasevich Marcel Lafosse Karl Zeise Armando Ghitalla Sheldon Rotenberg Josef Zimbler Gerard Goguen Fredy Ostrovsky Bernard Parronchi Clarence Knudson Leon Marjollet Trombones Pierre Mayer Martin Hoherman William Gibson Manuel Zung Louis Berger William Moyer Samuel Diamond Richard Kapuscinski Kauko Kahila Josef Orosz Victor Manusevitch Robert Ripley James Nagy Flutes Tuba Melvin Bryant Doriot Anthony Dwyer K. Vinal Smith Lloyd Stonestreet James Pappoutsakis Saverio Messina Phillip Kaplan Harps William Waterhouse Bernard Zighera Piccolo William Marshall Olivia Luetcke Leonard Moss George Madsen Jesse Ceci Oboes Timpani Noah Bielski Ralph Gomberg Roman Szulc Alfred Schneider Jean Devergie Everett Firth Joseph Silverstein John Holmes Percussion Basses English Horn Charles Smith Georges Moleux Louis Speyer Harold Farberman Gaston Dufresne Clarinets Harold Thompson Ludwig Juht Gino Cioffi Piano Irving Frankel Manuel Valeric Henry Freeman Pasquale Cardillo Bernard Zighera Henry Portnoi JEb Clarinet Librarians Henri Girard Bass Clarinet John Barwicki Leslie Rogers Rosario Mazzeo Victor Alpert, Ass't Carnegie Hall, New York Seventieth Season in New York SEVENTY-FIFTH SEASON, 1955-1956 Boston Symphony Orchestra CHARLES MUNCH, Music Director Richard Burgin, Associate Conductor Concert Bulletin of the Third Concerts WEDNESDAY EVENING, January 11, at 8:45 SATURDAY AFTERNOON, January 14, at 2:30 with historical and descriptive notes by John N. Burk The trustees of the BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, Inc. Henry B. Cabot . President Jacob J. Kaplan . Vice-President Richard C. Paine . Treasurer Talcott M. Banks, Jr. C. D. Jackson John Nicholas Brown Michael T. Kelleher Theodore P. Ferris Palfrey Perkins Alvan T. Fuller Charles H. Stockton Francis W. Hatch Edward A. Taft Harold D. Hodgkinson Raymond S. Wilkins Oliver Wolcott TRUSTEES EMERITUS Philip R. Allen M. A. DeWolfe Howe N. Penrose Hallowell Lewis Perry Thomas D. Perry, Jr., Manager G. W. Rector ) Assistant J. J. Brosnahan, Assistant Treasurer S. N. Shirk j Managers Rosario Mazzeo, Personnel Manager [1] HONOR LIST In answer to an inquiry addressed to those subscribers who have heard this orchestra under Wilhelm Gericke, the conductor who first led these concerts in Carnegie Hall, the following have submitted their names: Miss Mary B. Fitzpatrick Mr. Arthur L. Friedman Mr. Stanleigh P. Friedman Mr. Edwin Gibbs Mrs. Isidor Greenwald Mr. B. W. Huebsch Miss Dorothy E. Joline Miss Edith R. Saekett Mrs. Edward W. Sparrow Mrs. I. M. Strauss Miss Mabel Foote Weeks Mr. Kenneth C. R. White Mr. Walter B. Woodbury [«] seventy-fifth season • nineteen hundred fifty-five and fifty-six Seventieth Season in New York Third Evening Concert WEDNESDAY, January ii Program ERNEST ANSERMET, Conductor Mozart Symphony in C major, "Jupiter" (K. 551) I. Allegro vivace II. Andante cantabile III. Menuetto: Allegretto IV. Finale: Allegro molto Debussy Two Nocturnes Nuages Fetes INTERMISSION Bartok Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta I. Andante tranquillo II. Allegro III. Adagio IV. Allegro molto Ravel Bolero Performances in Boston by the orchestra are broadcast each week on Monday evenings from 8:15 to 9:00 P.M. on the NBC Network. Music of these programs is available at the Music Library, 58th Street Branch, the New York Public Library. BALDWIN PIANO RCA VICTOR RECORDS [3] ERNEST ANSERMET ERNEST Ansermet, bom in Vevey, Switzerland, November ii, 1883, began his career as a professor of mathematics at the University of Lausanne, and at the Sorbonne, but studied music with Denereaz in Lausanne, Gedalge in Paris, and Otto Barblan and Ernest Bloch in Geneva. He became conductor of the Kursaal concerts in Montreux in 1 91 2, and succeeded Stavenhagen as director of the Geneva Sub- scription Concerts in 1914. In 191 5 he toured Europe and both Americas as conductor of Diaghileff's Ballet Russe. In 191 8 he founded the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande. He conducted the symphony orchestra at Buenos Aires in the seasons 1924-27, and in 1936-37 re- turned to conduct in South America and several cities of the United States. Having conducted concerts over Radio Berne during the war, he resumed his activities as guest conductor in Europe in 1946, and returned to this country in the season 1947- 1948 for guest appearances. On January 25, 28-29, 1949, he appeared as guest conductor of this Orchestra. In the season of 1 951-1952, he conducted the concerts from December 14 to February 9, during the illness of Mr. Munch. The Orchestre de la Suisse Romande still commands most of his time. SYMPHONY IN C MAJOR, "Jupiter," K. No. 551 By Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Born at Salzburg, January 27, 1756; died at Vienna, December 5, 1791 The manuscript score is dated August 10, 1788. The symphony requires: a flute, 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings. CLASSICAL work bearing a cold number, or even only an identifying A key, sometimes acquired a descriptive title at that midpoint of time when the composer was no longer there to protest and posterity had not yet developed a sense of desecration. Apt or not, but at least convenient, the names have had a way of sticking as if for eternity. The canny publisher who tagged certain sonatas of Beethoven "Moonlight" or "Appassionata" has triumphed by the test of endur- ance over the protesting scholars. The "Jupiter" Symphony was so named more than a century ago, and, although there is no positive of evidence, J. B. Cramer, pianist and pedagogue, has been suspected the deed. Tovey objected to the title: " 'Jupiter' takes rank with the titles 'Emperor Concerto' and 'Moonlight Sonata' as among the silliest [4] injuries ever inflicted on great works of art. Mozart's musical culture may have been Italian, but his artistic nature was neither Roman nor Grasco-Roman. He was as Greek as Keats." And Philip Hale once remarked: "There is nothing in the music that reminds one of Jupiter Tonans, Jupiter Fulgurator, Jupiter Pluvius; or of the god who, assuming various disguises, came down to earth, where by his ad- ventures with women semi-divine or mortals of common clay he excited the jealous rage of Juno. The music is not of an Olympian mood. It is intensely human in its loveliness and its gayety." The first movement is more than Jovian — it is an extraordinary combination of various elements, conditioning each other in a serene over-all equilibrium, with a development prodigious for its time, with a renewing freshness of invention which deserves the word godlike. The four opening bars at once disclose two of these elements: a strong martial rhythm from the orchestra, answered by a gentle, persuasive phrase from the strings. The martial beat becomes without preamble (there is no preamble in the direct progression of this movement) a full, striding march rhythm. Its character is indisputable — there is no mistaking the military Mozart (compare the snare drum triplets of 'Won piu andrai" in Figaro to the triplet figure here suggesting the drum-beat) . Yet it need not be pointed out that this military buoyancy, enforcing the other elements, never overbears them. An emphatic cadence in the dominant brings in the second subject proper, which opens gently in the violins, but suddenly (and quite naturally) turns into a lively and tripping tune right out of opera buffa,* Whereupon, from these ingredients martial, tender, and gay, Mozart proceeds with his development through close upon a hundred bars. He begins it with his buffa theme, which he is presently to dissect and put to surprisingly dignified uses. He alternates and combines his various elements into a discourse unified in mood, a mood which Saint-Foix aptly describes as "joyous steadfastness." He is sly and vagrant, but adroit in tonality, resourceful in adding relevant detail. In his restatement (which opens in C minor) , he chooses to be fairly literal — in his conclusion, brief. There is a sense of tragedy in the Andante cantabile. When the first phrase (from the muted violins) is followed by a loud defiant chord, one is reminded, as elsewhere, of the Eroica. A second phrase, where ornate thirty-second notes increase the emotional expressiveness, has the gradual subsidence which with Mozart often signifies lamentation. Sforzando chords in the winds over halting triplets increase the tension. This air had been provided by Mozart, intact, in the spring previous, for an opera by AlbertareUi. [5] . This thesis is developed, there is a fresh treatment of the opening sub- ject matter, bringing the climax of the movement. The coda is magnificent. The sudden alternation of forcefulness and gentleness, now estab- lished as