| Spanish Don, Song, Drama of Finland | ||||||||||
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Overture to Don Giovanni, K. 527 Throughout his short career, Mozart wrote nearly 20 operas, many of which – especially the three with libretti by Lorenzo Da Ponte, Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni and Cosí fan tutte – changed the face of opera forever and raised the bar for future composers. By the time Mozart died, the old form of the opera seria, with its formulaic libretti, strict dramatic and musical constraints, the casting of castrati as the hero/lovers and the proliferation of da capo (ABA) arias, was dead as well. Mozart’s groundbreaking operas demanded new ears and open minds; their plots often challenged the accepted social and political order; and the music blossomed into a wealth of new aria forms and stunning ensembles. Many poets, playwrights and composers have tackled the popular story of Don Juan, the rake who seduced his way across Europe only to end up dragged into hell unrepentant by the statue of the murdered father of one of his victims. Mozart composed Don Giovanni in 1787 on a commission from Prague, subtitling it “A Comic Drama.” In reality, Da Ponte and Mozart made the opera as amusing as possible within a serious dramatic setting, transforming the mood of the source play, El burlador de Sevilla (The Trickster of Seville) by seventeenth century playwright Tirso de Molina. Maintaining this balance has always been the challenge to conductors and stage directors. Most opera composers of the period composed special music for opera overtures, unrelated to the music of the opera itself. Mozart, however, manages to convey the intensity of the drama, and hint at its highlights, without giving away the elements of surprise and excitement of the music and the action. The Overture opens with a sustained chord for the entire orchestra in d minor, portending the doom of the hero.  Unlike his other opera overtures, however, he incorporates one theme from the opera itself, the sweeping scales that accompany the denouement as the Commendatore drags Don Giovanni down to Hell. After setting up the tragedy, Mozart then goes on to lighten the mood, although still not suggesting broad comedy. Don Giovanni, after all, is only "comic" in the sense that by the end, the villain gets his just deserts and the majority of the rest of the cast is still alive. | ||||||||||
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Selections from Old American Songs Like his idol Charles Ives before him, Aaron Copland was enchanted by the folksy nature of American ballads, hymns and minstrel tunes. In contrast to Ives, however, he only occasionally used folk melodies as themes in his compositions, preferring original themes and giving them a folk-like flavor. The Old American Songs are an exception. Copland used authentic folk melodies, giving them an unmistakable "Copland flavor". The five of Set I were composed in 1950, the five of Set II two years later. Originally composed for voice and piano, he orchestrated them soon after and also reset some of them for chorus. Ching-a-ring Chaw Is a minstrel song published in 1833. Copland also used it in his opera The Tender Land. Simple Gifts was composed by Shaker Elder Joseph Brackett, Jr., in 1848 for dancing during Shaker worship. It was popular in the ascetic Shaker communities of New England. Copland had earlier made it famous by using it in 1944 in the ballet Appalachian Spring. | ||||||||||
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Look at the World One of the most popular contemporary composers, John Rutter has written a large number of works, mostly choral, but also including two children's operas, orchestral works and works based on the heritage of the Beatles. In 1981 he founded the Cambridge Singers, leading them to international prominence. Rutter’s style eschews the dissonant harmonies of the past century, preferring to compose in a tuneful style easily accessible to singers and audiences alike. His compositions have been performed extensively both here and in Europe. He states that his work "ranges in difficulty from very simple to fairly challenging, though it was my intention in writing them that none would be beyond the reach of a capable church choir." Rutter composed Look at the World in 1996 to his own text, in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Council for the Protection of Rural England. | ||||||||||
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Pavane, Op. 50 The bulk of Gabriel Fauré’s music – whether piano, chamber, vocal or orchestral – conveys the impression of a personal and private statement, an intimate conversation between the composer and his muse. Throughout his life Fauré’s ideal was to create chamber music; the grander forms, opera, symphony or concerto, were not for him. Although he tried several times to write symphonies, he abandoned or rejected them; the same fate awaited his attempt at a violin concerto. His music is admirably suited for performance in private homes or small halls. But the elegance and ease of much of his work belies the painstaking effort that went into the composition. Fauré was not one to wear his heart on his sleeve. Fauré was a student of Camille Saint-Saëns, the quintessential French neo-classicist of the late nineteenth century who considered form as an essential component of “good” music. Fauré respected Saint-Saëns greatly, and while the structure of his works usually adheres to classical models, he often experimented and surprised audiences with unexpected phrasing and harmonies. His Requiem, for example, represents a quiet, comforting revolution in the Catholic approach to death (it lacks the Dies irae, describing the panic of damned souls awaiting judgment). Although a secret agnostic and freethinker, he worked for many years as organist and choirmaster at La Madeleine, one of the largest churches in Paris. Fauré composed Pavane in 1887 for a small orchestra with an optional chorus part with a text by Robert, comte de Montesquiou-Fezensac (1855-1921). The text is frequently omitted since it adds little to the delicate and nostalgic mood of the piece. The modest orchestration is in line with Fauré’s dislike of vivid colors and effects, which he considered a form of self-indulgence and a cover-up for a shortage of ideas. Nevertheless, the elegant and gentle well-known theme represents the “A” in a conventional ABA form ; In the brief middle section, Fauré gives in to an orchestral outburst in sixteenth-century modal harmony, eliciting the image of a Velázquez princess surrounded by weeping courtiers in black with elaborate lace ruffs. Pavane became quite popular, and Fauré made a piano arrangement in 1889. | ||||||||||
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Symphony No. 1 in E minor, Op. 39 When Sweden relinquished Finland to the Russian Empire in 1809, it became an autonomous duchy with significant control over its own affairs. But in 1870 Tsar Alexander II gradually began whittling away the Finns’ privileges and autonomy. While Swedish had continued to be the language of the educated and of the middle class, Russian repression aroused strong nationalist feelings and initiated a revival of the Finnish language. Jean Sibelius was born into this nationalistic environment and in 1876 enrolled in the first grammar school to teach in the Finnish language. Sibelius was by no means a child prodigy. He began playing piano at nine, didn't like it and took up the violin at 14. Although he also started composing at ten, Sibelius’s ambition was to become a concert violinist and throughout his adult life regretted not following his dream. Lifelong addiction to alcohol produced a persistent tremor in his hands that precluded a concert career. His first success as composer came in 1892 with a nationalistic symphonic poem/cantata titled Kullervo, Op. 7, which met with great success but was never again performed in his lifetime. During the next six years he composed numerous nationalistic pageants, symphonic poems and vocal works, mostly based on the Finnish national epic, the Kalevala. In order to enable him to work undisturbed, the Finnish administrative government gave him a pension for life in 1897. For the next 28 years he composed the symphonies and tone poems that made him famous. But in 1926, at the age of 60, he suddenly ceased composing for reasons he never disclosed – although probably from the combined ravages of alcoholism and bipolar disorder. His pen remained silent until his death, 31 years later. Sibelius composed his Symphony No.1 during 1898-99 to immediate success. It was greatly influenced by Russian symphonic music, especially by Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6, (“Pathétique,”) which Sibelius particularly admired. While the Symphony still owes much to the Romantics of the nineteenth century, it contains much that is new and foreshadows his future works. Sibelius sought to portray in music the stark, wintery landscape of his native country. His signature writing for woodwinds chills his orchestral palette and becomes a feature of all of his music. The symphony opens with an introduction for solo clarinet over rumbling timpani that turns out to be the “topic” of the Symphony and will be taken up again in the fourth movement. The Allegro begins with a theme that ratchets up the tension that will pervade the entire symphony. The delicate staccato theme for a pair of flutes lessens the anxiety for a moment, but quickly morphs into a passage recalling the Scherzo from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. In the second movement Sibelius develops a single pulsating theme transforming it from its quiet beginning on muted strings into an agitated outburst by the full orchestra. The only digression from the theme is a fugal duet for the bassoons and clarinets. The third movement is a particularly energetic scherzo, its pounding theme introduced by the timpani. The contrasting trio is a gentle melody for the horns. It was common in the Classical symphony to keep the final movement light and frothy in order to end on a cheerful note. Beginning with Beethoven’s Ninth, however, composers tended to continue and ultimately resolve in the finale the weightier matters of the first movement. Sibelius’s First follows this pattern; the fourth movement is by far the most dramatic and intense, but Sibelius makes no attempt to resolve matters at the end, as do Beethoven, Brahms and Mendelssohn in their minor-mode symphonies. The movement opens with the clarinet theme from the first movement, now for full orchestra led by the upper strings. An important emphatic gesture in the brass follows, its final meaning determined only at the conclusion of the Symphony. The second theme by tradition should be more relaxed, and in its first appearance it is. But its final appearance is grim and even foreboding as if there is some unfinished business to be taken up at another time. | ||||||||||
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| Copyright © Elizabeth and Joseph Kahn 2011 | ||||||||||
