Longmont Symphony Orchestra
Robert Olson, conductor
John Adams: Short Ride in a Fast Machine (3/13/04)
Richard Strauss: Death and Transfiguration, Op.24 (3/14/04)
Also, Charley talks with violinist Jerilyn Jorgensen about her recitals with pianist Cullan Bryant this weekend.
Benjamin Britten: "Perpetual Motion" (2nd movement) & "Waltz" (4th movement) from Suite, Op.6
Jerilyn Jorgensen, violin; Cullan Bryant, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/13/09 MS
Wes Devore: In the Middle of Nowhere
Felix Mendelssohn: Andante & Rondo Capriccioso, Op.14
Wes Devore, piano
NCA (11/8/08) 2:56 + 6:44
John Adams (b.1947): Short Ride in a Fast Machine
Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, Adams grew up in New Hampshire. He studied the clarinet, and later composition with Leon Kirchner at Harvard. Moving to California in 1971, he worked in a warehouse, then joined the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory. He was composer-in-residence with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra from 1979-1985. His opera Nixon in China won a Grammy in 1989 and his Violin Concerto won the Grawemeyer Award in 1995.
Commissioned for the opening concert of the Great Woods Festival in Mansfield, Massachusetts, Short Ride in a Fast Machine was first performed by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Michael Tilson Thomas conducting, on June 13, 1986. The work is subtitled ``Fanfare for Great Woods.''
Asked to explain the title, Adams replied: ``You know how it is when someone asks you to ride in a terrific sports car, and then you wish you hadn't?'' Accordingly, the score is marked ``Delirando'' (frenzied), with a relentless clacking of the woodblock, which Adams calls ``almost sadistic.''
The score calls for 2 piccolos, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, English horn, 4 clarinets, 3 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, 2 synthesizers, timpani, percussion and strings.
Richard Strauss (1864-1949): Tod und Verklärung (Death and Transfiguration), Opus 24
During 1889, the last year of his contract as third conductor at the Munich Court Opera, Strauss completed the tone poem Death and Transfiguration. Strauss conducted the first performance on June 21, 1890 at a music festival in Eisenach. It was well received. After a Viennese performance three years later, the critic Eduard Hanslick wrote of the ``realistic vividness'' of the score.
The program for the work is best described by Strauss himself. In a letter, he said that the music depicts ``the dying hours of a man who had striven towards the highest idealistic aims, maybe indeed those of an artist. The sick man lies in bed, asleep, with heavy irregular breathing; friendly dreams conjure a smile on the features of the deeply suffering man; he wakes up; he is once more racked with horrible agonies; his limbs shake with fever--as the attack passes and the pains leave off, his thoughts wander through his past life; his childhood passes before him, the time of his youth with its strivings and passions and then, as the pains already begin to return, there appears to him the fruit of his life's path, the conception, the ideal which he has sought to realize, to present artistically, but which he has not been able to complete, since it is not for man to be able to accomplish such things. The hour of death approaches, the soul leaves the body in order to find gloriously achieved in everlasting space those things which could not be fulfilled here below.''
The music was so convincing that nearly sixty years later, on his own deathbed, Strauss wrote to his daughter-in-law: ``Dying is just as I composed it in Death and Transfiguration.'' His friend Alexander Ritter was moved to write a poem on the subject, a more elaborate telling of the original Strauss program. The composer approved, and the poem was printed with the score.
There are four main sections in the work. A slow introduction depicting illness and sleep leads to an agitated representation of the struggle with death. Some calm returns as dreams and childhood memories figure in the third part. But--to quote the Ritter poem--``the iron hammer of Death threatens its last blow,'' and the final section imparts the transfiguration, or ``deliverance from the world.''
The work is scored for 3 flutes, 2 oboes, English horn, 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, tam-tam, 2 harps and strings.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Thursday January 28, 2010
Colorado Symphony Orchestra
Jeffrey Kahane, conductor
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances, Opus 45 (10/23/09)
Also, Charley anticipates the Denver Young Artists Orchestra's concert Sunday.
Ottorino Respighi: “St. Michael Archangel”(2nd movement) from Church Windows
Denver Young Artists Orchestra/ Scott O'Neil)
NCA (11/9/08) 5:50
And, Charley anticipates the Veronika String Quartet's appearance with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs this weekend.
Franz Schubert: Quartettsatz in C minor, D.703
Veronika String Quartet (Veronika Afanassieva and Karine Garibova, violins, Ekaterina Dobrotvorskaia, viola; Mary Artmann, cello)
CPR Performance Studio 102308 MS
Dmitri Shostakovich: "Allegretto" (1st movement) from String Quartet No.3 in F major, Op. 73 5:13
Veronika String Quartet
(Veronika Afanassieva and Karine Garibova, violins, Ekaterina Dobrotvorskaia, viola; Mary Artmann, cello)
CPR Performance Studio 10/1/09 MS
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943): Symphonic Dances, Opus 45
I. Non allegro
II. Andante con moto: tempo di valse
III. Lento assai; Allegro vivace
A few months before his death in 1943, Rachmaninoff complained of lacking the ``strength and fire'' to compose. When friends reminded him of the Symphonic Dances, he replied: ``Yes, I don't know how that happened. That was probably my last flicker.''
Rachmaninoff's ``last flicker'' was begun during the summer of 1940 on an estate in Long Island. By August, he wrote to conductor Eugene Ormandy: ``Last week I finished a new symphonic piece, which I naturally want to give first to you and your orchestra. It is called Fantastic Dances. I should like to play the piece for you.''
Meanwhile, Rachmaninoff had second thoughts about the title. ``It should have been called just Dances,'' he said, ``but I was afraid people would think I had written dance music for jazz orchestras.'' At one point he even considered titles for the three movements--``Midday,'' ``Twilight'' and ``Midnight''--but abandoned the idea in favor of the Italian tempo designations.
By the time Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra introduced the work on January 4, 1941, Rachmaninoff had settled on the title Symphonic Dances.
A New York performance three days later received a lukewarm reception. The World-Telegram reported that ``the composer took a bow from the stage. The prolonged applause was doubtless a tribute to himself rather than to his music, for the novelty nowhere rises to his best standards....The piece teems with weird sounds, some of them just plain echoes. Mr. Rachmaninoff's orchestra is definitely haunted, especially the wind section, which is a real rendezvous of ghosts.''
Olin Downes, writing in the New York Times, was more perceptive: ``The dances are simple in outline, symphonic in texture and proportion. The first one, vigorously rhythmed and somewhat in a pastoral vein, is festive in the first part and more lyrical and tranquil in the middle section. The second Dance begins with a muted summons, or evocation, of the brass, a motto repeated in certain places, and for the rest there are sensuous melodies, sometimes bitter-sweet, sometimes to a Viennese lilt--and Vienna is gone.
``In the last Dance, the shortest, the most energetic and fantastical of the three, an idea obtrudes which has obsessed the musical thinking of Rachmaninoff these many years--the apparition, in the rhythmical maze, of the terrible old plain chant, the Dies Irae.
``The Dances have no ostensible connection with each other. They could easily reflect a series of moods, presented in a certain loose sequence--of Nature, and memories, and reveries with some Dead Sea fruit in them--all unpretentious, melodic, sensuously colored and admirably composed music.''
At the end of the score, Rachmaninoff had written ``I thank Thee, Lord!'' It was his last major work. Two and half years after its completion, he died in Beverly Hills, California.
Jeffrey Kahane, conductor
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances, Opus 45 (10/23/09)
Also, Charley anticipates the Denver Young Artists Orchestra's concert Sunday.
Ottorino Respighi: “St. Michael Archangel”(2nd movement) from Church Windows
Denver Young Artists Orchestra/ Scott O'Neil)
NCA (11/9/08) 5:50
And, Charley anticipates the Veronika String Quartet's appearance with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs this weekend.
Franz Schubert: Quartettsatz in C minor, D.703
Veronika String Quartet (Veronika Afanassieva and Karine Garibova, violins, Ekaterina Dobrotvorskaia, viola; Mary Artmann, cello)
CPR Performance Studio 102308 MS
Dmitri Shostakovich: "Allegretto" (1st movement) from String Quartet No.3 in F major, Op. 73 5:13
Veronika String Quartet
(Veronika Afanassieva and Karine Garibova, violins, Ekaterina Dobrotvorskaia, viola; Mary Artmann, cello)
CPR Performance Studio 10/1/09 MS
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943): Symphonic Dances, Opus 45
I. Non allegro
II. Andante con moto: tempo di valse
III. Lento assai; Allegro vivace
A few months before his death in 1943, Rachmaninoff complained of lacking the ``strength and fire'' to compose. When friends reminded him of the Symphonic Dances, he replied: ``Yes, I don't know how that happened. That was probably my last flicker.''
Rachmaninoff's ``last flicker'' was begun during the summer of 1940 on an estate in Long Island. By August, he wrote to conductor Eugene Ormandy: ``Last week I finished a new symphonic piece, which I naturally want to give first to you and your orchestra. It is called Fantastic Dances. I should like to play the piece for you.''
Meanwhile, Rachmaninoff had second thoughts about the title. ``It should have been called just Dances,'' he said, ``but I was afraid people would think I had written dance music for jazz orchestras.'' At one point he even considered titles for the three movements--``Midday,'' ``Twilight'' and ``Midnight''--but abandoned the idea in favor of the Italian tempo designations.
By the time Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra introduced the work on January 4, 1941, Rachmaninoff had settled on the title Symphonic Dances.
A New York performance three days later received a lukewarm reception. The World-Telegram reported that ``the composer took a bow from the stage. The prolonged applause was doubtless a tribute to himself rather than to his music, for the novelty nowhere rises to his best standards....The piece teems with weird sounds, some of them just plain echoes. Mr. Rachmaninoff's orchestra is definitely haunted, especially the wind section, which is a real rendezvous of ghosts.''
Olin Downes, writing in the New York Times, was more perceptive: ``The dances are simple in outline, symphonic in texture and proportion. The first one, vigorously rhythmed and somewhat in a pastoral vein, is festive in the first part and more lyrical and tranquil in the middle section. The second Dance begins with a muted summons, or evocation, of the brass, a motto repeated in certain places, and for the rest there are sensuous melodies, sometimes bitter-sweet, sometimes to a Viennese lilt--and Vienna is gone.
``In the last Dance, the shortest, the most energetic and fantastical of the three, an idea obtrudes which has obsessed the musical thinking of Rachmaninoff these many years--the apparition, in the rhythmical maze, of the terrible old plain chant, the Dies Irae.
``The Dances have no ostensible connection with each other. They could easily reflect a series of moods, presented in a certain loose sequence--of Nature, and memories, and reveries with some Dead Sea fruit in them--all unpretentious, melodic, sensuously colored and admirably composed music.''
At the end of the score, Rachmaninoff had written ``I thank Thee, Lord!'' It was his last major work. Two and half years after its completion, he died in Beverly Hills, California.
Wednesday January 27, 2010
Colorado Music Festival
Colorado Music Festival Chamber Orchestra
Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor; Olav van Hezewijk, oboe
Johann Sebastian Bach: Oboe Concerto in F major, BWV 1053 20:53
Wolfgang Mozart: Symphony No. 31 in D major, K.297 (Paris) 17:29 (7/15/07)
Also, Charley talks with violinist Jerilyn Jorgensen about her recitals with pianist Cullan Bryant this weekend.
Benjamin Britten: "Perpetual Motion" (2nd movement) & "Waltz" (4th movement) from Suite, Op.6
Jerilyn Jorgensen, violin; Cullan Bryant, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/13/09 MS
And, Charley anticipates the Colorado Chamber Players' collaboration with St. John's Cathedral Sunday.
D'Arcy Reynolds: "The Camel Yard" (opening section) from Cloven Dreams (2:34)
Gordon Jacob: "Gavotte" (2nd movement) from Four Fancies
Colorado Chamber Players (Paul Nagem, Flute; Paul Primus, Violin; Barbara Hamilton-Primus, Viola; Judith McIntyre, Cello)
CPR Performance Studio 1/16/09 MS
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750): Oboe Concerto in F major,
BWV 1053
I. [Allegro]
II. Siciliano
III. Allegro
After working for Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, Bach was appointed cantor of the St. Thomas School in Leipzig. He moved family and furniture in May of 1723. His job description included duties as civic director of music, and this meant numerous odious encounters with the Town Council. He complained of ``superiors who are strange people, with little regard for music.''
Some relief from his official duties came in 1729, when he was asked to direct the Leipzig Collegium Musicum, a group founded 25 years earlier by Telemann. During the winter, they performed every Friday night at Gottfried Zimmermann's coffeehouse. In the warmer months, they moved outdoors in the garden for concerts every Wednesday afternoon.
For these concerts, Bach resurrected a number of violin and oboe concertos that he had written in Cöthen and transcribed them for keyboard and strings. The F major Concerto is a reconstruction of a lost work whose component parts have survived. As best scholars can figure, the oboe concerto came first, then material from it was used in later cantata movements, a keyboard concerto and even a work for organ and voice that Bach wrote as a proficiency test for his eldest sons, Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Phillip Emmanuel.
In three cantata movements from 1726 the solo line is allocated to the organ. The first two movements of the oboe concerto appear in the Cantata No. 169 (Gott soll allein mein Herze haben) and the last movement in the Cantata No. 49 (Ich geh und suche mit Verlangen). The keyboard concerto in E major (BWV 1053) comes from the same sources, if not from the oboe concerto version itself.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791): Symphony No. 31 in D major, K.297 (300a) [Paris]
I. Allegro assai
II. Andante
III. Allegro
Mozart had not composed a symphony in four years when, in June of 1778, Joseph Legros, the director of the Paris Concerts Spirituels, commissioned one. Mozart and his mother had arrived in Paris from Mannheim only three months earlier.
Mozart's Paris Symphony was introduced on June 18, 1778. The rehearsals were a trial. ``Never in my life have I heard a worse performance,'' he wrote to his father. ``You have no idea how they twice bumbled and scraped through it.'' At the actual concert, ``the audience was quite carried away--and there was a tremendous burst of applause. I was so happy that as soon as the symphony was over, I went off the the Palais Royal, where I had a large ice.''
Legros said that ``this was the best symphony ever written'' for the Concerts Spirituels. He then asked for a new second movement, as he found the first version too long. Mozart duly supplied a new second movement for the second performance in August. ``Each is right in its way,'' he said, ``for they have different characters; however, I like the second still better.''
Commentators disagree on what influences are at work in the symphony. Alfred Einstein says that it is ``characteristic of the Mannheim-Paris style. In the first movement it even parodies that style to a slight degree.'' It begins with a precise unison attack by the strings, an effect much boasted by the Parisian orchestra. ``What a fuss the oxen here make of this trick!'' said Mozart. ``The devil take me if I can see any difference! They all begin together, just as they do in other places.''
The opening movement also features ``pompous runs in the strings characteristic of the French overture,'' writes Einstein, and ``impressive unison passages for the strings against sustained tones in the winds. But that is where the parody, or the connivance to please the French taste, ends. Mozart's ambition was far too great, and there was too much dependent on the success of the work, for him not to take it seriously. The fact that the last of the three movements was the most successful does honor to the taste of the Parisians. The second theme of this movement is a fugato, supplying the natural material for development; it does not return in the recapitulation--one of the strokes of genius in this masterful movement, which hovers continually between brilliant tumult and graceful seriousness.''
Jens Peter Larsen calls the work ``the first fully mature symphony in the Viennese classical style.'' But H.C. Robbins Landon writes: ``It is not really a Viennese classical symphony at all, but rather a conscious attempt to write an orchestral work in the grand Mannheim style.''
The score calls for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani and strings.
Colorado Music Festival Chamber Orchestra
Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor; Olav van Hezewijk, oboe
Johann Sebastian Bach: Oboe Concerto in F major, BWV 1053 20:53
Wolfgang Mozart: Symphony No. 31 in D major, K.297 (Paris) 17:29 (7/15/07)
Also, Charley talks with violinist Jerilyn Jorgensen about her recitals with pianist Cullan Bryant this weekend.
Benjamin Britten: "Perpetual Motion" (2nd movement) & "Waltz" (4th movement) from Suite, Op.6
Jerilyn Jorgensen, violin; Cullan Bryant, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/13/09 MS
And, Charley anticipates the Colorado Chamber Players' collaboration with St. John's Cathedral Sunday.
D'Arcy Reynolds: "The Camel Yard" (opening section) from Cloven Dreams (2:34)
Gordon Jacob: "Gavotte" (2nd movement) from Four Fancies
Colorado Chamber Players (Paul Nagem, Flute; Paul Primus, Violin; Barbara Hamilton-Primus, Viola; Judith McIntyre, Cello)
CPR Performance Studio 1/16/09 MS
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750): Oboe Concerto in F major,
BWV 1053
I. [Allegro]
II. Siciliano
III. Allegro
After working for Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, Bach was appointed cantor of the St. Thomas School in Leipzig. He moved family and furniture in May of 1723. His job description included duties as civic director of music, and this meant numerous odious encounters with the Town Council. He complained of ``superiors who are strange people, with little regard for music.''
Some relief from his official duties came in 1729, when he was asked to direct the Leipzig Collegium Musicum, a group founded 25 years earlier by Telemann. During the winter, they performed every Friday night at Gottfried Zimmermann's coffeehouse. In the warmer months, they moved outdoors in the garden for concerts every Wednesday afternoon.
For these concerts, Bach resurrected a number of violin and oboe concertos that he had written in Cöthen and transcribed them for keyboard and strings. The F major Concerto is a reconstruction of a lost work whose component parts have survived. As best scholars can figure, the oboe concerto came first, then material from it was used in later cantata movements, a keyboard concerto and even a work for organ and voice that Bach wrote as a proficiency test for his eldest sons, Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Phillip Emmanuel.
In three cantata movements from 1726 the solo line is allocated to the organ. The first two movements of the oboe concerto appear in the Cantata No. 169 (Gott soll allein mein Herze haben) and the last movement in the Cantata No. 49 (Ich geh und suche mit Verlangen). The keyboard concerto in E major (BWV 1053) comes from the same sources, if not from the oboe concerto version itself.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791): Symphony No. 31 in D major, K.297 (300a) [Paris]
I. Allegro assai
II. Andante
III. Allegro
Mozart had not composed a symphony in four years when, in June of 1778, Joseph Legros, the director of the Paris Concerts Spirituels, commissioned one. Mozart and his mother had arrived in Paris from Mannheim only three months earlier.
Mozart's Paris Symphony was introduced on June 18, 1778. The rehearsals were a trial. ``Never in my life have I heard a worse performance,'' he wrote to his father. ``You have no idea how they twice bumbled and scraped through it.'' At the actual concert, ``the audience was quite carried away--and there was a tremendous burst of applause. I was so happy that as soon as the symphony was over, I went off the the Palais Royal, where I had a large ice.''
Legros said that ``this was the best symphony ever written'' for the Concerts Spirituels. He then asked for a new second movement, as he found the first version too long. Mozart duly supplied a new second movement for the second performance in August. ``Each is right in its way,'' he said, ``for they have different characters; however, I like the second still better.''
Commentators disagree on what influences are at work in the symphony. Alfred Einstein says that it is ``characteristic of the Mannheim-Paris style. In the first movement it even parodies that style to a slight degree.'' It begins with a precise unison attack by the strings, an effect much boasted by the Parisian orchestra. ``What a fuss the oxen here make of this trick!'' said Mozart. ``The devil take me if I can see any difference! They all begin together, just as they do in other places.''
The opening movement also features ``pompous runs in the strings characteristic of the French overture,'' writes Einstein, and ``impressive unison passages for the strings against sustained tones in the winds. But that is where the parody, or the connivance to please the French taste, ends. Mozart's ambition was far too great, and there was too much dependent on the success of the work, for him not to take it seriously. The fact that the last of the three movements was the most successful does honor to the taste of the Parisians. The second theme of this movement is a fugato, supplying the natural material for development; it does not return in the recapitulation--one of the strokes of genius in this masterful movement, which hovers continually between brilliant tumult and graceful seriousness.''
Jens Peter Larsen calls the work ``the first fully mature symphony in the Viennese classical style.'' But H.C. Robbins Landon writes: ``It is not really a Viennese classical symphony at all, but rather a conscious attempt to write an orchestral work in the grand Mannheim style.''
The score calls for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani and strings.
Tuesday January 26, 2010
Friends of Chamber Music
Miró String Quartet; Shai Wosner, piano
Leoš Janáček: In the Mist
Leoš Janáček: String Quartet No. 2 (Intimate Letters) (2/18/09)
Also, Antonin Dvořák: Scherzo (Furiant: Molto vivace) [3rd movement] & Finale (Allegro) from Piano Quintet in A major, Op.81
Shai Wosner, piano; Axel Strauss, Chee-Yun, violins; Nokuthula Ngwenyama, viola; Alisa Weilerstein, cello 11:15
Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival (7/18/06)
Leoš Janáček (1854-1928): String Quartet No. 2 (Intimate Letters)
I. Andante--Con moto--Allegro
II. Adagio—Vivace—Andante—Presto—Allegro—Vivo--Adagio
III. Moderato—Adagio--Allegro
IV. Allegro—Andante--Con moto—Adagio--Tempo I
In 1917, at the age of sixty-two, Janáček fell in love with Kamila Stösslová, who was twenty-seven. The relationship continued for ten years, right up to Janáček’s death in 1928. On January 29 of that year, he began his second string quartet. “I’ve begun to write something nice,” he wrote to her. “Our life will be in it. It will be called ‘Love Letters.’ I think that it will sound delightful. There have already been so many of those dear adventures of ours, haven’t there? They’ll be little fires in my soul and they’ll set it ablaze with the most beautiful melodies.”
He completed the piece on February 19. “Today I managed to write a piece in which the earth moves,” he reported. “This work will be dedicated to you. You are the cause of it and composing it has been my greatest joy.”
Not wishing “to deliver up my feelings to the tender mercies of fools,” Janáček changed the title to “Intimate Letters.”
The Moravian Quartet came to Janáček’s house in Brno to rehearse the new work on May 18. “It’s going to be beautiful,” he said, “outside all conventional composition….It’s my first composition to spring from directly-experienced emotion.” After the final rehearsal on June 27, he wrote to Kamila: “They played with fire as if they themselves were writing Intimate Letters….I think that I shall write nothing deeper or more truthful….Everything is somehow coming to an end by itself! It’s as if I were never to take up my pen again.” Janáček was prophetic: the first performance was given by the Moravian Quartet in Brno on September 11, 1928, one month after Janáček’s death from pneumonia.
The music is profoundly autobiographical. The first movement, he told Kamila, represents “the impression when I saw you for the first time…Mine alone the speaking; yours—just surprised silence.” In the second movement, “you are giving birth. Just like you, falling from tears into laughter, that’s how it sounds.” The third movement “is bright and carefree, but dissolves into an apparition which resembles you.” “Let it be jolly,” he said of the last movement, “and then dissolve into a vision resembling your image, translucent as mist….It is the sound of my fear for you, not exactly fear, but yearning, yearning which is fulfilled by you.”
Miró String Quartet; Shai Wosner, piano
Leoš Janáček: In the Mist
Leoš Janáček: String Quartet No. 2 (Intimate Letters) (2/18/09)
Also, Antonin Dvořák: Scherzo (Furiant: Molto vivace) [3rd movement] & Finale (Allegro) from Piano Quintet in A major, Op.81
Shai Wosner, piano; Axel Strauss, Chee-Yun, violins; Nokuthula Ngwenyama, viola; Alisa Weilerstein, cello 11:15
Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival (7/18/06)
Leoš Janáček (1854-1928): String Quartet No. 2 (Intimate Letters)
I. Andante--Con moto--Allegro
II. Adagio—Vivace—Andante—Presto—Allegro—Vivo--Adagio
III. Moderato—Adagio--Allegro
IV. Allegro—Andante--Con moto—Adagio--Tempo I
In 1917, at the age of sixty-two, Janáček fell in love with Kamila Stösslová, who was twenty-seven. The relationship continued for ten years, right up to Janáček’s death in 1928. On January 29 of that year, he began his second string quartet. “I’ve begun to write something nice,” he wrote to her. “Our life will be in it. It will be called ‘Love Letters.’ I think that it will sound delightful. There have already been so many of those dear adventures of ours, haven’t there? They’ll be little fires in my soul and they’ll set it ablaze with the most beautiful melodies.”
He completed the piece on February 19. “Today I managed to write a piece in which the earth moves,” he reported. “This work will be dedicated to you. You are the cause of it and composing it has been my greatest joy.”
Not wishing “to deliver up my feelings to the tender mercies of fools,” Janáček changed the title to “Intimate Letters.”
The Moravian Quartet came to Janáček’s house in Brno to rehearse the new work on May 18. “It’s going to be beautiful,” he said, “outside all conventional composition….It’s my first composition to spring from directly-experienced emotion.” After the final rehearsal on June 27, he wrote to Kamila: “They played with fire as if they themselves were writing Intimate Letters….I think that I shall write nothing deeper or more truthful….Everything is somehow coming to an end by itself! It’s as if I were never to take up my pen again.” Janáček was prophetic: the first performance was given by the Moravian Quartet in Brno on September 11, 1928, one month after Janáček’s death from pneumonia.
The music is profoundly autobiographical. The first movement, he told Kamila, represents “the impression when I saw you for the first time…Mine alone the speaking; yours—just surprised silence.” In the second movement, “you are giving birth. Just like you, falling from tears into laughter, that’s how it sounds.” The third movement “is bright and carefree, but dissolves into an apparition which resembles you.” “Let it be jolly,” he said of the last movement, “and then dissolve into a vision resembling your image, translucent as mist….It is the sound of my fear for you, not exactly fear, but yearning, yearning which is fulfilled by you.”
Monday January 25, 2010
Strings in the Mountains Music Festival
Reinhold Gliére: Tarantella, Op.9 No. 2
Evan Premo, double bass; Katherine Collier, piano (8/9/06) 6:06
Johannes Brahms: “Scherzo” (2nd movement) & “Andante” (3rd movement) from Piano Quartet in C minor, Op.60
Jonathan Feldman, piano; Xiao-Dong Wang, violin; Yizhak Schotten, viola; Young Song, cello (8/2/06) 13:50
Dmitri Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 9 in E flat major, Op.117
Miami String Quartet (8/9/06) 24:59
Also, Charley anticipates the Telling Stories show "Culture Shock" on Saturday.
Benjamin Britten: "Andante sostenuto" (1st movement) from String Quartet No.1 in D major, Op.25
KVOD Performance Studio 9/29/09 MS
And, Charley talks with Telling Stories den mother, Jennie Dorris.
Reinhold Gliére: Tarantella, Op.9 No. 2
Evan Premo, double bass; Katherine Collier, piano (8/9/06) 6:06
Johannes Brahms: “Scherzo” (2nd movement) & “Andante” (3rd movement) from Piano Quartet in C minor, Op.60
Jonathan Feldman, piano; Xiao-Dong Wang, violin; Yizhak Schotten, viola; Young Song, cello (8/2/06) 13:50
Dmitri Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 9 in E flat major, Op.117
Miami String Quartet (8/9/06) 24:59
Also, Charley anticipates the Telling Stories show "Culture Shock" on Saturday.
Benjamin Britten: "Andante sostenuto" (1st movement) from String Quartet No.1 in D major, Op.25
KVOD Performance Studio 9/29/09 MS
And, Charley talks with Telling Stories den mother, Jennie Dorris.
Friday January 22, 2010
Charley anticipates Sunday's Englewood Arts Presents concert with Yumi Hwang-Williams and Michael Thornton.
Ernest Bloch: "Vidui" (Contrition): "Un poco lento" (1st movement) from Baal Shem
Yumi Hwang-Williams, violin; Dror Biran, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/9/09 MS
Ludwig van Beethoven: “Allegro moderato” (1st movement) from Horn Sonata in F major, Op.17 (6:07)
Michael Thornton, horn; Anne Epperson, piano
CPR Performance Studio 12/15/05 MS
John Adams: Road Movies 17:37
Yumi Hwang-Williams, violin; David Korevaar, piano
CPR Performance Studio 060608 MS
Franz Strauss: Nocturno, Op.7 (5:51)
Michael Thornton, horn; Anne Epperson, piano
CPR Performance Studio 12/15/05 MS
Wolfgang Mozart: “Adagio—Allegro” (1st movement) from Duo in B flat major, K.424
Yumi Hwang Williams, violin; Basil Vendryes, viola
CPR Performance Studio 030309 JP
Felix Mendelssohn: "Allegro vivace" (1st movement) from Sonata in F Major (1838)
Yumi Hwang-Williams, violin; Dror Biran, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/9/09 MS
Ernest Bloch: "Vidui" (Contrition): "Un poco lento" (1st movement) from Baal Shem
Yumi Hwang-Williams, violin; Dror Biran, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/9/09 MS
Ludwig van Beethoven: “Allegro moderato” (1st movement) from Horn Sonata in F major, Op.17 (6:07)
Michael Thornton, horn; Anne Epperson, piano
CPR Performance Studio 12/15/05 MS
John Adams: Road Movies 17:37
Yumi Hwang-Williams, violin; David Korevaar, piano
CPR Performance Studio 060608 MS
Franz Strauss: Nocturno, Op.7 (5:51)
Michael Thornton, horn; Anne Epperson, piano
CPR Performance Studio 12/15/05 MS
Wolfgang Mozart: “Adagio—Allegro” (1st movement) from Duo in B flat major, K.424
Yumi Hwang Williams, violin; Basil Vendryes, viola
CPR Performance Studio 030309 JP
Felix Mendelssohn: "Allegro vivace" (1st movement) from Sonata in F Major (1838)
Yumi Hwang-Williams, violin; Dror Biran, piano
CPR Performance Studio 11/9/09 MS
Thursday January 21, 2010
Colorado Symphony Orchestra
Jeffrey Kahane, conductor; Olga Kern, piano
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 4 in G minor, Opus 40 (10/23/09)
Also, Charley anticipates Benedetto Lupo's appearance with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra this weekend.
Nino Rota: Concerto Soirée
Benedetto Lupo, piano; Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana/ Massimo de Bernart
Nuova Era 7063 5-9 19:54
Charley anticipates the Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado's "Mozart by Candlelight" concert this weekend.
Georg Philipp Telemann: Oboe Concerto in C minor
Debra Nagy, oboe; Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado 8:32
NCA (5/1/09)
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943): Piano Concerto No. 4 in G minor, Opus 40
I. Allegro vivace
II. Largo
III. Allegro vivace
The most neglected of Rachmaninoff's concertos, the Fourth dates from as early as 1911, when he wrote an Étude-Tableau in C minor, originally intended for his Opus 33 set but withdrawn. In 1914 a Russian musical periodical mentioned that he was working on a concerto. A year later, Rachmaninoff complained of ``being unable to control either the work or myself and so I gave up working.''
It wasn't until 1926 that he resumed work on the Concerto, first in New York and later in Dresden, where he completed it in August. He was concerned about the length of the piece and remarked to his old friend Nikolai Medtner that ``it will probably be performed like `The Ring' on several evenings in succession.''
After the first performance by the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Leopold Stokowski on March 18, 1927, Rachmaninoff played the Concerto in New York and other cities to generally negative critical reaction. Calling the work ``long-winded, tiresome, unimportant, in places tawdry,'' Pitts Sanborn wrote that ``Mme. Cécile Chaminade might safely have perpetrated it on her third glass of vodka.'' Lawrence Gilman said the Concerto ``remains as essentially nineteenth century as if Tchaikovsky had signed it.''
Rachmaninoff made revisions in the score during the summer of 1927 and still more revisions in 1941.
After a typical upward sweep by the orchestra, the piano enters with the first theme, derived from the earlier Étude-Tableau. A more lyrical second theme follows, and a development section based primarily on a fragment of the first theme. The middle movement's melody reminded some critics of the nursery tune Three Blind Mice. Indeed, Rachmaninoff reprimanded Medtner for not noticing the music's resemblence to Schumann's Piano Concerto. A transition based on the same Étude-Tableau leads directly to the Finale, which features themes both brilliant and lyrical, as well as reminiscences of the first two movements.
Jeffrey Kahane, conductor; Olga Kern, piano
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 4 in G minor, Opus 40 (10/23/09)
Also, Charley anticipates Benedetto Lupo's appearance with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra this weekend.
Nino Rota: Concerto Soirée
Benedetto Lupo, piano; Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana/ Massimo de Bernart
Nuova Era 7063 5-9 19:54
Charley anticipates the Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado's "Mozart by Candlelight" concert this weekend.
Georg Philipp Telemann: Oboe Concerto in C minor
Debra Nagy, oboe; Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado 8:32
NCA (5/1/09)
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943): Piano Concerto No. 4 in G minor, Opus 40
I. Allegro vivace
II. Largo
III. Allegro vivace
The most neglected of Rachmaninoff's concertos, the Fourth dates from as early as 1911, when he wrote an Étude-Tableau in C minor, originally intended for his Opus 33 set but withdrawn. In 1914 a Russian musical periodical mentioned that he was working on a concerto. A year later, Rachmaninoff complained of ``being unable to control either the work or myself and so I gave up working.''
It wasn't until 1926 that he resumed work on the Concerto, first in New York and later in Dresden, where he completed it in August. He was concerned about the length of the piece and remarked to his old friend Nikolai Medtner that ``it will probably be performed like `The Ring' on several evenings in succession.''
After the first performance by the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Leopold Stokowski on March 18, 1927, Rachmaninoff played the Concerto in New York and other cities to generally negative critical reaction. Calling the work ``long-winded, tiresome, unimportant, in places tawdry,'' Pitts Sanborn wrote that ``Mme. Cécile Chaminade might safely have perpetrated it on her third glass of vodka.'' Lawrence Gilman said the Concerto ``remains as essentially nineteenth century as if Tchaikovsky had signed it.''
Rachmaninoff made revisions in the score during the summer of 1927 and still more revisions in 1941.
After a typical upward sweep by the orchestra, the piano enters with the first theme, derived from the earlier Étude-Tableau. A more lyrical second theme follows, and a development section based primarily on a fragment of the first theme. The middle movement's melody reminded some critics of the nursery tune Three Blind Mice. Indeed, Rachmaninoff reprimanded Medtner for not noticing the music's resemblence to Schumann's Piano Concerto. A transition based on the same Étude-Tableau leads directly to the Finale, which features themes both brilliant and lyrical, as well as reminiscences of the first two movements.
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