Program Notes

Georges Bizet (1838-1875)

Patrie (1874)

Scored for pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets and bassoons, four horns, four trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, strings and harp

No one would argue that Georges Bizet’s greatest masterpiece is the beloved opera Carmen. It is among not only the greatest operatic treasures in the world, but among musical works of any kind. It is so justly famous and familiar that most would be shocked to hear that its premier was a dismal failure. Its remarkable music was not enough to overcome the mature themes of sexual passion, moral ambiguity and murder that are presented. In fact, it was pronounced obscene by many who saw it for the first time in Paris. The opera would recover, but, unfortunately, Bizet would not. He died only three months after Carmen’s debut.

The story of Carmen is typical of the tragically short life of the great French master. He was bolstered by a number of early successes, including winning the coveted prix de Rome, which offered him a chance to work and study in Italy for three years. He found acceptance as both pianist and composer and on his return to Paris he received many offers to teach and perform, offers that would have given him a comfortable living. But Bizet turned them all down. By then he knew beyond any doubt that his life’s work would be composition, and he threw himself into it with all his soul. His greatest passion was now the operatic stage, and in 1863, his one-act La guzla de l'emir was in rehearsal when the Theatre-Lyrique director invited Bizet to compose The Pearl Fishers.

But the Parisian audiences were notoriously difficult to please and they met the work with, at best, polite indifference. Added to this, the frustrations of having conceived a child out of wedlock, service in the National Guard during the Franco-Prussian war and serious bouts of bad health, put considerable strain on him. Discouraged but not beaten, he continued to compose, and in 1874 he was able to muster the strength and courage to write the spirited overture Patrie.

The piece was commissioned from the famous conductor Charles Pasdeloup, a champion of new compositions and the first man to introduce German music into France. It is notable for being one of the few works from late in the composer’s life that was met with an enthusiastic reception. The overture is a jaunty, vivacious offering filled to overflowing with French patriotic fervor. The beautiful middle section is at turns brooding, stirringly dramatic and deeply passionate, and the overture ends on a note of uninhibited triumph. It was just the thing for a public for which the Franco-Prussian war was still a recent and bitter memory.

 

Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Symphony No. 8 in B minor “Unfinished” (1822)

Scored for pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets, three trombones timpani and strings 

After hearing the remarkable Eighth Symphony of Franz Shubert, there is really only one thing left to say. That one thing is not a statement, but a question. And that question is the same one that has been asked by everyone from musicologists to record-collectors. That question is this: WHY? Why, we ask, was one of the most overwhelmingly original and deeply inspired symphonic statements of the 19 th century only two movements long? Why, in short, was the “Unfinished” symphony left – well – unfinished?

If we examine Schubert’s symphonies as a whole, we find something that usually raises eyebrows. Though Schubert wrote six completed symphonies between 1813 and 1818, he left the next four, including the eighth, incomplete. Most were in early stages of composition. It seems that the composer was struggling to find solutions to symphonic form and harmonic structure that would take him beyond what he had written so far. And during this struggle, he seems to have hit pay dirt with the eighth, and the thing that has been the most baffling is why Schubert wasn’t inspired enough by this incredible start to carry it through to the end. It can be an irritating point if one bothers to give it any thought. I suppose most are content to bask joyfully in the movements we do have.

The symphony was both begun and set aside in 1822. Schubert did begin a third movement, a scherzo, which was complete up to the melody for a trio section. Several attempts have been made to complete it, but none have proved satisfactory in comparison with what Schubert himself left us in the two preceding movements. The symphony was never performed in Schubert’s lifetime, but after a long and complicated history, it was finally given its premiere on December 17, 1865.

The symphony begins with an ominous rumbling in the cellos and basses, a theme shrouded in mystery and uncertainty. This barely audible pronouncement reaches into the very depths of the soul and when its final note is deliberately drawn out, it seems an eternity. This theme could easily be mistaken for an introduction, but its notes of searching tragedy will play a key role in the movement. The tension is finally relieved when the strings take up an agitated accompaniment, and an oboe and clarinet, as if in defiance to the nervous energy, introduce a brooding theme that unfolds slowly and deliberately. On its repeat it is taken up by the orchestra which builds to a mighty climax. The bassoons and horns persistently hold on to a single note of the crashing B minor chord, encouraging the rest of the winds to join them as they gently glide into the new key of G major. A gentle syncopated accompaniment begins in the clarinets and violas, and here Schubert introduces one of the most famous melodies in the world, happily played by the cellos. Soon the theme is taken up even more gleefully by the violins. But the joy is short-lived and the melody, which we would be happy to hear go on forever, is suddenly cut off. Soon a series of violent chords reassert the movement’s true character. When the chords stop, a snippet of the second theme gently reasserts itself, but it is tossed carelessly about, and the orchestra builds again to breaking point. With this new surge of energy exhausted, the second theme cautiously makes another attempt to take charge, first in the strings, then a solo flute, but it, too, soon becomes a spent force. One more outburst leads the orchestra into the development section. Here the orchestra seems to be almost obsessed by the theme that was introduced in ominous rumblings to begin the movement, several times interrupting a pale ghost of the famous second theme represented only by its accompaniment before exploding into a wail of grief. With its grief and energy now depleted, the music falls quietly back into the recapitulation section. But here, Schubert gives us not the movement’s opening theme, but the agitated accompaniment and the oboe-clarinet melody. Soon the ominous opening theme once more dominates in the coda, and the movement ends with a final, dramatic utterance.

The opening of the second movement offers us a tranquil escape from the foreboding which has just come before it. A gentle lyricism is evident in the lovely first theme. The second theme brings back some of the agitation, and is remarkable for its time in that Schubert is able to sustain an adventurous, almost startling tonality, which shifts to remote keys. The two main themes alternate throughout and the coda presents an unaccompanied violin melody, sharing time with the winds, and the symphony ends in gentle serenity.

 

Johaness Brahms (1833-1897)

Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat major, Op. 83 (1878-1881)

Scored for piano solo, pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets and bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, timpani and strings 

“I want to tell you that I have written a tiny little concerto with a tiny little scherzo. It was written in the key of B-flat major, and I fear that I have made too heavy and frequent a demand on this udder which has on many occasions provided such excellent milk.”

Johaness Brahms’ tongue-in-cheek self-deprecatory manner must certainly have been a breath of fresh air to those he called friends. In fact, when Elisabeth von Herzogenberg first read these words printed above in 1881, one can imagine her rolling her eyes to the ceiling and letting out a gentle sigh of half-hearted exasperation and a gentle chuckle. Brahms similarly described the concerto to his friend Theodor Billroth as “some little piano pieces.” (Clara Schumann, however, knew Brahms better than anyone, and when she received a similarly worded letter, she was quick to reply, “Of course, I do not trust the ‘little one’ you included.”)

For Brahms, who was frequently dissatisfied with his work, it would not be unusual to notice a hint of bitterness in his remarks about his music. But these comments about his new piano concerto must have seemed to those closest to him as something very different. This time Brahms’ understatement had a mischievous, playful edge to it. He actually seemed to be happy about what he had done.

First of all, he was talking about a piano concerto of four movements and some forty-five minutes duration which contained a piano part that would tax the abilities and try the patience of the world’s greatest pianists. In short, it was the most massive, ambitious and demanding concerto that had ever been written. It also contains some of Brahms most inspired music, and inspired music-making, uniting the piano and orchestra in a symbiotic relationship that reveals an unerring gift honed to an unbelievable height of perfection. The piano is at turns master and servant, rising to heights of grandiose self-confidence and then simply stepping aside, or adding a subtle supporting voice to the proceedings. The composer wrote to his friend Joseph Joachim when he started the work and said, “The next one (his second piano concerto) will sound quite different [from the first].” Today, this is not simply a true statement about the piece, but one that has been ringing ever since in the ears of those composers since who have tried to equal it, and those pianists who have tried to tame it.

The first movement opens with a gentle horn call, answered by piano and both continue in discourse. The music is briefly taken up by the orchestra, which then steps aside for a brilliant piano cadenza, firmly establishing the kind of effort required of the soloist. An enthusiastic orchestral tutti then gives this opening music full-blooded treatment. Other themes are introduced in a harmonically complex framework. Throughout the movement the piano is clearly the star, yet seems surprisingly generous to the orchestra. It does not merely take up the orchestra’s themes, but offers its own varied interpretation. Though the mood is optimistic, the sweeping drama and overwhelming passion of Brahms is also in good supply here.

The second movement is a fiery scherzo, the first theme impassioned and forceful, and the second wistful, but no less dramatic. The piano and orchestra are once more engaged in a synergistic dialogue which rises to overwhelming heights of emotion. Out of nowhere, Brahms offers us a stately baroque dance, its growing fervor leading us naturally back into the scherzo, this time with the orchestra clearly in charge. But lest we forget that the piano is the headliner, it takes its place at the fore to impart a dynamic conclusion.

Brahms wrote to Clara Schumann that the third movement was a tender portrait of her. The startlingly lovely theme for solo cello that opens the andante causes us in an instant to forget its unlikely existence in a work of such drama and mammoth proportions. We are quite happy for this gentle music to carry on, and when the piano enters with its own romantic and inspired reply, we are utterly enraptured. An unexpected, impassioned outburst from the piano does little to dispel our pleasure. The middle section dispenses with the orchestra and allows the piano a tender discourse with two clarinets. Once the opening music has been established again, the cello returns and its gently intertwined duet with the piano is breathtaking.

Not even really hinted at in the first three movements, Brahms’ love of Hungarian dance is evident in the enticing sonata-rondo that serves as finale. Brahms now seems to be content to leave most of the impassioned pleas and lofty utterances behind and present us with music brimming over with joyful enthusiasm and rhythmic verve.