the PROGRAM - Rockport Music

Saturday
18
june
Lise de la Salle, piano
8 PM
Pre-concert talk with Dr. William Matthews, 7 PM
PIANO SONATA IN C MAJOR, OP. 2, NO. 3
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Allegro con brio
Adagio
Scherzo: Allegro
Allegro assai
GASPARD DE LA NUIT
Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)
Ondine: Lent
Le Gibet: Très lent
Scarbo: Modéré
:: intermission ::
SIX PRELUDES
Claude Debussy (1862-1918)
Modéré: Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir
[Sounds and fragrances mingle in the evening air]
Rapide et légère: Les fées sont d’exquises danseuses
[Fairies are exquisite dancers]
Très calme et doucement expressif: La fille aux cheveux de lin
[The girl with the flaxen hair]
Capricieux et léger: La danse de Puck [Puck’s dance]
Lent et grave: Danseuses de Delphes [Dancers of Delphi]
Animé et tumultueux: Ce qu’a vu le vent d’ouest
[What the west wind saw]
The program continues on the next page
35TH SEASON | ROCKPORT MUSIC :: 41
WEEK 3
the program
VARIATIONS AND FUGUE IN B-FLAT MAJOR ON A THEME BY HANDEL, OP. 24
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
Aria
Variation I: Più vivo
II-IX: No titles
X: Allegro
XI: Moderato
XII: L’istesso tempo
XIII: Largamente, ma non troppo
Notes
on the
program
by
Sandra Hyslop
XIV-XIX No titles
XX: Andante
XXI: Vivace
XXII: Alla Musette
XXIII: Vivace
XXIV-XXV: No titles
Fuga: Moderato
PIANO SONATA IN C MAJOR, OP. 2, NO. 3
Ludwig van Beethoven (b. Bonn, December 16, 1770; d. Vienna, March 26, 1827)
Composed 1794-95; 25 minutes
Upon Ludwig van Beethoven’s permanent move from Bonn to Vienna in 1793, he quickly
established himself as a virtuoso pianist. His self-assured, brilliant keyboard improvisations
made him a popular guest in the homes of prominent Viennese patrons of music. That
confident public persona veiled Beethoven’s private ambitions to become an equally assured
and capable composer.
To that end, he had a few private lessons each with Josef Haydn, Johann Albrechtsberger,
and Antonio Salieri. Beethoven dedicated his first published piano sonatas, the three works
issued as Opus 2, to the 63-year-old Haydn, who was at the height of his fame.
Given Beethoven’s exceeding piano skills, no one need be surprised that the Piano
Sonata No. 3 in C major, not only exudes self-confidence, but also is an exemplar of
the beautiful construction and dynamism that runs through the entire body of his
32 piano sonatas. Only the third to be composed, this sonata asks as much in
terms of technique and musical acumen as any of his so-called mature sonatas.
A dual portrait by an
anonymous artist of the
composer Josef Haydn and
his student (of a few months)
Ludwig van Beethoven.
Note the evidence of
differences in their generations
and their temperaments
through the stylings of
their hair—Classic wig
vs. Romantic abandon.
Beethoven dedicated the
three piano sonatas of
Opus 2 to Haydn.
Beethoven cast the Allegro con brio in classic sonata form, with two clearly defined
and memorable main subjects—in C major and in G minor—that provide the
substance for the entire structure of the first movement. It concludes with a coda
that brings the movement to an emphatic end in C major.
The change to the distant key of E major for the Adagio alters the listener’s attention
abruptly. The wistful main theme comprises a series of questions and replies—a kind of
inner dialogue. The mood darkens with the introduction of the next subject, in E minor.
The entire movement is a slow rondo that combines lyrical elements with dark drama.
The mood is lightened in the Scherzo, a bubbling spring propelled by sforzandi that accent the
quirky rhythmic flow. The dynamic energy of the third movement is intensified and completed
by the Finale, a rondo in rapid 6/8 measure. Beginning with the principal thematic element—
the rising scale in sixths—the forward propulsion of the Allegro assai never loses energy.
Even with no orchestra present, it caps the sonata with all the bravura of a piano concerto.
42 :: NOTES ON THE PROGRAM
GASPARD DE LA NUIT: TROIS POÈMES POUR PIANO D’APRÈS ALOYSIUS BERTRAND
Maurice Ravel (b. Ciboure, Basses Pyrénées, March 7, 1875; d. Paris, December 28, 1937)
Composed in 1908; ca. 21 minutes
Ravel composed Gaspard de la nuit as a musical manifestation of the night mysteries that the
French writer Aloysius Bertrand (1807-1841) had explored in a book of the same title. Bertrand’s
Gaspard de la nuit, published in 1830, was a treasury of fantasy prose-poems, drawings, and
sketches. In the book’s introduction, Bertrand claimed that the Devil himself, using “Gaspard”
as his pseudonym, had dictated the work. Gaspard’s night was at once threatening, seductive,
enchanted, and beautiful. Ravel instructed his publisher, Durand, to print the full texts of
Bertrand’s evocative prose poems in the piano’s score.
Gaspard de la nuit represents the pinnacle of technical and musical challenges for a pianist.
Ravel himself described its “transcendental virtuosity,” and the eminent French pianist Gaby
Casadesus spoke even more plainly. “Hellishly difficult,” Mme. Casadesus said, authoritatively.
The work was first performed by Ravel’s childhood friend Ricardo Viñes in Paris, January 9, 1909.
1923 photo of Maurice
Ravel and two close friends
and colleagues, the violinist
Hélène Jourdan-Morhange
and the pianist Ricardo
Viñes, who had played the
premiere of Gaspard de
la nuit in 1909
Ondine Dedicated to the British pianist Harold Bauer (1873-1951)
Ondine, the water fairy, attempts—unsuccessfully—to seduce a human male to
dwell with her.
Le Gibet Dedicated to the music critic Jean Marnold (1859-1935)
Le Gibet: The gallows! An insistent, B-flat tolling, 153 iterations of gloom, directs
attention toward the “carcass of a hanged man glowing in the dying sunlight.”
Scarbo Dedicated to the pianist Rudolph Ganz (1877-1972)
The Egyptian “scarab,” a diabolic, beetle-like imp who chills the night with his
mad scratching and flitting. Ravel’s Scarbo is a true and beautiful nightmare.
SIX PRELUDES
SELECTED PRELUDES FOR PIANO
Claude Debussy (b. Saint-Germain-en-Raye, France, August 22, 1862;
d. Paris, March 25, 1918)
Composed 1910-13, 22 minutes
Debussy composed two sets of Préludes during the years 1909-1913, 24 piano pieces that
assured his reputation as a masterful composer for the instrument. Twelve Préludes, Book
One, were finished between December 1909 and February 1910; Twelve Préludes, Book Two,
between winter 1912 and early April 1913.
A formal portrait of the
young Claude Debussy,
and a candid photo of the
rumpled Debussy on vacation
at the seaside
In 1910 Ricardo Viñes (1875-1943) was the first pianist to perform any of the Book One Préludes
in public. Both he and Debussy frequently programmed them on concerts in miscellaneous
groups of three or four. Soon, other pianists were performing the entire sets of Préludes on
one recital. However, although the Préludes were published in a thoughtful order, they do not
conform to the strict cohesiveness of a real cycle. They lack, for instance, the structural order
that both Bach and Chopin had designated for their keyboard preludes. Debussy composed
his to be played in any desirable grouping according to the taste of the performer.
Debussy’s 24 Préludes portray people, legends, architecture, the elements of nature, and
other familiar scenes. He meant for each of these piano pieces to evoke specific images.
Debussy assigned each piece a number, rather than a title. Then, at the end of each work,
below the final brace of notes in the score, he appended the descriptive title that he had in
35TH SEASON | ROCKPORT MUSIC :: 43
Notes
on the
program
by
Sandra Hyslop
mind. By removing the “title” from the head of the piece and placing it at its foot, Debussy
was directing extra attention to the music that is its heart.
Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir: This “waltz”—patterns of alternating
3/4 + 2/4 measures—reflects a line from Charles Baudelaire’s poem “Harmonie du soir”
[evening harmony], in which he refers to the vibrations of sound and aroma exuded by flowers
at night as “Valse mélancolique and langoureux vertige” [melancholy waltz and languid vertigo].
Les fées sont d’exquises danseuses: Thanks to his gossamer harmonic structure and
sensitive use of piano pedals, Debussy coaxes delicate clarity from the percussive instrument
to evoke the fairies’ exquisite dance.
La fille aux cheveux de lin: Debussy drew inspiration from a collection (Poèmes antiques)
by the prominent French poet Charles-Marie-René Leconte de Lisle (1818-1894). In one of
four “Scottish poems,” the poet’s question “Who is singing in the meadow on this fresh
morning?” prompted this poetic reply, “c’est la fille aux cheveux de lin.”
La danse de Puck: The Robin Goodfellow character from A Midsummer Night’s Dream—the
self-described “merry wanderer of the night”—appears in this delicately sparkling, swirling
dance.
Danseuses de Delphes: This slow, ritual dance in five-measure phrases, with its steady and
mesmerizing rhythm, expresses the appropriate attitude for approaching the great oracle
at Delphi.
Ce qu’a vu le vent d’ouest: This whirlwind of a piece is animated by brilliant, complex, and
demanding piano effects.
VARIATIONS AND FUGUE IN B-FLAT MAJOR ON A THEME BY HANDEL, OP. 24
Johannes Brahms (b. Hamburg, May 7, 1833; d. Vienna, April 3, 1897)
Composed 1861; 27 minutes
1853 photo of Johannes
Brahms, age twenty, when
he met Clara and Robert
Schumann for the first time
Immediately after meeting the twenty-year-old Johannes Brahms for the first time, the
composer and critic Robert Schumann published an essay, "Neue Bahnen" [New Paths],
that has become famous for its lavish praise, as well as for the weight of expectation that
it imposed upon the young composer. Already hyper-critical of his own work, Brahms
struggled to live up to Schumann's encomiums.
By the late 1850s, Johannes Brahms had begun to emerge from a long, dry spell. He had
also found a person whose opinion mattered to him nearly as much as his own: Clara
Schumann, pianiste extraordinaire and widow of the composer Robert Schumann, who had
died in 1856. Both Clara and Robert had befriended and encouraged Brahms; Clara truly
inspired him. He composed with her, and her pianism, foremost in his mind.
Brahms culled the main theme for the difficult Handel Variations and Fugue from the first
Suite, in B-flat, from the Suites de pieces de clavecin that Handel published in 1733. In addition
to devising 25 clever variations on that theme, Brahms cast the variations in special clothing:
Number 6, for example is a Baroque canon; Number 13 has the Hungarian flavor that
appeared frequently in Brahms’s music; Number 19 has the lilt of an Italian Siciliano. The
subject of the concluding Fugue derives from the main theme, as well, and brings the work
to a brilliant close. Clara Schumann played the premiere public performance of the Handel
Variations on December 7, 1861, in Hamburg.
44 :: NOTES ON THE PROGRAM