Sinfonia Viva in association with Derby LIVE and Orchestras Live

About the Orchestra
Sinfonia Viva is a virtuoso ensemble delivering original and extraordinary creative musical
experiences. Founded in 1982, Sinfonia Viva has a national reputation as a leader in creative music
activity in the UK. Its work offers relevant and enriching possibilities for all.
Sinfonia Viva:
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Embraces new opportunities and ways of working whilst nurturing the
best of existing practice, making music accessible to the widest audience
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Connects participants, communities and professional musicians through
shared creative activities and performances
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Creates exciting and imaginative performance experiences for audiences
and participants
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Collaborates with partners to devise, develop and deliver original
musical opportunities
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Is an ambassador for music making
The Orchestra has toured to Ireland and Berlin, has broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and has been part of
a project for Granada Television. The Orchestra made its London debut as part of an Indian music
festival in London’s Kings Place, building on its partnership with top Indian classical violinist Kala
Ramnath. One of the Orchestra’s tracks on the Gorillaz’ album Plastic Beach was nominated for a
Grammy award. The Orchestra has hosted the Association of British Orchestras’ national conference.
It took part in the BBC Radio 3 co-ordinated Music Nation week-end which was a countdown event to
the London 2012 Festival and the performance was also broadcast on BBC Radio 3. The Orchestra
was the local content producer for the Olympic Torch Evening Celebration event in June 2012 in
Derby.
Sinfonia Viva in association with
Derby LIVE and Orchestras Live presents
Leonard Elschenbroich (Cello)
Fawzi Haimor (Conductor)
Derby Cathedral
Tuesday 22nd July 2014, 7.30pm
Sinfonia Viva prides itself on its project development activity and partnership working, often bringing
together musicians from other musical styles, genres and traditions. It also has extensive experience
in event management activity and delivery.
Sinfonia Viva is supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England
and receives funding from Derby City Council.
Feedback on any Sinfonia Viva event is welcome via the contact details below.
Sinfonia Viva, Beaufort Street Business Centre, Beaufort Street, Derby, DE21 6AX
Tel: 01332 207570 Fax: 01332 207569 Email: [email protected] www.vivaorch.co.uk
www.facebook.com/sinfonia.viva https://twitter.com/sinfoniavivauk
Viva Chamber Orchestra Ltd is a company limited by guarantee
registered in England No.187955. Registered address 22-26 Nottingham Road,
Stapleford, Nottingham. Registered Charity No.291046 VAT No.385367024
This concert is supported by Rolls-Royce plc, Derby City Council,
Derby LIVE and Orchestras Live.
Joseph Haydn
Overture to Il Ritorno di Tobia
Schumann
Cello Concerto in A minor, Op 129
Wagner
Siegfried Idyll
Sibelius
Incidental music to Kuolema, Op 44,
Valse Triste and Scene with Cranes
Beethoven
Symphony No.1 in C, Op 21
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Overture to Il Ritorno di Tobia
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
Il Ritorno di Tobia (The Return of Tobias) was Haydn’s first oratorio, composed in 1775, some
twenty years or so before the much better-known The Creation. Written for a Viennese musical
society, it sets a libretto by Giovanni Gastone Boccherini, brother of the cellist and composer Luigi
Boccherini.
It was a success at its first performance, and it was revived in 1784, when Haydn cut some of the
arias and added two new choruses, including a storm chorus which has since taken on a life of its
own, fitted to a new Latin text, as Insanae et Vanae Curae.
The oratorio has rarely been heard since, however, for which weaknesses in the libretto have
been held largely responsible. It is based on the story from the Apocrypha (biblical texts
sometimes considered peripheral to the Old Testament) in which the elderly Tobit is cured of his
blindness.
The overture (Haydn used the then current term ‘Sinfonia’) begins with a slow minor-key
introduction, leading to the spirited, energetic main section.
Cello Concerto in A minor, Op 129
Robert Schumann (1810-1849)
1. Nicht zu schnell (not too fast) - 2. Langsam (slow) - 3. Sehr lebhaft (very lively).
When Brahms first heard DvoĜák’s Cello Concerto he expressed amazement that it was possible
to write a cello concerto like that, and said that if he had known, he would have done so himself
long ago. He must have known Schumann’s Concerto; he was, after all, a close colleague in the
last few years of Schumann’s life, and it was the first major concerto for the instrument written in
the nineteenth century. But where DvoĜák’s is a big-boned, heroically-scaled work, of the kind we
tend to think of as the typical nineteenth-century concerto, Schumann’s works for solo instrument
and orchestra rarely aim for all-conquering heroism; the relationship is generally conceived in
more equal terms, and nowhere more so than in his intimate, almost chamber-like Cello Concerto.
He implied as much when he first entered it in his own catalogue of his compositions as a
Konzertstück (Concert-piece), which suggests more modest aims.
After damaging his right hand in 1832 Schumann took up the cello for a while, and this was
enough to give him some grasp of how to write effectively for it. In particular, he understood the
problems of balance involved in keeping the cello part audible against a full orchestra. As a result,
he limits the concerto’s instrumentation, with just two each of horns and trumpets, omitting
trombones altogether. Lightly scored accompanying passages allow the cello plenty of space to
make itself heard, particularly in its lower register.
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Schumann sketched the concerto in two weeks in October 1850, during a particularly productive
period following his move to Düsseldorf to take up the post of director of music there, and
immediately before the first signs of his mental breakdown. The work is a particularly striking
example of his attention to an extended composition’s overall unity. Themes recur across the
entire, remarkably compact, three-movement structure, and each movement runs seamlessly into
the next. After just four bars of orchestral introduction, the soloist enters with a characteristically
broad, lyrical main theme which soars and swoops through several octaves. Time and again
Schumann catches our attention with a typically poetic turn of phrase. In fact he is so concerned
with exploring the music’s lyrical qualities that the return of the opening theme at the
recapitulation, often the point at which the dramatic tension of a piece is at its height, here slips by
almost unnoticed.
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A brief transition passage, hinting at the first movement’s opening bars, leads into the tender,
song-like slow movement. This is Schumann the introverted dreamer, the side of his personality
he called ‘Eusebius’, in contrast to ‘Florestan’, the impulsive, fiery extrovert. As the movement
draws to its haunting close the tempo begins to revive, the first movement’s opening theme
returns, and a short unaccompanied passage for the soloist runs into the perky, rhythmically
incisive finale. The music drives impetuously towards its climax, and it is here, rather than the
more conventional point at the end of the first movement, that Schumann places the soloist’s
cadenza. That in itself was a stroke of great originality for its time, but he also gives it a discreet
orchestral accompaniment. It is typical of his whole approach that both the cadenza and the
exuberant final pages should be more concerned with musical values than virtuoso display.
Schumann’s uncertainty as to what to call the work looks not so much like indecision on his part
as doubt as to how it would be received by the public, an impression reinforced by its subsequent
comparative neglect. Schumann directed a run-through with the Düsseldorf orchestra and its
principal cellist in March 1851, but the concerto was not performed in public until 1860. Even now,
in spite of the advocacy of cellists of the stature of Pablo Casals, it still tends to be all too rarely
played, though the current re-assessment of Schumann’s later music may yet see it taking its
rightful place in the repertoire.
Siegfried Idyll
Richard Wagner (1813-1883)
Wagner and Liszt’s daughter, Cosima, became lovers in 1864, and two years later decided to
set up home in Tribschen, a house overlooking Lake Lucerne, near Geneva. They were
formally married in August 1870. In June 1869 their third child, Siegfried, was born and, except
for a few pages of the full score, Wagner also completed Siegfried, the third opera of the fourpart Niebelung’s ring cycle the same year.
Cosima celebrated her birthday on 25th December, even though the actual day was the 24th.
To mark the occasion in 1870 Wagner planned a surprise present, extravagant even by his
standards, a twenty-minute work for an ensemble of thirteen players, to be performed on the
staircase outside her room. The work was rehearsed in secret by the conductor Hans Richter,
who also played the trumpet part, having learned the instrument specially for the occasion.
The title page of the manuscript score read “Tribschen Idyll with Fidi-Birdsong and Orange
Sunrise, presented as a symphonic birthday greeting to his Cosima by her Richard, 1870.” Fidi
was their nickname for Siegfried and the orange sunrise was the phenomenon noted by Cosima
in her diary the day he was born when the sun shone in on the orange wallpaper of the room
creating “an incredibly beautiful, fiery glow”.
The piece draws on themes from Siegfried, and a traditional lullaby, ‘Sleep, baby, sleep’. The
result was so intensely personal to Wagner and Cosima that it was only with extreme
reluctance, for financial reasons, that they agreed to “the secret treasure” being published.
Incidental music to Kuolema, Op 44
Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
1. Valse triste; 2. Scene with Cranes.
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While Sibelius’s symphonies and tone-poems demonstrate his mastery of long-range musical
thinking, his many theatre scores show his ability to convey a mood or create an atmosphere in a
short space of time.
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In 1903 he provided music for Kuolema (Death), a play by his brother-in-law Arvid Järnefelt. The
following year he prepared a concert version of the music for the opening scene, in which the
central character, Paavali, is with his dying mother. She sees the figure of Death coming to claim
her; thinking he is her late husband, she dances with him. Under the title Valse Triste it quickly
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became one of Sibelius’s most popular works. But he sold the copyright to his publisher for a
paltry amount, a move that he was to regret for the rest of his life.
Scene with Cranes, adapted from the music to scenes 3 and 4 of the play, was published in 1906.
Sibelius was particularly haunted by the sight and sound of cranes in flight, and this is one of his
most powerfully atmospheric nature scenes. As so often, he achieves an unforgettable effect with
very simple means – a brief passage featuring falling two-note figures for two clarinets stands out
with stark clarity against the gentle background of string tone set up at the beginning, with a
passage of dialogue for solo violin and solo cello drawing the piece to its soft conclusion.
Symphony No.1 in C, Op 21
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
1. Adagio molto – allegro con brio; 2. Andante cantabile con moto; 3. Menuetto. Allegro molto e
vivace; 4. Adagio – allegro molto e vivace.
As a composer, Beethoven first established himself in his adopted Vienna with chamber works,
sonatas and concertos, mostly for, or involving, his own instrument, the piano. He seems to have
deliberately avoided the genres of string quartet and symphony of which Haydn was the greatest
living master. At any rate it is noticeable that Beethoven only began his First Symphony long after
Haydn had produced his last completed examples.
Beethoven started work on a symphony in C in 1795, but he left it unfinished. In the musical
climate of Vienna in the mid-1790s it would have taken more prestige than Beethoven currently
enjoyed to be able to present a symphony in public, and it may simply have been this lack of
performance opportunity which caused him to lose interest in the work.
Some of the material from this aborted attempt found its way into his first fully-fledged symphony,
which he began in 1799. It was premiered at his first benefit concert in Vienna in April 1800, an
ambitious undertaking which also included his Piano Concerto No.1 in C (Beethoven had intended
to perform No.3 in C minor but it was not completed in time) and the first performance of his
Septet.
From the point of view of the later symphonies, No.1 can seem a relatively conventional work on
the surface. No doubt conscious of what he was taking on, Beethoven, not surprisingly, drew on
the example of Haydn and Mozart as he tested the waters in his first completed attempt at the
genre. In particular, the second movement has an eighteenth-century grace and elegance, and
the main part of the finale bubbles along with Haydnesque good humour.
All the same, the music forcefully announces a fresh talent harbouring unorthodox ideas.
Beethoven’s scoring, which gives prominence to the wind instruments, was novel enough to
attract unfavourable comment after the first performance. The first movement does not even start
in the main key; instead the music works its way round to it during the slow introduction. The socalled minuet is no such thing, but a boisterous, hectic scherzo which moves at a faster pace than
even Haydn had dared in his string quartets and symphonies. This is the movement that most
clearly shows Beethoven striking out on his own path. The finale begins with a teasing slow
introduction, unfolding a rising scale one note at a time in mock-pedantic fashion (this idea derives
from the earlier, unfinished, symphony).
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For all its indebtedness to Haydn and Mozart, it is the sheer force and energy of Beethoven’s
personality which comes across most strongly in his First Symphony – qualities which Mozart had
recognised some fifteen years earlier when, after hearing the teenage Beethoven improvise, he
commented “Keep an eye on him. One day he will give the world something to talk about.”
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Programme notes © Mike Wheeler 2014. Unauthorised reproduction is prohibited.
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Thank You
www.vivaorch.co.uk
Special thanks go to our supporters:
Funders: Arts Council England, Derby City Council, Derbyshire County Council
Lincolnshire County Council, Orchestras Live
Principal Business Sponsor: Rolls-Royce plc
Business Supporter - New Year's Eve Gala Performance 2013: Handelsbanken Nottingham
Leader’s Chair - Sponsored by Maestro Members: Brian King, Peter Steer, Robin Wood
Trust and Foundations
Angus Allnatt Charitable Foundation
Children in Need
D'Oyly Carte Charitable Trust
Freemasons of Derby Grassroots Fund
Foyle Foundation
Heritage Lottery Fund
Jessie Spencer Trust
JR Halkes Settlement
Royal Philharmonic Society and PRS for Music Foundation
Santander
The Bergne-Coupland Charity
The Ernest Book Trust
The John Ellerman Foundation
The National Forest
The Prince of Wales Charitable Foundation
The Thomas Farr Charity
The Wallbrook Fund
The Waynflete Charitable Trust
Tom Carey Fund
Our grateful thanks also go to our kind patrons who attended our concerts and those that have
provided donations to support our work.
Just as each of our musicians in today’s concert has played a vital part, we invite you to play a
vital role. To find out how you can make a difference please contact Simone Lennox-Gordon,
Head of Development on 01332 207 566 or email [email protected]
The Orchestra
Conductor
Fawzi Haimor
Soloist
Leonard Elschenbroich
Violin 1
Benedict Holland
Kelly McCusker
Ken Mitchell
Rebecca Allfree
Chris Windass
Clare Bhabra
Emily Chaplais
Belinda Hammond
Flute
Rachel Holt
Jonathan Booty
Violin 2
Philip Gallaway
Sian McInally
Janet Hall
Hazel Parkes
Jacob Lay
Mathias Svensson
Viola
Isobel Adams
David Danford
Janina Kopinska
Nicky Akeroyd
Cello
Deirdre Bencsik
Graham Morris
Lucy Wilding
Diane Tice
Oboe
Emily Pailthorpe
Maddy Aldis-Evans
Clarinet
Helen Bishop
Matthew Dunn
Bassoon
Adam Mackenzie
Claire Gainford
Horn
James Topp
Richard Lewis
Trumpet
Anthony Thompson
Gordon Truman
Timpani
Graham Hall
Double Bass
Dan Storer
David Burndrett
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Images front cover and overleaf: Leonard Elschenbroich – copyright Felix Broede.
Fawzi Haimor
Conductor
Leonard Elschenbroich
Cello
“The Alabama Symphony, under Fawzi Haimor, performed both
works with remarkable verve.” Birmingham News, Alabama
“A very interesting interpretation… from cellist Leonard Elschenbroich - a
name we're going to hear much more of.” David Mellor, Classic FM
Fawzi Haimor holds the position of Resident
Conductor of the Pittsburgh Symphony
Orchestra, where he conducts a variety of
concerts including subscription, pops, education
and outreach. While in Pittsburgh, he has
served as a cover to esteemed conductors
including Manfred Honeck, Leonard Slatkin,
Gianandrea Noseda, Rafael Fruhbeck de
Burgos and Jan Pascal Tortelier.
As a guest artist, Haimor works with such
orchestras as Alabama Symphony Orchestra,
Jacksonville
Symphony,
Kansas
City
Symphony, Erie Chamber Orchestra and
Amman Symphony in the Middle East. He
made his European debut with Orquestra
Sinfónica do Porto in 2011 and he recently
made his Italian debut with the Filarmonica del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, receiving an immediate
reinvitation to the orchestra in the 2014/15 season. He returns to Europe this June to work with
Württembergisches Kammerorchester Heilbronn, which will incorporate his London debut at
Cadogan Hall. In the 2014/2015 season, debuts include those with Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano
Giuseppe Verdi and with Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra.
Passionate about the education of young musicians, Fawzi Haimor was the first music director of the
newly formed Alabama Symphony Youth Orchestra where he was involved in the development of a
brand new premier level youth orchestra for the state of Alabama. He was also the founder and first
music director of the Davis Summer Symphony, an organization geared towards the education and
outreach of classical music to residents of the Davis, California community. He has subsequently
been invited to guest conduct youth ensembles across the United States.
His repertoire includes the late romantic Germanic works, 19th and 20th century Russian and
American composers, plus he is a committed advocate of contemporary music and has performed
works by composers such as Kevin Puts, Bela Fleck, Mohammed Fairouz and Avner Dorman.
Born in Chicago in 1983, Fawzi Haimor was raised in the Middle East and the San Francisco Bay
Area. He began playing the violin at the age of 4 and completed his training at the Jacobs School of
Music in Indiana University. Here he studied under David Effron and Arthur Fagen as well as
attending master classes around the world led by highly respected conductors including Herbert
Blomstedt, Jorma Panula and Gustav Meier.
He earned bachelor’s degrees in both music and neurobiology, physiology, and behaviour, and a
master’s degree in conducting from the University of California-Davis, before completing his second
master’s in instrumental conducting at Indiana University.
Fawzi Haimor currently lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with his wife Houda and their young
children.
Leonard Elschenbroich has excited interest
as one the most charismatic cellists of his
generation. Leonard joined the BBC Radio 3
New Generation Artist scheme in 2012, a
prestigious award offering performances and
recordings with all the BBC orchestras,
recitals at Wigmore Hall and The Sage,
Gateshead, with all performances broadcast
on the BBC. Leonard has appeared at the
BBC Proms, most recently in 2013 with the
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Charles
Dutoit. In the 2013/14 season he makes
debuts with the Netherlands Philharmonic
Orchestra at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw
with Andrew Litton and his debut with the
Washington National Orchestra is a highlight.
He returns to the London Philharmonic
Orchestra and the Japan Philharmonic where he made his Tokyo debut in 2012 conducted by
Alexander Lazarev. He also appears with BBC Scottish Symphony and John Wilson, BBC
Philharmonic and Vassily Sinaisky, BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Gullberg Jensen.
He has worked with a number of eminent conductors, including Christoph Eschenbach, Dmitri
Kitajenko, Valery Gergiev, Semyon Bychkov and Manfred Honeck. As a soloist he has
performed with the London Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, WDR Symphony
Orchestra, Konzerthaus Orchester Berlin, Swedish Radio Symphony, Basel Symphony
Orchestra, Stavanger Symphony, St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Buenos Aires
Philharmonic, Nagoya Philharmonic and Japan Philharmonic. He made his debut at the
Musikverein in Vienna with the Dresden Staatskapelle and Christoph Eschenbach on their 2011
European tour. Leonard made his debut tour of China at the start of the 2012/2013 season with
concerts in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Tianjin, and Beijing. Leonard Elschenbroich has given
recitals at the Wigmore Hall in London and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, both returns this
season, the Auditorium du Louvre, at the Ravinia Festival in Chicago, the Lucerne Festival, the
Gstaad Festival, the Istanbul International Festival, the Rheingau, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern,
and Schleswig-Holstein Festival, where he performed the complete Beethoven sonatas with
Christoph Eschenbach. On tour in South America, he has performed with the Buenos Aires
Philharmonic at the Teatro Colon and gave recitals in Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires,
Montevideo, Lima and Sao Paulo.
In 2013, his debut CD (Rachmaninov & Shostakovich (viola) sonatas) for Onyx Classics
received 5 star reviews from The Telegraph, The Guardian, BBC Music Magazine (Choice of
the Month), Pizzicato, Diapason, amongst others. Leonard is a member of two distinguished
piano trios: the Sitkovetsky Piano Trio with whom he toured Australia this season and the
Benedetti, Elschenbroich, Grynyuk Piano Trio. Leonard Elschenbroich’s many awards include:
the Leonard Bernstein Award, Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award, Eugene Istomin Prize, Pro Europa
prize, Landgraf von Hessen price of the Kronberg Academy, Nordmetall Prize of the
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival, Firmenich Prize of the Verbier Festival.