Chamber Music New Zealand Presents

BORODINQUARTET

Tonight’s concert is sponsored by Maurice and Kaye Clark who are generous donors and patrons for a number of Wellington-based community and cultural organisations. Maurice is Managing Director of McKee Fehl and has developed a reputation for revitalising distressed heritage buildings. We welcome their friends and guests from Wellington City Council, Victoria University of Wellington and the Ministry for Culture and Heritage.

Warmest wishes from the whole team at Chamber Music New Zealand, until next year!

Enjoy!

Euan MurdochChief Executive Chamber Music New Zealand

Welcome

Thank you for joining us this evening for the final concert of our 2014 Kaleidoscopes season.

Formed in 1945, the Borodin Quartet is revered throughout the world for their authoritative and intense performances of the core repertoire, and their tour of New Zealand marks the culmination of our year-long exploration of the string quartet genre. What better way to complete this journey than by experiencing Shostakovich and late Beethoven in the hands of these masters.

We acknowledge our Australian sister organisation Musica Viva, Arts Festival Dunedin and all our generous supporters throughout New Zealand for helping us to present this legendary ensemble again.

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Please respect the music, the musicians, and your fellow audience members, by switching off all cellphones, pagers and watches. Taking photographs, or sound or video recordings during the concert is strictly prohibited unless with the prior approval of Chamber Music New Zealand.

1Borodin Quartet

Myaskovsky String Quartet No 13 Opus 86 4

Shostakovich String Quartet No 11 Opus 122 5

Interval

Beethoven String Quartet in B flat Opus 130 6

Wellington 16 October Christchurch 17 October Dunedin* 18 October Napier 20 October Auckland 22 October

The Auckland and Wellington concerts will be recorded for broadcast by Radio NZ Concert

Programme

*Part of Arts Festival Dunedin 2014

2 Chamber Music New Zealand

For nearly 70 years the Borodin Quartet has been renowned as a leader in the chamber music field, and praised for its searching performances of Beethoven and Shostakovich. Formed in 1945 at the Moscow Conservatory, the group took on the name of one of Russia’s great composers ten years later, and began touring outside the Soviet Union.

Since its inception the Quartet has included Russian music in its repertoire, and a close

relationship with Shostakovich – with whom the players frequently collaborated – has seen them give many performances of the complete cycle of his fifteen string quartets in major cities around the world.

The Borodin Quartet is equally at home in the core string quartet repertoire, and celebrated its 60th anniversary year by performing all sixteen Beethoven quartets in Amsterdam and Vienna, and later issuing a recording of them that has been described in the American Record Guide as “exemplary”. In 2010, their 65th anniversary was marked with a recording of quartets by Borodin, Myaskovsky and Stravinsky.

Ruben Aharonian violin

Sergey Lomovsky violin

Borodin Quartet

3Borodin Quartet

Vladimir Balshin cello

New Zealanders have been enjoying concerts by the Borodin Quartet for 50 years: this is the group’s sixth tour for Chamber Music New Zealand, and follows their previous visits in 1965, 1968, 1987, 1993 and 2010.

Members of the Borodin Quartet are all graduates of the Moscow Conservatory. Ruben Aharonian’s early career was as a soloist, and he was a prizewinner at several leading European competitions. He was also Principal Conductor and Music Director of the State Chamber Orchestra of Armenia. As a teenager, Igor Naidin was a member of the prize-winning Russo Quartet, and after graduating from the Conservatory he won the

Yuri Bashmet Viola Competition in Moscow. Both Ruben Aharonian and Igor Naidin joined in 1996. Vladimir Balshin was also a member of the Russo Quartet, and is a laureate of numerous quartet and cello competitions. He was a member of Yuri Bashmet’s Moscow Soloists, and the Brahms Trio, before joining the Borodin Quartet in 2007. Sergey Lomovsky was also a member of the Moscow Soloists, and took up the position of second violinist in 2011.

Igor Naidin viola

4 Chamber Music New Zealand

Nikolay MyaskovskyBorn Novo-Georgiyevsk, Poland, 20 April 1881 Died Moscow, 8 August 1950

String Quartet No 13 Opus 86ModeratoPresto fantasticoAndante con moto e molto cantabileMolto vivo, energico

Myaskovsky came from a military family, and despite his evident musical aptitude he was forced to study military engineering in St Petersburg. He continued studying music as well, taking composition lessons with Gliere. In 1906 he was released from military service and enrolled in the St Petersburg Conservatory, where he studied with Rimsky-Korsakov, Lyadov and Glazunov, and where he formed a life-long friendship with his fellow student Prokofiev.

During his time at the Conservatory, Myaskovsky produced two symphonies, several piano sonatas, and a few other orchestral works. He was recalled to the army during World War II, and after the war was appointed to the Moscow Conservatory, where his composition students during the following 30 years included Kabalevsky and Khatchaturian. In 1927 the Soviet Republic honoured Myaskovsky as an Artist of Merit, and in 1941 he was awarded a Stalin Prize for his 21st Symphony.

Five years later he was named a People’s Artist of the USSR, but in 1948 his 26th Symphony – despite being based on Russian themes – was criticised for being ‘gloomy’

and not optimistic enough. Along with Shostakovich and Prokofiev, he was one of the composers denounced in the ‘Zhdanov decree’, which attacked them for being ‘formalist’ and bourgeois rather than publicly accessible. Myaskovsky was also attacked as a teacher, for encouraging ‘inharmonious music’, and was apparently devastated by the criticism.

His String Quartet No 13 was composed the following year, and was his last work to be published. It crowned a productive period, in which he also wrote his Cello Sonata, his final symphony and three piano sonatas, despite being ill. The Quartet was given its première by the dedicatees, the renowned Beethoven Quartet, shortly after Myaskovsky’s death, and was he was posthumously awarded a State Prize for it. Written in a nostalgic, late-Romantic style, the work also demonstrates Myaskovsky’s contrapuntal skills, and the singing melodic lines that constantly permeate the music make his denounciation by the authorities hard to comprehend.

The rich textures of the opening Moderato, in A minor, contain three distinct themes that return throughout and gradually mutate, making this sonata form movement reminiscent of a ‘rondo’. A whirlwind scherzo, marked Presto fantastico, is dominated by its waltz-like central section. The only movement in the major key is the slow Andante, which has a classical and affecting simplicity. The final Molto vivo is again packed with melodies, and draws the work together with an exuberant flourish.

5Borodin Quartet

Dmitri ShostakovichBorn St Petersburg, 25 September 1906 Died Moscow, 9 August 1975

String Quartet No 11 in F minor Opus 122Introduction: Andantino – Scherzo: Allegretto – Recitative: Adagio – Etude: Allegro – Humoresque: Allegro – Elegy: Adagio – Finale: Moderato

In 1964 there was a leadership change in the Soviet Republic, when Brezhnev ousted Khrushchev, and controls were relaxed while the new regime was established. By 1966, though, a neo-Stalinist clampdown on anything ‘liberal’ was in place. Shostakovich had already suffered from official ‘disapproval’ in 1936, when he was accused of writing ‘formalist’ music that lacked simplicity, but had regained favour with his Fifth Symphony the following year. A further attack, in the 1948 ‘Zhdanov decree’, led to Shostakovich losing his position as a teacher at the Conservatoire, forcing him to write film scores for a living.

The Quartet No 11 was written shortly after his sombre Symphony No 13 of 1962, which had been banned by the Soviet authorities. The symphony had set to music five poems by the Russian poet Yevtushenko, the most controversial of which, Babi Yar, dealt with the German massacre of Jews in World War II. This Quartet inhabits the same desolate sound world.

As with most of his chamber works, the Beethoven Quartet gave the public première, in March 1966. It was warmly received, but later that night Shostakovich had a heart attack that put him in hospital for three months.

The work has been described as “cryptic” and is in the unusual form of seven short inter-linked movements, played without a break. Fleeting shifts in mood and tempo produce a fragmentary effect that underlines the work’s bleak nature. It opens with a solo violin introducing the main material of the first movement, and shortly afterwards the cello enters with a motif that appears in each of the following movements in varying guises. In the second movement this motif is rewritten as repeated quavers – a form in which it is heard again in the final movement. At the end of the second movement a seemingly casual accompanying idea is carried through into the jagged-edged third movement, the oddly-titled Recitative.

The Etude that follows is an equally steely moto perpetuo, and the next movement, Humoresque, is an exercise in repetition and minimalism. The title of this movement is also odd, suggesting an element of black humour.

The long Elegy commemorates Vassily Shirinsky, the former second violinist of the Beethoven Quartet, who had died the previous year. It begins with a dotted rhythm motif which is most likely a reference to the ‘Funeral March’ movement of Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony. The Finale closes the work with a muted reminder of textural and melodic material from the earlier movements.

6 Chamber Music New Zealand

Ludwig van BeethovenBaptised Bonn, 17 December 1770 Died Vienna, 26 March 1827

String Quartet in B flat Opus 130Adagio ma non troppoPrestoAndante con moto, ma non troppoAlla danza tedescaCavatinaAllegro

Beethoven’s last few years were plagued by poverty, ill health and difficult personal relationships. His hearing had gone, and many of his aristocratic patrons had suffered financially from the Napoleonic wars, so could no longer support him. Musically, however, Beethoven was achieving great things. Successful premières of the Mass and Ninth Symphony in 1824 allowed him time to relax a little, and he took the opportunity to return to string quartet writing.

He had been commissioned in 1822 by Prince Nikolay Galitzin of St Petersburg to write three quartets, but was not able to begin work on them until 1824. The first (Opus 127) was completed in February 1825 and he immediately began work on the second (Opus 132). That work was not finished until July due to a serious illness that kept Beethoven confined to his bed. The third, which became the Quartet in B flat Opus 130, was written later in 1825, and overflows with ideas and mood changes – so much so that the publisher suggested to Beethoven that his

original ending was a bit too much. He agreed and wrote a new, shorter final movement, saving the first version to publish as the Grosse Fuge Opus 133.

The massive first movement begins with a measured introduction that eventually bursts into a highly contrapuntal and passionate exposition. As the music progresses, it becomes clear that the introductory material is in fact an integral part of the movement, and the contrast between stately and energetic is an essential element in the musical argument. A fleeting second movement is in the form of a scherzo with a central ‘trio’ section that is dominated by the busy first violin part.

After its initial solemn chords, the third movement provides a timely reminder that Beethoven was originally a Classical composer, with its gracefulness and moments of humour recalling the quartets of Haydn. The following movement also looks back to an earlier time, and some commentators have suggested that in this Quartet Beethoven was deliberately invoking the suite, a multi-movement form that was popular in the Baroque period. Marked ‘like a German dance’, the fourth movement is in the style of a lyrical minuet, and like the second movement is brief. The Cavatina that follows takes the music in a new direction, with a heart-felt and contemplative extended aria. A final exuberant Allegro returns the music to the lighter mood of the central movements.

7Borodin Quartet

The string quartet in Russia

For this final concert of Chamber Music New Zealand’s ‘Year of the String Quartet’, the spotlight comes on Russia’s contribution. In the first half of the 19th century little of significance was written for the ensemble, although the early nationalist composer Glinka (1804-1857) produced two by 1830, and the founder of the St Petersburg Conservatory Anton Rubinstein (1829-1894) wrote six of his ten quartets in the 1850s.

The genre seems to have become popular in the early 1870s, with the three quartets by Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) leading the way. The ‘Mighty Handful’, a group who sought to include Russian melodies and stories in their music, included three quartet composers: Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908), Cui (1835-1918) and Borodin (1833-1887). The latter’s String Quartet No 2, written in 1881, contains one of the most well-known pieces in the repertoire, the elegantly romantic ‘Nocturne’.

Rimsky-Korsakov and his students Lyadov (1855-1914) and Glazunov (1865-1936) were leaders of the St Petersburg musical circle that gathered around the wealthy patron and later music publisher Belyayev. He hosted weekly ‘quartet evenings’ on Fridays, and his support for Russian music inspired several collaborative pieces, including the eponymous ‘B-la-F’ quartet, written by Rimsky-Korsakov, Lyadov, Glazunov and Borodin for Belyayev’s 50th birthday.

At the same time, the Russian Musical Society was presenting concerts and providing musical education in both St Petersburg and Moscow, and members of the Society played newly written quartets by both established and emerging composers. The first permanent ensemble, though, was formed by the Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and became the St Petersburg Court Quartet. That group toured for 22 years, performing around Europe on a set of Guarneri instruments.

Two years after the 1917 Russian Revolution the Glazunov Quartet was formed in Leningrad (formerly St Petersburg), and the group is notable for giving the première of Shostokovich’s First String Quartet. The Beethoven Quartet started life in 1923 as the Moscow Conservatory Quartet, adopting its new name eight years later, after performing their second cycle of Beethoven’s sixteen quartets. They enjoyed a close relationship with Shostakovich, giving premières of all his quartets except the first and last, and with other significant composers such as Myaskovsky. Shostakovich also worked with both the Borodin Quartet and the Taneyev Quartet, both of which have continued until today. The latter took its name from the composer, Sergey Taneyev (1856-1915), who wrote nine string quartets between 1876 and 1905.

These long-lived groups have been joined in recent years by many other fine ensembles, and Russian repertoire has continued to grow, with notable contributions from composers such as Gubaidulina (born 1931), Schnittke (1934-1998) and Silvestrov (born 1937).

8 Chamber Music New Zealand

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BoardChair, Roger King; Paul Baines, Gretchen La Roche, Sarah Sinclair, Vanessa Van den Broek, Peter Walls, Lloyd Williams.

StaffChief Executive, Euan MurdochBusiness Manager, Jenni Hall Business Support Coordinator, Gemma RobinsonOperations Coordinator, Rachel HardieOffice Administrator, Becky HolmesArtist Development Manager, Catherine Gibson Programme Coordinator (Education and Outreach), Sue Jane Programme Writer, Jane Dawson Audience Development Manager, Victoria DaddMarketing & Communications Coordinator, Candice de VilliersTicketing & Database Coordinator, Laurel BruceDesign & Print, Chris McDonaldPublicist, Sally Woodfield

BranchesAuckland: Chair, Victoria Silwood; Concert Manager, Ros Giffney

Hamilton: Chair, Murray Hunt; Concert Manager, Gaye Duffill

New Plymouth: Chair, Joan Gaines; Concert Manager, Susan Case

Hawkes Bay: Chair, June Clifford; Concert Manager, Liffy Roberts

Manawatu: Chair, Graham Parsons; Concert Manager, Virginia Warbrick

Wellington: Concert Manager, Rachel Hardie

Nelson: Chair, Annette Monti; Concert Manager, Clare Monti

Christchurch: Chair, Colin McLachlan; Concert Manager, Jody Keehan

Dunedin: Chair, Terence Dennis; Concert Manager, Richard Dingwall

Southland: Chair, Shona Thomson; Concert Manager, Jennifer Sinclair

Regional Presenters Blenheim, Cromwell, Gisborne, Gore, Hutt Valley, Kaitaia, Kerikeri, Morrinsville, Motueka, Rotorua, Taihape, Tauranga, Te Awamutu, Tokoroa, Upper Hutt, Waikanae, Waimakariri, Waipukurau, Wanaka, Wanganui, Warkworth, Wellington, Whakatane and Whangarei.

© Chamber Music New Zealand 2014 No part of this programme may be reproduced without the prior permission of Chamber Music New Zealand.

Regional Concerts & Other Events

The Troubles ( jazz band) Kaitaia, 18 October

Donizetti Trio (flute, bassoon, piano) Gore, 19 October Wanaka, 21 October Cromwell, 22 October Motueka, 24 October

Stephen de Pledge (piano) Whakatane, 2 November

Koru Quintet (wind quintet) Rangiora, 24 October Motueka, 21 November

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KALEIDOSCOPES 2015 Chamber Music New Zealand

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