February 20, 21, 2016

Samuel Barber

American composer

born 1910, West Chester, Pennsylvania; died 1981, New York City

Overture to “The School for Scandal”

First Classics performance: November 19, 1950, conducted by William Steinberg; most recent

performance: March 4, 2001, conducted by JoAnn Falletta; duration 8 minutes

Precocious as a child, American composer Samuel Barber entered the prestigious Curtis

Institute of Music at 14, where he studied piano, composition, conducting and voice. Listeners

who admire Barber’s original scores will not be surprised to learn that it was the composer’s

voice training which exerted the greatest pull on his musical development. In fact, as an aspiring

baritone soloist, Barber became advanced enough to present professional recitals in Vienna and

the United States, in addition to a featured appearance on the NBC radio network in 1935.

In sum, it seems natural that a vocal and expressly melodic instinct would inform all of

Barber’s compositions, including his works for full orchestra, several of which have become

mainstays in the concert repertoire. Among his most frequently performed symphonic scores are

the exceedingly popular Adagio for Strings (1938), Violin Concerto (1940), Piano Concerto

(1962), and Capricorn Concerto for flute, oboe, trumpet (1944).

Inspired by a play by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the Overture to the School for Scandal was

composed in 1932 to fulfill Barber’s graduation thesis requirement from the Curtis Institute. The

masterful setting of the overture’s melodic, harmonic and structural parameters were hardly to be

expected from a composer of just 22 years of age. The opus revealed what was to become

Barber’s life-long inclination to compose works with literary associations, resulting in a wide

repertoire of songs and symphonic works reflecting the diverse styles of Joyce, Shelley, Yeats,

Rilke, Neruda and others.

As for Sheridan’s original of 1777, The School for Scandal is a ribald theater farce. The play

pokes merciless fun at pretentious English society, as the sincere but naive love between Charles

and Maria is saved in the nick of time from the salacious designs of their blundering superiors.

Given the hilarious bantering on-stage -- “Those who gossip are as important as those who create

it” -- Barber’s musical digest is likewise charged with delightful witticisms and ironic turns of

phrase. The tempo and tone is up-beat and breezy, full of symphonic sparkle and embellished by

sassy figurations which tease the moods and modes on the fly. Along the way, lovely, lyrical

phrases in the strings are balanced by expressive moments for the solo clarinet and English horn,

among other highlights from the savvy orchestration. As in the case of Sheridan’s original, it is

all over too quickly.

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Ludwig van Beethoven

German composer and pianist

born: December 17, 1770, Bonn; died: March 26, 1827, Vienna

Concerto for Piano No. 4 in G Major, Op.58

Allegro moderato

Andante con moto

Rondo: Vivace

First Classics performance: May 3, 1936, with pianist Stanley Fletcher, conducted by Creighton

Churchill; most recent performance: October 9, 2011, with pianist William Wolfram, conducted

by JoAnn Falletta; duration 33 minutes

Beethoven was fortunate to enjoy the rare gift of a magnificent mental ear -- while

composing, he could hear perfectly all of the pitches and harmonies in his head. But we must

also note that earning a livelihood depended upon his reputation as one of the great piano

virtuosos of his time. And like Mozart before him, Beethoven composed a lot of music for his

own use, including his piano concertos. It is in that regard that his hearing loss had to be the most

compromising. Composer Louis Spohr noted:

“Beethoven’s playing was not a treat, for in the first place the piano was badly out of tune,

which Beethoven minded little since he did not hear it. In forte passages the poor deaf man

pounded on the keys till the strings jangled, and in the piano passages he played so softly that

whole groups of notes were omitted.”

Apart from that sad reality, Beethoven never lost touch with daily life and revealed a keen

interest in the technical development of the piano. In fact, the composer was on the scene at

exactly the right moment to take full advantage of important technical developments. For

example, the new ‘pianoforte’ as it was known (literally: soft-loud) could produce a range of

dynamic contrasts which compared favorably with today’s modern concert grands. And

Beethoven did all he could to encourage various manufacturers. He once wrote to a leading piano

builder:

“It is certain that the current ways of playing the pianoforte are still the most uncultivated of

all the instruments. I am glad, my dear fellow, that you are one who comprehends and feels that

one may sing on the pianoforte, if one is capable of feeling.”

Beethoven was speaking about the new Viennese six-octave instrument which not only added

a full octave of expressive potential, but was the first keyboard to be triple-strung, i.e. with three

strings under each hammer. Beyond that, the pedal mechanism to shift the hammers was so

accurate a player could strike just one string at a time. Indeed, Beethoven calls for the effect

throughout the Andante with the instruction una corda. Our modern-day pianists achieve the

effect by employing the soft pedal on a concert grand.

But of course, where Beethoven inspired the greatest changes in both piano building and

performance technique is found in his legacy to the repertoire: 32 sonatas, five splendid

concertos, double and triple concertos and a broad array of other works which feature the

keyboard in a variety of roles.

Completed in 1805 and dedicated to Archduke Rudolf, Concerto No. 4 begins with a

deflecting surprise - as if the soloist were browsing over the keys barely aware that an orchestra

was standing by. This is a major departure from the classical norm of a big intro from the full

orchestra, first and second themes, etc. But in a moment the improvised feel transforms into an

orchestral bouquet, with full-scale pyrotechnics from the keyboard.

The opening to the second movement Andante is likewise unusual -- we first hear a stark

recitative from the imperial strings, with angular rhythms poised over plaintive replies from the

soloist in E minor. The yin-yang interplay is doubtless a symbolic dialogue -- a kind of

intermezzo -- about which Beethoven gave no direct hint. A dreamy final lyric from the soloist

closes the scene. En garde. A brilliant dawn is about to break, as a wake-up call from the

morning breeze captures the scene in full. Back in G major, the dance-like energy is one of the

happiest and most playful movements from the desk of Beethoven -- the bringer of Promethian

joy.

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Béla Bartók (1881-1945)

Hungarian composer, pianist and musicologist

born: March 25, 1881, Nagyszentmiklós; died: September 26,1945, New York City

Concerto for Orchestra Introduction: Andante non troppo; Allegro vivace

Giuoco delle coppie (Game of Pairs): Allegretto scherzando

Elegia: Andante non troppo

Intermezzo interrotto: Allegretto

Finale: Pesante; Presto

In 1940, the legendary maestro Fritz Reiner and violinist Joseph Szigeti convinced the

Koussevitsky Foundation to commission a new orchestral work from Bela Bartók. The composer

had just emigrated from his native Hungary to the United States, taking up residence in New

York City at the age of 60. But his personal circumstances were exceedingly strained, due to the

declining state of his health and the dire condition of his finances. It was therefore all the more

difficult for him to adjust to the frenetic tempo of his new environment. Bartók’s letters reveal

exasperation at every turn from the normal difficulty of learning a new language late in life to the

frustrations of getting lost for hours in the Manhattan subways. He also possessed a measure of

stubborn pride which meant he would not accept any commission that might possibly be

construed as a charitable gesture. Happily, Reiner and Szigeti found the requisite finesse and by

1943 the Concerto for Orchestra was complete.

Bartók provided the following commentary for the world premiere of the work by the Boston

Symphony under conductor Serge Koussevitsky in December of 1944:

“The general mood of the work represents, apart from the jesting second movement, a gradual

transition from the sternness of the first movement and the lugubrious death-song of the third, to

the life assertion of the last one.

“The title of this symphony-like orchestral work is explained by its tendency to treat the

single instrument in a ‘concertante’ or soloistic manner. The ‘virtuoso’ treatment appears, for

instance, in the fugato sections of the development of the first movement (brass instruments), or

in the ‘perpetuum mobile’ styled passage of the principal theme in the last movement (strings),

and especially, in the second movement, in which pairs of instruments consecutively appear with

brilliant passages.”

If ever one might be intoxicated by the lavish color, energy and nuance of 20th century

orchestral music, it will happen here. Featuring each of the sections of winds, brass, percussion

and strings separately and in myriad combinations, the Concerto for Orchestra is an

instrumental tour de force, with contrasts that blend from the macrosonic stratosphere to lush

delicacy.

The work opens with quiescent low strings, over which are patched high-string shimmers and

pastel woodwinds, with tuneful motifs on which the entire piece is conceived. In the second

movement, ‘Game of Pairs,’ a brief signal in the snare drum precedes the interaction of five

different instruments, paired at specific intervals: bassoons in sixths, oboes in thirds, clarinets in

sevenths and trumpets in major seconds.

For digression, the nocturne-like Elegia offers a misty memoir with evocative bird calls and

dark, full-throated chants in the strings. The effects seem far more surreal than Impressionistic --

perhaps a dreamy delirium of something or someone long lost (Bartók’s music is replete with

such souvenirs). This is followed by the sweetly seductive Intermezzo. After an opening in the

woodwinds spiced with augmented fourths, we are treated to an alluring gypsy tune in the choir

of low and mid-register strings. A brash and bawdy distraction interrupts momentarily before we

are again treated to the theme from the soul of Eastern Europe. Finally, the maddening pace of

the fifth movement takes flight as if upon the winds of a great storm of hail and fire. Many

surprises here: folk tunes, biting dissonances, deft counterpoint, irreverent rhythms, frightful

chaos, brazen peals in the brass. Spectacular..!

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program notes by Edward Yadzinski

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