Notes on the Program by Dr

Notes on the Program by Dr. Richard E. Rodda

Symphony No. 1 in D major, Op. 25, “Classical” Sergei Prokofiev

(1891-1953)

Composed in 1916-1917.

Premiered on April 21, 1918 in Leningrad, conducted by the composer.

“In the field of instrumental music, I am well content with the forms already perfected. I want nothing better, nothing more flexible or more complete than sonata form, which contains everything necessary to my structural purpose.” This statement, given to Olin Downes by Prokofiev during an interview in 1930 for The New York Times, seems a curious one for a composer who had gained a reputation as an ear-shattering iconoclast, the enfant terrible of 20th-century music, the master of modernity. While it is certainly true that some of his early works (Scythian Suite, Sarcasms, the first two Piano Concertos) raised the hackles of musical traditionalists, it is also true that Prokofiev sought to preserve that same tradition by extending its boundaries to encompass his own distinctive style. A glance through the list of his works shows a preponderance of established Classical forms: sonatas, symphonies, concertos, operas, ballets, quartets, overtures and suites account for most of his output. This is certainly not to say that he merely mimicked the music of earlier generations, but he did accept it as the conceptual framework within which he built his own compositions.

Prokofiev’s penchant for using Classical musical idioms was instilled in him during the course of his thorough, excellent training: when he was a little tot, his mother played Beethoven sonatas to him while he sat under the piano; he studied with the greatest Russian musicians of the time — Glière, Rimsky-Korsakov, Liadov, Glazunov; he began composing at the Mozartian age of six. By the time he was 25, Prokofiev was composing prolifically, always brewing a variety of compositions simultaneously. The works of 1917, for example, represent widely divergent styles — The Gambler is a satirical opera; They Are Seven, a nearly atonal cantata; the Classical Symphony, a charming miniature. This last piece was a direct result of Prokofiev’s study with Alexander Tcherepnin, a good and wise teacher who allowed the young composer to forge ahead in his own manner while making sure that he had a thorough understanding of the great musical works of the past. It was in 1916 that Prokofiev first had the idea for a symphony based directly on the Viennese models supplied by Tcherepnin, and at that time he sketched out a few themes for it. Most of the work, however, was done the following year, as Prokofiev recounted in his Autobiography:

“I spent the summer of 1917 in complete solitude in the environs of Petrograd; I read Kant and I worked hard. I had purposely not had my piano moved to the country because I wanted to establish the fact that thematic material worked out without a piano is better.... The idea occurred to me to compose an entire symphonic work without the piano. Composed in this fashion, the orchestral colors would, of necessity, be clearer and cleaner. Thus the plan of a symphony in Haydnesque style originated, since, as a result of my studies in Tcherepnin’s classes, Haydn’s technique had somehow become especially clear to me, and with such intimate understanding it was much easier to plunge into the dangerous flood without a piano. It seemed to me that, were he alive today, Haydn, while retaining his style of composition, would have appropriated something from the modern. Such a symphony I now wanted to compose: a symphony in the classic manner. As it began to take actual form I named it Classical Symphony; first, because it was the simplest thing to call it; second, out of bravado, to stir up a hornet’s nest; and finally, in the hope that should the symphony prove itself in time to be truly ‘classic,’ it would benefit me considerably.” Prokofiev’s closing wish has been fulfilled — the Classical Symphony has been one of his most successful works ever since it was first heard.

The work is in the four movements customary in Haydn’s symphonies, though at only fifteen minutes it hardly runs to half their typical length. The dapper first movement is a miniature sonata design that follows the traditional form but adds some quirks that would have given old Haydn himself a chuckle — the recapitulation, for example, begins in the “wrong” key (but soon rights itself), and occasionally a beat is left out, as though the music had stubbed its toe. The sleek main theme is followed by the enormous leaps, flashing grace notes and sparse texture of the second subject. A graceful, ethereal melody floating high in the violins is used to open and close the Larghetto, with the pizzicato gentle middle section reaching a brilliant tutti before quickly subsiding. The third movement, a Gavotte, comes not from the Viennese symphony but rather from the tradition of French Baroque ballet. The finale is the most brilliant movement of the Symphony, and calls for remarkable feats of agility and precise ensemble from the performers.

The Classical Symphony, in the words of Milton Cross, “was an attempt to approximate how Mozart would have written a symphony had he lived in the 20th century. Each of the four movements is epigrammatic in its brevity, and given to pellucid writing, old-world grace, and bright-faced wit.”

Cello Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Op. 33......... Camille Saint-Saëns

(1835-1921)

Composed in 1872.

Premiered on January 19, 1873 in Paris, with Auguste Tolbecque as soloist.

Much of the history of 19th-century music could be written in the terms of Beethoven’s influence. Beside exploding the emotional and expressive boundaries of earlier music, he also bequeathed the composers who followed a whole arsenal of technical weapons with which to do battle against those devilishly recalcitrant musical notes: rich harmonies, complex textures, expanded instrumental resources, vibrant rhythmic constructions. Not the least of his compositional legacies was the process of total musical structure. His symphonies, for example, were created as great single spans of tightly integrated music rather than as four separate movements, as were the models he inherited. He accomplished this structural unity in two ways. One was by connecting movements directly together, as in the closing two movements of the Fifth Symphony and the last three of the Sixth. The other was by recalling themes from earlier movements during the unfolding of the piece. The towering example of this device is the finale of the Ninth Symphony, which brings back fragments from each of the preceding movements. This technique of formal integration, of creating an inexorable logic that drives the music from first movement to finale, became one of the touchstones of Romantic music.

Most of the important Romantic composers followed the lead of Beethoven in finding such integrated structures for at least some of their large, symphonic works. Berlioz in his Symphonie Fantastique (written only three years after Beethoven’s death) adopted the so-called “cyclical” procedure of the Ninth Symphony by inserting into each of his work’s five movements an “idée fixe,” a musical phrase representing his beloved. Not only are the four movements of Schumann’s Fourth Symphony directed to be played without pause, but they also share melodic material, as do the movements of his Piano Concerto. One movement is joined directly to the next in Mendelssohn’s “Scottish” Symphony and Violin Concerto. In Bruckner’s Fifth, Seventh and Eighth Symphonies, themes from earlier movements are forged into triumphant apotheoses when they are brought back in the grand closing pages of those scores. It was Franz Liszt who found the logical conclusion to this formal process of structural integration in his tone poems, splendid works which simultaneously embody characteristics of single- and multiple-movement compositions. Camille Saint-Saëns, too, a staunch defender of both Liszt and Berlioz, was another who chose this formal path toward enriching the musical experience of his art.

Saint-Saëns’ Third Symphony, Fourth Piano Concerto, First Violin Concerto and this A minor Cello Concerto are among his compositions which exhibit carefully integrated formal structures. The Cello Concerto is in a single movement. It begins with an impetuous theme in rushing triplets for the soloist that recurs throughout the piece like a supporting pillar. A contrasting, lyrical second theme for the cello is accompanied by a sedate, chordal accompaniment for the string choir. The vibrant motion of the opening theme soon returns and encourages the entire ensemble to join in a developmental discussion. The lyrical theme is heard again, this time as a transition to the Concerto’s central portion, a slow movement with the sweet spirit of a delicate minuet embroidered with a simple, flowing descant from the soloist. The mood of this quiet, little dance is broken by a resumption of the rushing triplet theme acting as a link to the Concerto’s last large division. After a brief pause, the finale-like section begins with the cellist’s introduction of a gently syncopated theme. The music builds on this theme, and adds another in the cello’s sonorous, low register as it calls forth increasingly brilliant pyrotechnics from the soloist. One final time, the rushing triplet theme returns, to mark the beginning of the coda and launch the Concerto on its invigorating dash to the end.

Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

(1756-1791)

Composed in 1788.

“Music is the heart of God, and Mozart is His voice.” So says the character of Antonio Salieri, the court composer to Austrian Emperor Joseph II, who is portrayed by Peter Shaffer in his brilliant (but misleading in its puerile characterization of the title character) play/movie Amadeus as being maniacally jealous of his young competitor. Shaffer, also known for the gripping drama Equus, spent two years in reading and research in an attempt to understand the life, works and personality of Mozart. As has everyone else, he came up against a solid wall of bafflement in trying to fathom this particular genius which has never known an equal in the entire history of music. The perfection of form coupled with the depth and purity of feeling heard in Mozart’s compositions cannot be explained by any exercise of mere human logic. It surpasses our limited purview, and, lacking any other inkling of comprehension, one is forced to admit that Mozart’s inspiration might, indeed, have been “divine.” Shaffer-Salieri echoes the sentiments of George Bernard Shaw, who believed that Sarastro’s arias in The Magic Flute were the only music fit to issue from the mouth of God.

At no time was the separation between Mozart’s personal life and his transcendent music more apparent than in the summer of 1788, when, at the age of 32, he had only three years to live. His wife was ill and his own health was beginning to fail; his six-month-old daughter died on July 29th; Don Giovanni received a disappointing reception at its Viennese premiere on May 7th; he had small prospect of participating in any important concerts in the foreseeable future; and he was so impoverished and indebted that he would not answer a knock on the door for fear of finding a creditor there. Yet, amid all these difficulties, he produced, in less than two months, the three crowning jewels of his orchestral output, the Symphonies Nos. 39, 40 and 41.

The G minor alone of the last three symphonies may reflect the composer’s distressed emotional state at the time of its composition. It is among those great works of Mozart that look forward to the passionately charged music of the 19th century while epitomizing the structural elegance of the waning Classical era. “It may be,” wrote Eric Blom, “that the G minor Symphony is the work in which Classicism and Romanticism meet and where once and for all we see a perfect equilibrium between them, neither outweighing the other by the tiniest fraction. It is in this respect, at least, the perfect musical work.”

The Symphony’s pervading mood of tragic restlessness is established immediately at the outset by a simple, arpeggiated figure in the violas above which the violins play the agitated main theme. This melody is repeated with added woodwind chords to lead through a stormy transition to the second theme. After a moment of silence (a technique Mozart frequently used to emphasize important structural junctures), a contrasting, lyrical melody (in B-flat major) is shared by strings and winds. The respite from the movement’s prevailing powerful energy provided by the dulcet second theme is brief, however, and the level of tension soon mounts again. The wondrous development section gives prominence to the fragmented main theme. The recapitulation returns the earlier themes in heightened settings.

The Andante, in sonata form (as are all the movements of Mozart’s last six symphonies, save the minuets), uses rich chromatic harmonies and melodic half-steps to create a mood of brooding intensity and portentous asceticism. Much of the movement, especially the development, makes use of the repeated notes of the opening theme and the quick, fluttering figures of the second subject.

Because of its somber minor-key harmonies, powerful irregular phrasing and dense texture, the Minuet of the Symphony No. 40 was judged by Arturo Toscanini to be one of the most darkly tragic pieces ever written. The character of the Minuet is emphasized by its contrast with the central Trio, the only untroubled portion of the entire work.

The finale opens with a rocket theme that revives the insistent rhythmic energy of the first movement. The gentler second theme, with a full share of piquant chromatic inflections, slows the hurtling motion only briefly. The development section exhibits a contrapuntal ingenuity that few late 18th-century composers could match in technique, and none surpass in musicianship. A short but eloquent silence marks the beginning of the recapitulation, which maintains the Symphony’s tragic mood to the closing page of the work.

The evaluation that the French musicologist F.J. Fétis wrote of Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 remains as valid today as when it appeared in 1828: “Although Mozart has not used formidable orchestral forces in his G minor Symphony, none of the sweeping and massive effects one meets in a symphony of Beethoven, the invention which flames in this work, the accents of passion and energy that pervade and the melancholy color that dominates it result in one of the most beautiful manifestations of the human spirit.”