October 30, 2022: EMERSON STRING QUARTET DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH (1906–1975) String Quartet No. 12 in D-flat, Op. 133 October 30, 2022: EMERSON STRING QUARTET Toward the end of his life, Shostakovich was beset by multiple health problems—loss of feeling and mobility in his limbs, a heart attack, a broken ankle—all of which brought his performing career to an end and curtailed many of his civic activities. With sadly more time on his hands, lengthy hospital stays, and deaths of people in his circle, he began thinking more about his own mortality. Many of his late works—the vocal cycles, Symphony No. 14, and the last four string quartets—reflect this preoccupation by plumbing new depths. While living at the Composers’ Union retreat at Repino, Shostakovich wrote to his friend Isaak Glikman on March 9, 1968, that he constantly feared he would die and leave whatever piece he was working on incomplete. Just two days later he finished his String Quartet No. 12 in D-flat major and wrote to the first violinist of the Beethoven Quartet, Dmitry Tsïganov, whose birthday was March 12, asking him to accept the dedication. Two years earlier he had dedicated his Eleventh Quartet to the memory of Vasily Shirinsky, second violinist of the Quartet until his death in 1965, and thus Shostakovich was continuing his plan of writing a quartet for each member of the group that had premiered most of his quartets. Shostakovich was quite pleased with the work, reportedly answering Tsïganov’s question about whether it was “chamber” in its proportions by saying, “No, no—it’s a symphony, a symphony.” The Beethoven Quartet gave the private premiere on June 14, 1968, at the first creative convocation of the new secretariat of the Russian Composers’ Union. Shostakovich commented on the magnificence of the performance, and the favorable reaction of musicians in attendance made its way into the press in advance of the public premiere in Moscow on September 14. The audience at both performances recognized a newness of form and language in the Twelfth Quartet, in particular its reliance on twelve-tone themes. Though Shostakovich was well-aware of the avant-garde tendencies of his younger colleagues and had occasionally incorporated twelve-tone rows himself, he was now using them in a new way to suit his own purposes. He described his approach to twelve-tone writing in a remarkable encapsulation of his ideals just before the private premiere: As far as the use of strictly technical devices from such musical “systems” as dodecaphony or aleatory is concerned . . . everything in good measure. If, let’s say, a composer sets himself the obligatory task of writing dodecaphonic music, then he artificially limits his possibilities, his ideas. The use of elements from these complex systems is fully justified if it is dictated by the concept of the composition. . . . You know, to a certain extent I think the formula “the end justifies the means” is valid in music. All means? All of them, if they contribute to the end objective. What makes Shostakovich’s use of twelve-tone material in the Twelfth Quartet so fascinating is the way in which he juxtaposes it with the work’s tonal anchor of D-flat major. One might expect the twelve-tone writing to sound antagonistic and be settled by the reassurance of tonality, but Shostakovich’s D-flat major passages seem instead to explore other realms that are at times anguished, brutal, or drained of enjoyment. Laid out unconventionally in two movements with the second much longer than the first, the work opens with a wandering twelve-tone gesture in the cello, which is treated along with other dodecaphic fragments as a delineating device rather according to the “rules” of serial technique. The answering, low-register D-flat music with its oscillating rising patterns sounds sorrowfully contemplative and searching. Another twelve-tone utterance, now in the first violin, brings on a kind of waltz that is far-removed from a glittering social occasion, and yet another twelve-tone fragment introduces an idea characterized by staccato repeated notes. These ideas become joined or layered in myriad ingenious ways with the twelve-tone interjections serving as points of departure. The hushed, fragmented ending still seems in search of closure despite its D-flat fade-out. The huge second movement takes on the symphonic proportions and sonorities Shostakovich suggested in his remarks to Tsïganov. He rolls several movement-like sections into one, beginning with an almost savage mixed-meter “scherzo” that is pierced by individual trills and a jabbing melodic idea begun by the cello. Eventually the tumult dies away with a somber cello recitative that initiates a “slow movement” (Adagio) comprised of funereal chanting juxtaposed with searing melodic lines of great pathos. A striking, insistent pizzicato solo by the first violin based on first-movement figures launches a remarkable section that further develops materials from the entire work. Shostakovich combines motives and textures from the scherzo and the Adagio, and at a climactic point has the lower strings play dense pizzicato chords containing all twelve pitches. A brief revisiting of the Adagio’s sustained pathos brings a return to the first movement’s contemplative sorrow as if “ending with the beginning.” Shostakovich has more to say, however, and revs up the music of the “scherzo” to drive relentlessly to the conclusion. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

November 4, 2018: Yoobin Son, solo flute; Sheryl Staples, violin; Qian-Qian Li, violin; Cynthia Phelps, viola; Eileen Moon, cello; Tim Cobb, bass; Alessio Bax, harpsichord ANTONIO VIVALDI (1678-1741) Flute Concerto in D, RV428, (The Goldfinch) November 4, 2018: Yoobin Son, solo flute; Sheryl Staples, violin; Qian-Qian Li, violin; Cynthia Phelps, viola; Eileen Moon, cello; Tim Cobb, bass; Alessio Bax, harpsichord If one were to compose a concerto a month every year for thirty-five years, one would still not match Vivaldi’s feat. He composed close to 500 concertos, including numerous solo concertos and many for different numbers of soloists in a variety of combinations. Of these, twelve complete concertos survive for solo flute—many reworked from other versions—and ten as chamber concertos that include flute. In addition he managed to compose solo and trio sonatas, operas, oratorios, masses, motets, and cantatas, all the while maintaining a heavy schedule of performing, teaching, and traveling. Vivaldi’s extraordinary mastery of instrumental forms and orchestration influenced generations of composers. To him goes the credit for establishing the three-movement norm for concertos. He typically cast his first and last movements in ritornello form, in which periodic returns of thematic material alternate with contrasting episodes. Dating proves difficult with many of Vivaldi’s compositions, but most of his concertos were written for the Ospedale della Pietà, the famous orphanage and music school for girls in Venice. He served as maestro di violino there beginning in 1703 and remained associated with the institution in some capacity for the rest of his life. The present Flute Concerto was published in 1728 in a set of six as Opus 10—the first collection of flute concertos published in Italy. As with most of its companions, Vivaldi adapted it from an earlier version. At several times in his career Vivaldi showed great interest in pictorial composing, most famously in the four Violin Concertos known as “The Four Seasons.” In the present Flute Concerto, which he reworked from an earlier version for chamber ensemble, he focused on the depiction of bird song—not in the type of exact rendering Messiaen would later employ, but in a charming, stylized manner. The Concerto is nicknamed “Il gardinello”—alternately translated as goldfinch, green finch, or bull finch—for its depiction of the finch in raucous and more lyrical moods, with abundant trills, repeated notes, and arpeggios. After the opening ritornello, striking for its forceful unison pattern, the solo flute gives a wonderful free bird-song impression. In other solo passages the flute is joined by solo violin, which also takes an avian role. Certain conventional musical patterns may be superimposed, but the overall effect is delightfully picturesque. The lovely slow movement avoids birdlike representations in favor of a general pastoral atmosphere, with the flute lilting a tender melody in Siciliano style. In contrast to the outer movements, the accompaniment is reduced to continuo alone (keyboard with supporting bass instruments). In between the decisive descending scales in the third-movement ritornello, beguiling pairings of flute and violin again suggest our feathered friends. The solo passages offer more twitterings, some again pairing flute with violin—or two violins—and some pitting the flute alone against the entire ensemble. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

May 15, 2016: James Morris, bass-baritone; Ken Noda, piano RICHARD STRAUSS (1864–1949) Zueignung, op. 10, no. 1 Traum durch die Dämmerung, op. 29, no. 1 Heimliche Aufforderung, op. 27, no. 1 Allerseelen, op. 10, no. 8 Cäcilie, op. 27, no. 2 May 15, 2016: James Morris, bass-baritone; Ken Noda, piano Strauss wrote songs all his life, from his first song, “Weinachtslied” (Christmas song), at the age of six, to his Four Last Songs, so-named by his publisher, which he composed at the age of eighty-four. Many of his more than 200 songs were written for soprano Pauline de Ahna who became his wife in 1894; the composer himself usually accompanied her on the piano. Some of his songs remain infrequently performed—often because of their difficulty—while others hold a firm place both in recital and in orchestrated versions by Strauss and others on symphonic programs. “Zueignung” (Dedication) opens Strauss’s first set of published songs, entitled Acht Gedichte aus Letzte Blätter von Hermann von Gilm (Eight Poems from Last Leaves by Hermann von Gilm), op. 10. “Zueignung,” however, was the only text by the Tyrolean poet that was not taken from Letzte Blätter but from a collection entitled Frühling (Spring). Strauss came across the poems for Opus 10 in an 1864 volume brought back from Innsbruck by his friend and composer Ludwig Thuille. The songs were composed in 1885 and were soon dedicated to Heinrich Vogl, principal tenor at the Munich Court Opera, who had expressed admiration for them to the young composer. The impulsive, glowing “Zueignung,” so titled by Strauss and not the poet, unfolds in three very similar strophes with the same brief refrain. One of his best-loved songs, “Zueignung” also exists in a version with orchestral accompaniment made by the composer himself in 1940. In 1894 Strauss and his beloved wife Pauline left Weimar soon after they were married to return to the Court Opera in his native Munich. There on June 7, 1895, he set three poems by his friend Otto Julius Bierbaum, which he published as Opus 29, dedicated to Eugen Gura, a leading baritone at the Munich Court Opera. The first of these, the brief, haunting “Traum durch die Dämmerung” (Dreaming through the twilght), poignantly captures the unhurried anticipation of a love tryst through intimate vocal phrases, subtle modulations, and gently rocking accompaniment. Strauss said that his melodies were usually the result of long, painstaking work, but he told a friend that he composed this song in just twenty minutes—the time allotted to him by his notoriously demanding wife before departing on a walk. Strauss composed the four marvelous songs of Opus 27 in 1894 as his wedding present to his wife Pauline. He had become interested in a group of poets—followers of Max Stirner and his socialist ideals—who had established themselves as a force against sentimental mid-nineteenth-century poets and against folk and mock-ancient poetry. Strauss was little interested in their politics, but latched onto their Romantic outpourings. Third in the set, “Heimliche Aufforderung” (Secret invitation) sets a text by Scottish-born but German-raised Stirner disciple, John Henry Mackay. Far from a political statement, his text is an ardent love song, sung during a tryst amid a crowd of merrymakers. The eager vocal line is accompanied by rippling figurations that change several times to a more static texture to reflect the text. A peaceful postlude follows the ecstatic appeal for night to fall. “Allerseelen” (All Souls’ Day) appears last in the Opus 10 collection of 1885 (see above). November 2 is the day when Western Christians commemorate those dear to them who have died, and the poet of Strauss’s setting is longing for his departed love to return, tenderly wishing for things to be as they once were. Like “Zueignung,” the song shows the twenty-one-year-old’s lyrical and harmonic mastery, in this case unfolding in a through-composed form that becomes progressively more dramatic. “Cäcilie,” which Strauss had placed second in the Opus 27 set, makes a perfect concluding selection here as his most impassioned and ecstatic love song. Dashed off on September 9, the day before his wedding, “Cäcilie” sets a poem that, in a nice parallel, had been written to honor the wife of the poet, Heinrich Hart. (The text is often misattributed to Heinrich’s brother Julius.) Strauss is said to have embellished the already full and virtuosic accompaniment when performing the song, so it comes as no surprise that he decided to orchestrate it in 1897. Together and separately the Opus 27 love songs have been successful with audiences and performers alike ever since they were introduced by the composer and his favorite interpreter, Pauline. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

May 15, 2016: James Morris, bass-baritone; Ken Noda, piano JOHN DUKE (1899-1984) Three Songs May 15, 2016: James Morris, bass-baritone; Ken Noda, piano After early music training from his mother, a talented singer, John Duke attended the Peabody Institute where he studied composition with Gustav Strube and piano with Harold Randolph. He continued his studying composition in New York with Howard Brockway and Bernard Wagenaar and furthered his piano skills with Franklin Cannon. He gave his piano debut piano recital in New York’s Aeolian Hall in 1920 in a program of Chopin, Debussy, and Liszt, among others, and performed the Grieg Concerto with the New York Philharmonic on tour in his hometown of Cumberland, Maryland, the following year. Fully aware of the challenges of a career as a concert pianist, he joined the faculty of Smith College in 1923, where he taught piano until his retirement in 1967. He furthered his musical training on sabbatical in 1929–30, studying composition with Nadia Boulanger in Paris and piano with Artur Schnabel in Berlin. He also spent a summer at Yaddo, the renowned artists’ community in Saratoga Springs, New York, and many summers at the Seagle Colony, a school for singers in Schroon Lake, New York. Though Duke composed a handful of orchestral and chamber pieces, the vast majority of his output features the voice—265 songs, several stage works, and a few choral pieces. His family background no doubt fostered his interest in song, though he himself said he was amazed at the way his career turned out. “In my early days, my ambition was to be a great pianist, and I could not have believed anyone who told [me] I was destined to be a song composer.” He came to believe that “vocal utterance is the basis of music’s mystery. The thing that makes melody a concrete expression of feeling and not just a horizontal design in tones is its power to symbolize the pull, the tension of our feeling of duration.” Duke was particularly interested in setting texts by American poets and he corresponded with many, among them Archibald MacLeish, William Rose Benet, Mark Van Doren, and Richard Nickson. Just as this correspondence attests to his choice of texts, his correspondence with prominent musicians—among them Roger Sessions, Aaron Copland, Walter Piston, Daniel Gregory Mason, Mack Harrell, Ross Lee Finney, Roy Harris, Arthur Fieldler, William Warfield, and Douglas Moore—reflects the neo-Romantic orientation of his style. This afternoon’s selections, “Richard Cory,” “Miniver Cheevy,” and “Luke Havergal,” feature three of four songs that Duke set to poems of Edwin Arlington Robinson in 1945. Duke creates a perfect musical description of the elegant saunter of Richard Cory as a man about town with his jaunty accompaniment in 6/8 meter. The shocking suicide moment he treats bare of accompaniment, followed by a brief dissonant piano comment. Duke sets “Miniver Cheevy” as “a satire in the form of variations.” The nine colorful variations following the presentation of the theme are labeled Melancholy, Sprightly, Dreamy, Dolorous, Grandiose, Indignant, Puzzled, Tipsy, and Epilogue, all describing someone who thought himself born too late, said to be Robinson’s skewering of his own anachronistic tendencies and referencing his alcoholic brother. “Luke Havergal,” in which a voice from the grave encourages Luke Havergal to join his dead lover, follows a ternary form in which the rich outer sections flank a chilling central section and the final section becomes positively majestic before ebbing. The poem might bring to mind Aeneas of classic lore being led by Sibyl to Queen Dido, who has died by suicide, but coupled with Duke’s music the result especially embodies the nineteenth-century Romantics’ theme of an intense yearning for death so as not to have to endure grief-stricken loneliness. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

January 14, 2024: Goldmund Quartet ANTON WEBERN (1883-1945) Langsamer Satz January 14, 2024: Goldmund Quartet Webern was in love. In his third year as a student at the University of Vienna, he became romantically involved with his cousin Wilhelmine (Minna), and Webern’s diary, each entry filled with passionate outpourings combined with images of nature, radiates his happiness: “Our love rose to infinite heights and filled the universe! Two souls were enraptured!” The Langsamer Satz (“slow movement”), originally for string quartet, was composed in June 1905 as a direct expression of that love. They kept their affair secret knowing the anguish it would cause both sets of parents, but they married in 1911 after finding out Minna was pregnant. The marriage was officially prohibited by the Roman Catholic Church and solemnized only in 1915, by which time three of the couple’s four children had been born. In 1904 Webern had begun private composition studies with Arnold Schoenberg, which were to have profound impact on his life. There are some indications in the original set of parts for Langsamer Satz that the work was played, most likely within the Schoenberg “circle,” but Webern never made the work public. He may have suppressed it as a student work or because his compositional style soon underwent a major shift toward Schoenberg’s atonal language. In any case, it was not until 1962, almost twenty years after his death, that the world first heard this moving piece, performed on May 27 in Seattle by the University of Washington String Quartet. Langsamer Satz shows Webern’s indebtedness to late Romanticism in its rich harmonies and sweeping melodic lines. While this kind of expressiveness soon became telescoped into bare essentials, the movement exhibits the contrapuntal techniques that enabled him to structure even his most concise serial compositions. The piece consists of four basic sections, the fourth a reprise of the first, plus a coda. Though the key of the movement is E-flat major, the flowing opening melody gives the initial impression of C minor. A short, more restless section in G minor precedes a beautiful new calm theme that, if the opening was not enough, puts to rest questions about Webern’s lyrical abilities. The section peaks with the opening bar of this theme played triple forte, doubled in three octaves. In the reprise of the opening section, the second statement of the main theme is now the property of the cello. A coda based on the lyrical third section climaxes ecstatically and Webern’s wordless expression of love concludes quietly in E-flat major after a brief reminiscence of the C minor opening. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

September 29, 2024: Zvi Plesser, cello; Jeewon Park, piano Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) Andante from Sonata in G minor, Op. 19 for cello and piano September 29, 2024: Zvi Plesser, cello; Jeewon Park, piano Rachmaninoff had sunk into a depression after the failure of his First Symphony in 1897, and it took the hypnotic treatment—or the sympathetic conversations—with Dr. Nicolai Dahl to bring him out of it. The spectacular result of his “cure,” for which the composer remained eternally grateful to Dr. Dahl, was his famous Second Piano Concerto in 1900, followed by the Cello Sonata in 1901. Rachmaninoff wrote the Sonata for cellist Anatoly Brandukov, with whom he gave the first performance in Moscow on December 2, 1901. Though much of the piece had been composed that summer, Rachmaninoff dated the manuscript December 12, 1901, after the premiere, indicating that he had some second thoughts that he incorporated in the final version. With its sweeping passion and melodic appeal, much in the same vein as the Second Piano Concerto, the Cello Sonata has enjoyed immense popularity. Its virtuoso piano part makes it an especially attractive vehicle for the pianist, but cellists, too, revel in its luxurious melodies. Regrettably it was Rachmaninoff’s last piece of chamber music. The slow movement basks in Rachmaninoff’s rich, songful style, initiated by the piano. The central section in the minor mode comes to a dramatic climax before the varied return of the main theme. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

March 24, 2019: Gilles Vonsattel, solo piano; Paul Huang, violin; Danbi Um, violin; Wen Qian, violin; Kristin Lee, violin; Sarah Crocker Vonsattel, violin; Ming-Feng Hsin, violin; Dov Scheindlin, viola; Pierre Lapointe, viola; Mihai Marica, cello; Edward Arron, cello; Joel Noyes, cello; Tim Cobb, bass JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (1685-1750) Piano Concerto in D Minor for BWV 1052 March 24, 2019: Gilles Vonsattel, solo piano; Paul Huang, violin; Danbi Um, violin; Wen Qian, violin; Kristin Lee, violin; Sarah Crocker Vonsattel, violin; Ming-Feng Hsin, violin; Dov Scheindlin, viola; Pierre Lapointe, viola; Mihai Marica, cello; Edward Arron, cello; Joel Noyes, cello; Tim Cobb, bass As the busiest and most important musician in one of the most active musical centers in Germany in the 1730s and ’40s, how did Bach find time to meet all of his obligations? He was serving as director of church music in Leipzig with all the myriad duties that entailed, and he directed the Collegium Musicum, which presented weekly concerts. (For more about the Collegium see the notes for his Double Violin Concerto.) Like many an enterprising composer before and after him, Bach borrowed from materials he had composed earlier to meet the constant demand. For his keyboard concertos he drew on preexisting violin concertos, cantata movements, and harpsichord and organ pieces. Instead of being frowned upon, such borrowing was considered a practical and artful way of providing a great amount of music. He also tapped concertos by other composers, notably Vivaldi, adopting his three-movement model—fast, slow, fast—together with his ritornello form (in which a refrain alternates with episodic excursions). Was Bach aware that he was creating an entirely new genre with his keyboard concertos? His older sons carried the concept to other German centers, and, though too young to have participated in the Collegium concerts, his son Johann Christian brought the genre to London. Mozart, often considered the father of the modern piano concerto, was profoundly influenced by the keyboard concertos of the “London Bach,” whom he greatly admired. Probably the best known of Bach’s keyboard concertos, the D minor Concerto borrowed its first and second movements from Cantata 146: “Wir müssen durch viel Trübsal” (1726–28); the third movement had also been employed as the sinfonia of Cantata 188: “Ich habe meine Zuversicht” (c. 1728). The cantata movements in turn had probably been transcribed from a violin concerto that no longer exists, but which has been reconstructed. The D minor Concerto presents an earnest and dark-hued world. The Allegro opens with a driven theme, played by soloist and tutti (ensemble) strings in unison and octaves, which returns in a developmental episode and then closes with the theme’s final statement in the original key, again in unison and octaves. Bach’s use of a minor key (G minor) for the slow movement further emphasizes the Concerto’s dark color—in his other minor-mode concertos and sonatas the slow movement is usually in a major key. The Adagio is structured on a repeating pattern in the bass (basso ostinato or ground bass) of thirteen measures, which is played in unison and octaves at the opening and again at the close of the movement. The soloist plays a poignant cantilena (lyrical melody) over the intervening presentations of the ground bass. Short passages are introduced between patterns for the purposes of changing from one key to another. A driving rhythmic motive launches and pervades the closing movement. Brief respite from the prevailing relentless quality comes in the form of a cadenza (improvisatory passage for the soloist alone) just before the final statement of the main theme. Bach is said to have liked a very brisk tempo for such movements. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

November 2, 2014 – Isabel Leonard, mezzo-soprano; Sharon Isbin, guitar JOAQUÍN RODRIGO (1901–1999) Aranjuez, ma pensée November 2, 2014 – Isabel Leonard, mezzo-soprano; Sharon Isbin, guitar Rodrigo, blind since the age of three, showed great musical talent and was sent to Paris to study, where he became a student of Paul Dukas. In the 1930s he traveled extensively in Switzerland, Austria, and Germany, returning to Spain with the outbreak of war in 1939, the year he composed his famous guitar concerto, Concierto de Aranjuez. Although he was highly regarded by Dukas and also by his friend Manuel de Falla, he did not receive public recognition until the premiere of the Concierto in November 1940 by Regino Sainz de la Maza. Rodrigo became famous overnight. In addition to composing over the next six decades, Rodrigo wrote many articles about music, toured and lectured, gave piano recitals, and received numerous awards. His musical style was conservative yet imaginative—he called it “faithful to a tradition.” The successful combination of Classical influences with nationalist idioms was enhanced by his ability to write inspired melodies. One of these, from the slow movement of his famous Concierto, became the basis of “Aranjuez, ma pensée,” arranged in 1988 by the composer himself with lyrics in French by his beloved wife Victoria Kamhi. She frequently translated or adapted anonymous texts for many of his songs in addition to contributing her own poetry. They invited Sharon Isbin to meet them in 1979 after she won the Queen Sofia Competition playing the Concierto, and they maintained a warm friendship for two decades—Kamhi died in 1997 and Rodrigo two years later. Ms. Isbin writes that Rodrigo composed this melody “during the sleepless nights spent grieving over the stillborn birth of his first child and his wife’s ensuing illness. He wrote it as they reminisced about their honeymoon in the majestic gardens of Aranjuez, the magnificent eighteenth-century sight of kings and courtiers. It is both a love song and a song of painful yearning.” After many unauthorized arrangements of this ultra-popular theme appeared, some instrumental and some supplied with texts, the Rodrigos tried to reclaim the rights in court in 1967, but lost. Finally in 1987, Cecilia Rodrigo, their daughter, won the rights and it was she who encouraged Kamhi to pen the lyrics. TEXT AND TRANSLATIONS © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

April 24, 2022 – Marc-André Hamlein, piano MARC-ANDRÉ HAMELIN Suite à l’ancienne (Suite in the old style) (2020) April 24, 2022 – Marc-André Hamlein, piano For biographic background about pianist and composer Marc-André Hamelin please see the artist’s biographical profile in this program. Just like C.P.E. Bach in this afternoon’s first piece, Marc-André Hamelin turns a retrospective gaze on the Baroque suite form, though through a much later lens. A consummate piano virtuoso who has composed throughout his illustrious career, Hamelin wrote his Suite à l’ancienne as a commission rather than as a solo vehicle for himself. He first encountered pianist Rachel Naomi Kudo in 2017 when he judged the 15th Van Cliburn International Competition. He was impressed by her performance of his Toccata on L’homme armé, which he had composed as the competition’s compulsory piece. For her part, Kudo was enamored of the piece and felt she had finally found the composer she wanted to commission with her funding from the prestigious Gilmore Young Artist Award. Said Hamelin, “I was very happy to accept. I knew I would be in good hands.” Kudo gave the premiere of the Suite à l’ancienne on February 21, 2021, in a “Virtual Special Event for The Gilmore” (Gilmore International Piano Festival). Hamelin himself will perform the piece in May 2022 at the Berliner Klavierfestival and agreed to play it one month earlier on this Parlance Chamber Concert at the request of Michael Parloff. Kudo had asked for something inspired by J. S. Bach, which turned Hamelin’s thoughts to the Baroque suite. “My suite is directly derived from the Baroque models of the various works in the genre by Bach and Handel in that the general forms are very similar. Beyond that, even though the language remains completely tonal (in A major/minor in this case), the harmony is much more involved, more chromatic.” Further, the work brims with textures and pianistic effects built on an intimate knowledge of masterful piano works ranging from Chopin and Ravel to Godowsky and Skryabin. Many Baroque suites opened with an introductory movement that was meant to be improvised or written out so as to sound like an improvisation. The stunning Préambule that opens the six-movement Suite à l’ancienne indeed sounds improvisatory with its careful notation tempered by the instruction to be played “liberamente” (freely). The brief movement commands attention with its rapid, chromatically inflected figurations that range the entire keyboard at double or triple forte throughout, ending with a grand A major chord. The Allemande presents a delightful contrast, meant to be played sweetly, charmingly, without agitation. In the binary form of most suite movements (two sections, each repeated), the music swings along easily, tunefully, despite its intricate chordal texture. In the Courante, literally “running” in French, Hamelin combines the Baroque dance type in fast triple meter with the light and playful character of a nineteenth-century scherzo, also in fast triple meter. Kudo calls this movement with its fast running sixteenth notes and leaping accompaniment “fiendishly difficult.” The right and left hands switch roles briefly at the start of the second section, which intensifies—without getting louder!—when both hands join in the fleeting sixteenth notes. The opening returns, then alters course to end in an impish disappearing act. Rather than using the typical “sarabande” designation of many Baroque suites, Hamelin titles his slow movement “Air avec agréments” (Air with ornaments). Its sound is magical, Impressionistic—shimmering in the upper register of the piano, delicately sprinkled with ornamental flourishes. A brief transition to the lower register leads directly into the next movement. This is the point in a Baroque suite where composers would often insert their choice of dances—gavotte, minuet, bourrée, among others—usually in pairs with a return to the first dance after the second. Hamelin does just that with his Gavotte—more of a graceful bustle than a courtly dance—which envelops the Musette. In earlier centuries the musette was a dance-like pastoral piece named for the small French bagpipe and imitating its sound with underlying drones and simple stepwise melodies. Hamelin cleverly makes his “drones” sound in open fifths, but they actively oscillate while ranging the left half of the keyboard. By holding everything in the pedal, including the right hand’s melodic lines, Hamelin creates a mesmerizing effect before the Gavotte returns. The Gigue makes a dazzling—and humorous—conclusion to the Suite à l’ancienne, fully in keeping with the spirit of the Baroque gigue but blasted into the twenty-first century. At one point, in a particularly chromatic passage, Hamelin writes: “Whoa, this floor’s too slippery—let’s go jig somewhere else.” The music rights itself, as if to start the section again, but continues on its roller-coaster course to a return of the jaunty opening just before the triumphant finish. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

October 15, 2023: Lysander Piano Trio Edvard Grieg (1843-1907) Andante con moto for piano trio October 15, 2023: Lysander Piano Trio By 1878, when Grieg set out to write a piano trio, he had earned recognition as Norway’s foremost composer. He had made important connections in Germany through his studies in Leipzig and had won renown in Copenhagen as well as in his native Bergen, but it was not without great effort. Influenced by violinist Ole Bull, Grieg had begun incorporating Norwegian folk idioms into his compositions, but he struggled to meet expectations in the larger forms of the chamber music medium because of his natural inclination to short, self-contained, lyrical melodies. Grieg had just completed his G minor String Quartet in the summer of 1878, which he said “is not intended to bring trivialities to market. It strives towards breadth, soaring flight and above all resonance for the instruments for which it is written. I needed to do this as a study. Now I shall tackle another piece of chamber music; I think in that way I shall find myself again.” Yet he composed only one movement of the projected piano trio, the Andante con moto in C minor. He made notes on the manuscript suggesting he might revise it, but he never returned to it nor did he write any other piano trio. After Grieg’s death, his friend, Leipzig-born Dutch pianist and composer Julius Röntgen (who also played a role in this afternoon’s second work), unearthed the Andante con moto and wrote to Grieg’s widow, Nina Hagerup Grieg, saying, “It is a beautiful piece and completely in order. . . . What a solemnity it conveys! How he can’t get enough of that single theme, that even in the major mode retains its mourning character, and then develops so beautifully its full power. . . . The piece can very well stand by itself and does not at all give the impression of being a fragment, as it constitutes a perfect entity in itself.” The piece was not published, however, until 1978 in the Grieg Critical Edition. Grieg’s monothematic movement is so striking because of how often Grieg showcases his theme in octave unison, first presented by the piano after a hushed introduction of string chords. Whereas the major-mode section offers contrast—and one might consider it considerably less “mournful” than Röntgen suggested—there is no doubt about the overall dark intensity of the piece, which rises to a dramatic climax before ebbing quietly. Return to Parlance Program Notes

December 15, 2024: THE VIRTUOSO FLUTIST. DENIS BOURIAKOV, FLUTE. A RECITAL FOR FLUTE AND ORCHESTRA, with Erin Bouriakov, Flute. Musicians From The New York Philharmonic. Michael Parloff, Conductor. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Andante in C, K. 315 for flute and orchestra December 15, 2024: THE VIRTUOSO FLUTIST. DENIS BOURIAKOV, FLUTE. A RECITAL FOR FLUTE AND ORCHESTRA, with Erin Bouriakov, Flute. Musicians From The New York Philharmonic. Michael Parloff, Conductor. The lovely Andante in C major is considered a product of the Ferdinand Dejean commission (see above)—possibly a substitute for the slow movement of the G major Flute Concerto or as the slow movement of a third but abandoned concerto. Based on the paper type of the undated manuscript, scholars suggest a date of 1779 or 1780—just one or two years after Mozart furnished Dejean with the G major Concerto and the D major Concerto (adapted from the Oboe Concerto). However, the suggestion that Mozart composed the Andante because Dejean had requested a simpler movement for the G major Concerto does not stand up to scrutiny, since Dejean has been shown to be a very talented amateur. Further, we have seen that paper types, whose watermarks were sometimes forged, can be misleading in some dating. Whatever Mozart intended with the Andante, we are fortunate to have this lyrical gem, which has won its own place as a stand-alone concert piece. The movement unfolds in three sections, A-B-A, separated by orchestral interludes. In the final section Mozart provides the flutist with the opportunity to improvise a cadenza before the final utterance of the main theme. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

May 6, 2018: Clara Neubauer, violin; Kerry McDermott, violin; Paul Neubauer, violan ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK (1841-1904) Terzetto in C, Op. 74 for 2 violins and viola May 6, 2018: Clara Neubauer, violin; Kerry McDermott, violin; Paul Neubauer, violan During some 1886 New Year’s Eve festivities, Dvořák met a young chemistry student and amateur violinist Josef Kruis, who was a fellow tenant in his mother-in-law’s house. Dvořák had heard Kruis practicing his sight-reading with his violin teacher Jan Pelikán, member of the National Theater Orchestra and Ondřiček Quartet, and wanted to compose something he could play with them on his viola. With lightning speed—precisely Sunday, January 7, to Sunday, January 14—Dvořák composed his Terzetto. When the trio got together to read the new piece, Dvořák found that the first violin part was too difficult for Kruis, so immediately he wrote his Drobnosti (Miniatures) for the same combination. By January 25 he turned this second trio into a version for violin and piano, which he published as Romantic Pieces, op. 75; the original trio version of the Drobnosti went unpublished until 1945, when it was designated Opus 75a. The delightful Terzetto he left in its nonstandard configuration of instruments, and premiered it on March 30, 1887, with two other violinists: Jan Buchal, a doctor, and Jaroslav Stastny, a lawyer. The work was published later that year as Opus 74. The Terzetto’s first movement contrasts a theme in sweet, fluid motion with a much more active, running passage that culminates in unison. Throughout the viola sometimes provides a bass line and other times accompanimental figuration. Toward the end Dvořák introduces some new chromatic inflections and closes with a note of drama as he makes a transition to the second movement. The Larghetto juxtaposes a poignant, lyrical section with one of marked dotted (long-short) rhythms. Dvořák indulges in some gentle canonic imitation before returning to his singing opening section. The Scherzo takes the form of a furiant, a fast Czech dance full of rhythmic play and shifting accents, together with quick changes between major and minor. The contrasting trio swings along as a stylized waltz with some delicate touches before the furiant resumes. For his finale Dvořák employed a theme with ten variations, each of individual character. The contrasts of melancholy and high spirits are typical of much of Dvořák’s native Czech music. Much to his credit, we often forget that we are listening to only three instruments, particularly as he builds to the close. Return to Parlance Program Notes