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BAS
YORK
ARTUR PIZARRO
(piano)
Friday, 18 February 1994
Programme: 50p
Presented by the British Music Society of York
in association with the Department of Music
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BAS
YORK
SOCIETY NEWS
Tonight's Music
If you are interested in seeing what the music being played this evening
looks like on paper, copies will be available (if I remember to bring them)
at the Members' Desk during the interval.
Advance Booking
The Committee is making advance booking for our concerts slightly easier.
During tonight's interval tickets for the final recital of our 73rd Season
will be on sale at the Members' Desk in the foyer. The concert takes
place on Thursday 17 March and features the violinist Michael D'Arcy: for
full details, see under Forthcoming Concerts at the end of this book.
Future Programmes
Is there an artist or group you would like to have perform for the BMS?
Is there a favourite work or works you would like to hear at a BMS
concert? The Programme Secretaries are always open to suggestions. Tell
a committee member (they should all be wearing badges), or come to the
Members' Desk.
Registered Charity No.700302
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BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY of YORK
73rd Season
Friday, 18 February 1994
Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall
ARTUR PIZARRO
Sonata in F, K.533/494
(piano)
Sonata in F minor, Op.57 (Appassionata)
INTERVAL
Polonaise-Fantaisie in A flat, Op.61
8 Pieces for piano, Op.76
For the sake of others in the audience,
please turn off all alarms on watches, calculators etc.
before the concert starts,
and use a handkerchief when coughing.
Mozart
Beethoven
Chopin
Brahms
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ARTUR
PIZARRO UM
Artur Pizarro was born in Portugal and began his piano studies at the age
of five with the distinguished Portuguese pianist and teacher Sequeira
Costa, first in Lisbon and later at the University of Kansas.
He also
studied at the National Conservatory of Music in Lisbon.
Mr Pizarro made his London debut in 1989 at the Wigmore Hall and went
on to play twice with the London Mozart Players in the Queen Elizabeth
Hall. It was after those performances that Jane Glover described him as
"surely one of the most promising pianists of his generation. He has a
remarkable technique, and brings to it great interpretative sensitivity".
In September 1990 Mr Pizarro won first prize in the Harveys Leeds
International Piano Competition and in the November of the following year
gave a memorable recital for the BMS. We have managed to persuade him
back this year to play some of the greatest works of piano literature.
PROGRAMME NOTES
Sonata in F major, K.533/494
Allegro
Andante
Rondo: Allegretto
Wolfgang Amadé Mozart
(1756 - 1791)
The Köchel number reflects this Sonata's history. Ludwig van Köchel
studied law, but practised minerology, bringing the forensic and taxonomic
skills he acquired in these disciplines to the compilation of his famous
1862 catalogue of Mozart's music the first ever to include all the known
works of a single composer. Köchel arranged the music chronologically,
dates in Mozart's own hand forming the framework against which he set
undated works according to stylistic or other evidence. It was a
remarkable achievement, and Köchel's numbers are still used today, though
some adjustments have had to be made to his chronology in the light of
more recent discoveries.
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The F major Sonata began as a Rondo for piano, which Mozart wrote as
an independent piece in 1786. It had distinguished neighbours:
K.491 C minor Piano Concerto (No.24), dated 24 March
K.492 The marriage of Figaro, dated 29 April
K.493 Piano Quartet in E flat, dated 3 June
K.494 "A little Rondo for solo piano", dated 10 June
K.495 Horn Concerto in E flat (No.4), dated 26 June
K.496 Piano Trio in G, dated 8 July
K.497
Piano Duet Sonata in F, dated 1 August
K.498
Kegelstatt Trio (piano, clarinet and viola), dated 5 August
String Quartet in D, dated 19 August
K.499
Not bad for six months' work well, not quite, Figaro had been begun a
bit earlier, between K.478 and K.479.
A year and a half later, Mozart returned to the "little" Rondo. He revised
it and turned it into a piano sonata by writing an Allegro and Andante to
go in front of it.
The new movements, dated 3 January 1788, occupy
No.533 in Köchel's catalogue. This was a relatively fallow period for
Mozart. After the strain of the world premiere of Don Giovanni (Prague,
29 October 1787) the only work of any stature he composed before the
three last symphonies of the summer of 1788 was the D major Piano
Concerto, K.535 (No.26, known as the Coronation), dated 24 February 1788.
The new composite F major Piano Sonata was published by Hoffmeister of
Vienna in 1788. The first movement is full of the sort of contrapuntal
byplay that had hitherto been more a feature of Mozart's quartet writing.
The slow movement contains some of his most daring harmonic experi-
ments, but the finale is a return to the more carefree days of 1786, when
Mozart was basking in the huge success of Figaro's first performance
(Vienna, 1 May).
Sonata in F minor, Op.57 (Appassionata)
Allegro assai
Andante con moto -
Allegro ma non troppo
Ludwig van Beethoven
(1770-1827)
The Appassionata Sonata was composed in 1804 and 1805, in the midst of a
period of astonishing creativity. Between 1803 and 1806 Beethoven
produced, in addition to the first two versions of the opera Leonora/
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Fidelio, the Waldstein Piano Sonata (Op.53), Piano Sonata in F (Op.54),
Eroica Symphony (Op.55), Triple Concerto (Op.56), Appassionata Piano
Sonata (Op.57), Fourth Piano Concerto (Op.58), Razumovsky Quartets
(Op.59), Fourth Symphony (Op.60) and Violin Concerto (Op.61).
Op.57 was published in Vienna in February 1807 by a firm rejoicing in the
title Bureau des Arts et d'Industrie. The nickname "Appassionata" is not
authentic: it first appeared on a piano duet arrangement of the work
published in Hamburg in 1838. But the name is not inappropriate to the
passionate nature of much of the music, written in what may have been
Beethoven's "stormiest" key, F minor, the key of the Egmont Overture and
the Op.95 String Quartet not to mention, fittingly, the storm movement
of the Pastoral Symphony.
We know from "sources close to" the composer (amongst them Czerny) that
Beethoven thought Op.57 his greatest piano sonata, an opinion he held at
least up to the time of the Hammerklavier Sonata (Op.106, 1817-8), and
that he liked to play it more than any other.
The first movement derives much of its tension and power from its wild
contrasts and sheer unpredictability of temperament. After the argument
apparently dies down at the end, a fiery coda presses the speed and
excitement onwards, until the music eventually burns itself out.
The slow movement is a set of variations on a rather more sober theme in
the more restful key of D flat major. The variations themselves are
elegant and decorative rather than, as often with Beethoven, probing. But
this is precisely what is needed between two such highly charged
movements.
The finale follows without a break. The law of diminishing returns
prevents Beethoven's repeating the first movement's approach. Instead, he
allows the tension to grow cumulatively, finally releasing it in a shattering
Presto coda.
INTERVAL
Coffee and drinks are available in the foyer. Coffee is 50p a cup: to find
it, go past the bar on to the landing and turn to the left.
1
1
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D
Do visit the Members' Desk if you are interested in the music for
tonight's concert, in tickets for the next concert or in becoming a Patron
or Benefactor of the BMS. We can be found in the foyer at the opposite
end to the bar, to your left as you leave the auditorium.
Polonaise-Fantaisie in A flat, Op.61
Frédéric Chopin
(1810 - 1849)
Chopin's output was dominated by the piano, and his music for the
instrument seldom strays outside a handful of forms - ballades, nocturnes,
sonatas, studies, waltzes and so on. Two of them are quintessentially
Polish, the mazurka and the polonaise. The mazurka was a traditional
Polish country dance (often sung as well as danced) which Chopin was
responsible for bringing into the concert hall, his 60 or so examples often
containing some of his most intimate music.
The Polonaise, on the other hand, already had a long history in the
concert hall. Bach had used the form (the Polacca in the First Branden--
burg Concerto is one) as well as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, amongst
others. There is evidence that it originated as courtly aristocratic dance,
and this would account for the magisterial style Chopin often adopted in
his polonaises. There is a wealth of patriotic feeling in the famous
Military Polonaise (A major, Op.40/1), the epic F sharp minor (Op.44) and
the heroic A flat (Op.53).
For all the aristocratic bearing of such music, Chopin was himself quite an
ordinary homely person - as comes across in his letters to his family back
home in Warsaw. Here's a taste from a letter dated "Paris, 12 December
1845":
I've told you about Chenonceaux, now about Paris. Gavary sends
best greetings to Ludw. and Jedrz. (he sends her Massillon, his own
work); likewise the Franchommes. I dined at both houses before
Mme S. arrived, and we talked a lot about you both. I'm already
starting on my treadmill. Today I've given only one lesson, to
Mme Rothschild, and have excused myself from two, as I had other
work. My new mazurkas have come out in Berlin at Stern's, so Ita
don't know whether they will get as far as you you in Warsaw
generally getting your music from Leipzig. They are not dedicated
to anyone.
Now I'd like to finish my cello sonata, barcarolle and foll
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Liszt
something else I don't know what to call; but I doubt whether I'll
have the time, as the rush is beginning. I have received many
enquiries whether I will give a concert, but I doubt I will.
has arrived from the provinces, where he's been giving concerts; I
found his card in the house. Meyerbeer is here, too. I was to have
gone today to a soirée at Leo's to see him, but we're going to the
Opéra, to the new ballet (new for Mme S.), Le diable à quatre, in
which the costumes are ours. Now I'm writing to you after the
ballet, on Saturday morning. Nothing is changed at the Opéra; it's
just as it was when you were there. As yet we have seen nothing
else; neither the Italian theatre where they do Verdi, nor Mme
Dorval in the new drama Marie Jeanne, which is said to be one of
her best parts.
The "something else I don't know what to call" is most probably the
Polonaise-Fantaisie, completed in the summer of 1846 and published in
Paris and Leipzig that November as Op.61. It's no wonder Chopin had
difficulty finding a title for it. Like many of his late works it is
structurally experimental, a work with no precedent to help shape it, only
Chopin's improviser's instincts. From the questing introduction (whose
harmonic web would remain unequalled for a generation) and the clear
polonaise idea this gives on to, through many contrasting episodes to the
final apotheosis, Chopin creates a discursive, developmental, seamless
whole.
8 Pieces for piano, Op.76
Johannes Brahms
(1833 1897)
Capriccio in F sharp minor: Un poco agitato
Capriccio in B minor: Allegretto non troppo
buda Intermezzo in A flat: Grazioso
Intermezzo in B flat: Allegretto grazioso
Capriccio in C sharp minor: Agitato, ma non troppo presto
Intermezzo in A: Andante con moto
Intermezzo in A minor: Moderato semplice
Capriccio in C: Grazioso ed un poco vivace
The piano was Brahms's own instrument, and music for it straddles his
composing career: his output reached Op.122, the first and last works for
solo piano being Op.1 and Op.119. The music for solo piano, however,
went through two distinct phases. In the first we find Brahms the young
lion or perhaps that should be "eagle", which is how the Schumanns saw
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the 20-year-old Brahms when he turned up on their doorstep in Düsseldorf.
The works are predominantly large-scale the three sonatas and the
variation sets, including the Handel Variations and the Paganini set, whose
appearance in 1866 marked the close of this first phase.
Then came something of a gap, until the second phase opened with the
publication of Acht Klavierstücke as Op.76 in March 1879.
It was
characterised by a smaller, much more intimate scale. After Op.76 came
the two Rhapsodies, Op.79 (1880) and another 12-year gap until the four
sets of pieces, Opp.116-119 of 1892/3. Nearly all the pieces in these sets
Brahms calls by one of two titles: capriccio for the faster pieces,
intermezzo for the slower.
The eight pieces of Op.76 were published in two books. The first book
consists of a restless Capriccio in F sharp minor, a quirky, gipsy-style
Capriccio in B minor, a teasingly graceful Intermezzo in A flat and a more
straight-forwardly lyrical Intermezzo in B flat. Book II opens with the
tense and intense Capriccio in C sharp minor, followed by the sweet and
simple Intermezzo in A, the gentle, wistful Intermezzo in A minor and
finally the Capriccio in C major. This last is a complex and subtle piece,
requiring musicianship of the first order. Brahms was so worried about
including it in the set that he asked Clara Schumann whether she didn't
agree he should leave it out. Fortunately she replied in a letter of 7
November 1878 that the C major was a great favourite of hers, and so
Brahms left it in.
Programme notes by David Mather
Floral decorations by Sue Bedford.
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FORTHCOMING CONCERTS
The final concert in the 73rd Season of the British Music Society,
presented in association with the Department of Music at the University,
takes place as usual in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall.
§ Thursday, 17 March 1994 at 8 p.m.
MICHAEL D'ARCY (violin)
NIGEL HUTCHISON (piano)
Sonata in G, Op.30/3
Sonata No.3
Sonata in D, Op.94a
Introduction and Rondo capriccioso, Op.28
Also in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall at 8.00:
§ Wednesday, 23 February 1994
NASH ENSEMBLE
Piano Quintets by Dvořák and Franck
Beethoven
Delius
Prokofiev
Saint-Saëns
§ Wednesday, 2 March
30 STRONG
The University big band playing repertory from the 1930s to the present
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BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY of YORK
OFFICERS OF THE SOCIETY
President
Dr Francis Jackson
Vice-Presidents
Joan Whitworth
Jim Briggs
Rosalind Richards
Chairman: Barbara Fox
Vice-chairman: Derek Sutton
Hon. Treasurer: Albert Ainsworth
Hon. Asst. Treasurer: John Petrie
Hon. Secretary: Nigel Dick
Hon. Programme Secretary: Brian & Rosalind Richards
NFMS Representative:
Dr Richard Crossley
Hon. Auditor: Derek Winterbottom
Members of the Committee: Sue Bedford, Margherita Biller, Andrew
Carter, Stephanie Kershaw, Peter Marsden and Dick Stanley
BENEFACTORS AND PATRONS
The BMS manages to maintain the high standard of its concerts largely
through the generosity of its Benefactors and patrons. Without their
covenanted gifts to the Society, we could not hope to balance our books.
Our Benefactors(§) and Patrons are as follows:
Mr A. Ainsworth
Mrs P. J. Armours
Mr R. A. Bellingham
Mr & Mrs J. Briggs
Mrs M. Danby-Smiths
Mr C. G. M. Gardner
Mr A. D. Hitchcocks
Dr F. A. Jackson
Mr J. C. Josling
Mrs F. Andrews
Dr D. M. Bearpark
Mr & Mrs D. A. C. Blunt
Dr R. J. S. Crossley
Mr N. J. Dick§
Mr D. P. Griffiths
Mr G. Hutchinsons
Mrs E. S. Johnsons
Professor R. Lawton§
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Mr R. P. Lorrimans
Mrs A. M. Morcom§
Mr & Mrs K. M. Nonhebel§ Miss H. C. Randall
Mr B. Richards§
Mr L. W. Robinsons
Mrs D. G. Roebuck
Mrs I. G. Sargent
Mr J. B. Schofield§
Mrs E. Sessions
Dr & Mrs G.A.C. Summers§
Dr M. J. Thomsons
Mr J. I. Watson
Mr & Mrs A. Wright
Mr P. W. Millers T
Mr G. C. Morcomg
If you would like to become a Benefactor or Patron, or have any queries,
recommendations, criticisms or even praise, please come and see us at the
Members Desk and make your feelings known.
滚术
Yorkshire & Humberside
ARTS
Mr D. A. Sutton
Mr O. S. Tomlinsons
Miss L. J. Whitworth
Mrs H. B. Wright
In addition to the generosity of our Benefactors and Patrons, the activities
of the BMS are supported by grants from Yorkshire and Humberside Arts.
O
NATIONAL FEDERATION
OF MUSIC SOCIETIES
NFMS
INSTITUTE
GORTHWICK
SMS 3/2/2 (1)
OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
☆
Compiled by David Mather and published by the British Music Society
of York. Reproduced by WrightDesign of Easingwold.
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B'S
YORK
STEVEN ISSERLIS
MELVYN TAN
(cello and fortepiano)
Friday, 28 October 1994
Programme: 50p
Presented by the British Music Society of York
in association with the Department of Music
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BAS
YORK
NOTICE BOARD
Advance ticket sales
At every concert of the 1994/1995 scason single tickets for the following
concert will be available at the Members Desk in the foyer during the
interval. This follows a successful try-out at the end of last season. As
at the first concert of last season, anyone with a single ticket for
tonight's concert who would like to convert it to a subscription for the
whole season may do so at the Members Desk at the interval on payment
of the balance.
Emma Johnson concert (25 November)
Eagle-eyed subscribers will have noticed that Emma's accompanist is given
as Gordon Back in the brochure and Julius Drake on the back of the
season ticket. The brochure's Gordon Back is correct: it was to have been
Julius Drake, but scheduling difficulties forced the substitution which came
too late to be noted on the season tickets.
Nossek Quartet concert (January 1995)
Please note that the Nossek Quartet's concert is on Thursday, 12 January,
as on the tickets. The brochure's date is incorrect.
Raymond Fox Bursary
The NFMS is to hold a fund-raising concert for the Bursary it established
in memory of BMS stalwart Raymond Fox. Details of performer and
programme will follow later, but if you want to make a note for your
diary, the concert will take place on 17 May 1995 at St John's, Smith
Square, London.
Brochure
This season's brochure, designed by John Hastie, has a very different look
from those of previous years. What do you think of it?
If you have
strong views one way or the other, please tell a committee member. They
should all be wearing their badges and they do want to hear from you.
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BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY of YORK
74th Season
Friday, 28 October 1994
Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall
STEVEN ISSERLIS 'cello
MELVYN TAN fortepiano
Cello Sonata No.1 in Bb major, Op.45
Cello Sonata No.1 in E minor, Op.38
INTERVAL
Variations concertantes, Op.17
Cello Sonata No.2 in D major, Op.58
Mendelssohn
before the concert starts,
and use a handkerchief when coughing.
Brahms
Mendelssohn
For the sake of others in the audience,
please turn off all alarms on watches, calculators etc.
Mendelssohn
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STEVEN ISSERLIS &
MELVYN TAN
Steven Isserlis is now internationally recognised as one of the finest
cellists of his generation; he has given audiences all over the world a new
insight into the whole repertory of the instrument, from baroque to
contemporary. In 1993 he was presented with the Royal Philharmonic
Society's Instrumentalist of the Year Award for "performances with a
quality of commitment that linger in the memory, and for an unfailing gift
for communicating the meaning of the music to the audience".
Melvyn Tan was born in Singapore and gave his first concert at the age
of five. At 12 he was invited by Yehudi Menuhin to study at the Menuhin
School in Surrey, where his teachers included Vlado Perlemuter and Nadia
Boulanger. Since 1980 Melvyn Tan has devoted himself exclusively to the
harpsichord and fortepiano, his repertory extending as far forward as
Chopin, Schumann and Brahms.
Steven Isserlis and Melvyn Tan have recorded all the Mendelssohn works
in tonight's programme for BMG Classics. The CD is due for release this
December with the number 09026 62553-2. If you don't want to pay shop
prices, you can get the CD post free from The Music Group, West Haddon,
NN6 7AA (tel/fax 0788 510 693) at £10.98 (pounds below list price).
PROGRAMME NOTES
Cello Sonata No.1 in Bb major, Op.45
Allegro vivace
Andante
Allegro assai
Felix Mendelssohn
(1809 - 1847)
The repertory for cello and piano effectively begins with Beethoven's five
sonatas plus variation sets: earlier works were originally either not for
cello or not for piano. The only prominent 19th-century composers to
take up this challenge with more than a one-off piece were Mendelssohn,
Brahms and, surprisingly, Chopin.
The Mendelssohn family was awash with culture, talent and money.
0
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Grandfather Moses Mendelssohn was one of the leading philosophers of the
Enlightenment; father Abraham co-founded the family banking business. Of
the children, the older sister Fanny had musical gifts to match her brother
Felix' (six of the 24 Songs published as Mendelssohn's Opp.8 & 9 were in
fact by Fanny), while the younger brother Paul showed talent as a cellist,
but followed his father into the world of finance. (It says much for his
choice that Paul outlived his siblings by decades, dying in 1874.)
Felix wrote several works for cello and piano: two sonatas, the Variations
concertantes and a couple of smaller pieces. Of these, the Variations and
the First Sonata (at least) were composed with Paul in mind.
The First Cello Sonata is dated 13 October 1838. Mendelssohn had been
at Leipzig for three years as conductor of the Gewandhaus concerts. In
March 1837 he had married the 20-year-old Cécile Jeanrenaud, and their
first child, Karl Wolfgang Paul, was born on 7 February 1838. Cécile was
quite ill, but gradually got better. In June Mendelssohn conducted at the
Lower Rhine Festival at Cologne, then went to the family home in Berlin,
a happy time when the family had its first chance to meet Cécile and the
new baby. They fled from Berlin in September, when there was an
outbreak of measles, but it was too late: Felix broke out in spots when
they got back to Leipzig and had to miss conducting engagements.
These minor domestic dramas make little impact on the Cello Sonata, with
its predominantly sunny first movement, wistful Andante and Finale by
turns lyrical and energetic.
Mendelssohn is often criticised in these sonatas for too often overwhelm-
ing the cello line with torrents of notes for the piano: we shall see, or
rather hear, whether the charge is justified when the music is played
with the clearer, less massive sound of a contemporary piano.
Cello Sonata No.1 in E minor, Op.38
Allegro non troppo
Allegretto quasi menuetto
Allegro
Johannes Brahms
(1833-1897)
Brahms had a particular love of lower sonorities: the Second Serenade for
orchestra does without violins altogether, and he wrote his two cello-rich
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string sextets before producing a string quartet he was prepared to see in
print. So it is fitting that the first of his seven duo sonatas should be
for cello and piano.
The chronology of the Sonata is a little hard to establish, since Brahms
could often be secretive or downright misleading about work in progress.
It seems, however, that it was composed between 1862 and 1865, alongside
several other works: the Piano Quintet (Op.34), Paganini Variations (Op.35),
Second String Sextet (Op.36), Waltzes for piano duet (Op.39) and Horn Trio
(Op.40) - even the First Symphony (Op.68) which was not to see the light
of day for another dozen years.
This was the period when Brahms was making the move from his native
Hamburg to Vienna, where he found the atmosphere freer, with more
chances to make his mark as a musician. It was, after all, the capital of
the German-speaking musical world.
The Cello Sonata is dedicated to a Dr Josef Gänsbacher, a keen cellist.
Once, when he was playing the work through with Brahms, he found
himself drowned out: Brahms was a forthright player, and despite the
elegiac and almost reticent tone of much of the Sonata, there are
nevertheless passages of blood-and-thunder, especially in the finale. At
one such Gänsbacher complained "I can't hear myself", to which Brahms
naturally and characteristically replied "Aren't you lucky?"
The Sonata has three movements. There were originally four, with an
Adagio placed second, but Brahms evidently felt the balance and contrast
of the work as a whole was better without it. The first movement
contains some of Brahms' simplest and most eloquent writing. The A
minor Minuet, with its hesitant mood, frames a melancholy, slightly
mysterious Trio in F# minor.
The powerful finale begins as a fugue and keeps returning to fugato style,
dropping it for the contrasting episodes. The main subject seems to have
been consciously modelled on Contrapunctus XIII from Bach's Art of
Fugue, though Brahms may also have had in mind Beethoven's last cello
sonata (D major, Op.102 No.2 Bernard Gregor-Smith played it at the
beginning of our 1992/3 season), where the last movement is a fully-
worked-out fugue.
as
sa
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)
INTERVAL
Coffee and drinks are available in the foyer. Coffee is 50p a cup: to find
it, go past the bar on to the landing and turn to the left.
Tickets for the next BMS concert (for details, see Forthcoming Concerts
at the end of this book) are now on sale at the Members Desk. This can
be found in the foyer at the opposite end to the bar, to your left as you
leave the auditorium.
Anyone with a single ticket for tonight's concert who would like to
convert it to a subscription for the whole season may do so at the
Members Desk. For example, those with an £8.00 ticket for tonight need
pay only the balance of £19.50 for a £27.50 season ticket.
If you are interested in becoming a Patron or Benefactor of the BMS, or
have any queries about the Society, come and see us at the Members Desk.
Variations concertantes, Op.17
Mendelssohn
The Variations concertantes, written for brother Paul, was the earliest of
Mendelssohn's works for cello and piano: the autograph is dated 30
and
January 1839, making him still 19 at the time of its composition
Paul only 14. Mendelssohn, though, was only chronologically young: he
already had an impressive list of compositions, including the spectacular
Octet (1825) and the Midsummer Night's Dream overture (1826).
Here he
In 1827 Mendelssohn's translation of a Latin comedy by Terence had been
published, gaining him a place at the University of Berlin.
wandered a little away from music, attending Hegel's lectures on aesthetics
as well as courses on geography and the French Revolution. But 1828 also
saw the composition of the overture Becalmed Sea and Prosperous Voyage
together with a couple of occasional cantatas.
Shortly after completing the Variations concertantes, and just after his
20th birthday, Mendelssohn conducted the famous revival of Bach's St
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Matthew Passion in Leipzig, after which he set out with his diplomat
friend Karl Klingemann for a tour of Britain: he was feted in London and
also visited Scotland, sowing the seeds of the Scottish works which
germinated over the next few years.
The theme of the Variations has a conventional pattern: it is in two
halves, each given first by the piano alone, then by cello with piano
accompaniment. But where Mozart or Beethoven, say, would have
continued this pattern of two repeated halves in each of the variations
the young Mendelssohn is more impatient and does away with the repeat
except in the fastest variations.
After the theme come eight numbered variations. The first three treat the
theme to increasingly quick figurations. Var.4 is a typically ficry Allegro
con fuoco for the piano with a few cello interjections. Var.5 is more of a
conversation between the instruments, and probably modelled on a passage
from Beethoven's variations on Bei Männern for the same combination of
instruments. Var.6 is slightly calmer, but Var.7 is a Presto ed agitato in
the minor key. The so-called "Var.8" is simply the theme, without
repeats, in the piano: the tune is unchanged, but there is some slightly
different harmony. It gives on to an extended coda.
Cello Sonata No.2 in D major, Op.58
Allegro assai vivace
Allegretto scherzando
Adagio
Molto allegro e vivace
Mendelssohn
Mendelssohn's Second Cello Sonata dates from 1843. This period of
Mendelssohn's life was slightly overshadowed by the death of his mother
(December 1842), which for a while stopped him composing: fortunately he
could occupy himself with a revision of his Goethe cantata Die erste
Walpurgisnacht.
Then there was the Leipzig Conservatory, inaugurated in April 1843 with
Mendelssohn as director. There was a good deal of organisational work to
do with the curriculum and staff (which included Schumann); but possibly
even more bothersome to Mendelssohn was the renegotiation of his Berlin
duties, with all the possibilities which that presented of offending the new
kir
18
MON
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SON
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Ocr'd Text:
200
ave
Ons
TO
n
f
T
king Friedrich Wilhelm IV.
1843 was the year that saw the production in Potsdam of Shakespeare's A
midsummer night's dream with Mendelssohn's 1826 Overture plus his new
1842 incidental music which include the celebrated Wedding March and
Scherzo.
the almost as famous
Mendelssohn may have had brother Paul in mind when he composed the
Second Sonata, but the work is dedicated to another amateur cellist, Count
Mateusz Wielhorski. Wielhorski and his composer brother Michal were the
sons of a Polish diplomat at the Russian court. They themselves were
effectively Russians and were very active as patrons of music, as
important for the development of Russian musical culture in the first half
of the century as the Rubinstein brothers were to be in the second.
Mateusz was also a military man, fighting in the war of 1812 and retiring
only in 1826, with the rank of colonel.
Unlike its companion, the Second Cello Sonata is in four movements. The
first, with its sunny disposition and bouncing rhythms has been likened to
that of the Italian Symphony. The second is another Mendelssohn
speciality, the light-footed scherzo, though, unlike so many earlier
examples, it is a gentle Allegretto, not a Presto.
It
The slow third movement is perhaps the most radical of the four.
opens with a chorale-like melody on the piano in huge arpeggiated chords,
The cello then
some with as many as ten notes spanning four octaves.
has freer, recitative-like music, following which these two ideas are
combined. At the end the piano has a short crack at the recitative idea,
over a cello pedal.
The finale begins after the barest of pauses, a typically fiery Allegro, full
of notes right up to its barnstorming finish.
Programme notes by David Mather
Floral decorations by Sue Bedford.
Ocr'd Text:
FORTHCOMING CONCERTS
The next concerts in the 74th Season of the British Music Society,
presented in association with the Department of Music at the University,
are as follows. They take place in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall,
beginning at 8.00 pm.
§ Friday, 25 November 1994
EMMA JOIINSON
GORDON BACK
Gavotte
3 Romances, Op.94
Grand duo concertant, J.204
Clarinet Sonata
3 Preludes
Fantasy on Verdi's Rigoletto
§ Thursday, 15 December 1994
(clarinet)
(piano)
ANTHONY HEWITT (piano)
NFMS/Esso Young Artist
Rameau (arr. Ettlinger)
Schumann
§ Wednesday, 9 November 1994
Music by Haydn, Beethoven (Sonata, Op.109), Schumann, Liszt and Chopin
(4 Ballades)
Also in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall at 8.00:
CITY WAITES
Weber
Poulenc
Gershwin
Bassi
Popular music of 16th & 17th century England
Ocr'd Text:
3
BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY of YORK
OFFICERS OF THE SOCIETY
President
Dr Francis Jackson
Vice-Presidents
Joan Whitworth
Jim Briggs
Rosalind Richards
Chairman: Barbara Fox
Vice-chairman: Derek Sutton
Hon. Treasurer: Albert Ainsworth
Hon. Asst. Treasurer: John Petrie
Hon. Secretary:
Nigel Dick
Hon. Publicity Secretary: Stephanie Kershaw
Hon. Programme Secretary: Brian & Rosalind Richards
NFMS Representative: Dr Richard Crossley
Hon. Auditor: Derek Winterbottom
Members of the Committee: Andrew Carter, Amanda Crawley, Lesley &
David Mather
BENEFACTORS AND PATRONS
The BMS manages to maintain the high standard of its concerts largely
through the generosity of its Benefactors and patrons. Without their
covenanted gifts to the Society, we could not hope to balance our books.
Our Benefactors(§) and Patrons are as follows:
Mr A. Ainsworths
Mrs P. J. Armour
Mr R. A. Bellingham
Mr & Mrs J. Briggs&
Mrs M. Danby-Smiths
Mr C. G. M. Gardner
Mr G. Hutchinsons
Mrs E. S. Johnson§
Mrs F. Andrews
Dr D. M. Bearparks
Mr & Mrs D. A. C. Blunt
Dr R. J. S. Crossley
Mr N. J. Dicks
Mr A. D. Hitchcock§
Dr F. A. Jackson
Mr J. C. Josling
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Professor R. Lawtong
Mr P. W. Millers
Mr G. C. Morcom§
Mr L. W. Robinsons
Mrs I. G. Sargent
Mr & Mrs N. Sexton
Dr G.A.C. Summers§
Mr O. S. Tomlinsons
Mr J. I. Watson
Mr R. Wilkinson§
Mrs H. B. Wright
If would like to become a Benefactor or Patron, or have any queries,
you
recommendations, criticisms or even praise, please come and see us at the
Members Desk and make your feelings known.
Mr R. P. Lorrimans
Mrs A. M. Morcom§
Mr B. Richards§
Mrs D. G. Roebuck
Mr J. B. Schofield§
Mrs D.C. Summers§
Mr D. A. Sutton
Dr M. J. Turner§
Miss L. J. Whitworth
Mr & Mrs A. Wright
In addition to the generosity of our Benefactors and Patrons, the activities
of the BMS are supported by grants from Yorkshire and Humberside Arts.
The Society also gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Royal Bank
of Scotland.
AR
Yorkshire & Humberside
ARTS
Registered Charity No.700302
NATIONAL FEDERATION
OF MUSIC SOCIETIES
NEMS
INSTITUTE
BORTHWICK
*(SMS 3/2/2 (2)
OF
HISTORICAL RESEARCH
Compiled by David Mather and published by the British Music Society
of York. Reproduced by Wright Design of Easingwold.
Ocr'd Text:
B'S
YORK
EMMA JOHNSON
GORDON BACK
(clarinet and piano)
Friday, 25 November 1994
Programme: 50p
Presented by the British Music Society of York
in association with the Department of Music
Ocr'd Text:
Advance ticket sales
BAS
YORK
NOTICE BOARD
Throughout the 1994/1995 season single tickets for the next concert will
be available at the Members Desk in the foyer during the interval. This
follows a successful try-out at the end of last season. During tonight's
interval tickets will be available for the concert by Anthony Hewitt on 15
December.
Nossek Quartet concert (January 1995)
Please note that the Nossek Quartet's concert is on Thursday, 12 January,
as on the tickets. The brochure's date is incorrect.
Your views
Raymond Fox Bursary
The NFMS is to hold a fund-raising concert for the Bursary it established
in memory of BMS stalwart Raymond Fox. Details of performer and
programme will follow later, but if you want to make a note for your
diary, the concert will take place on 17 May 1995 at St John's, Smith
Square, London.
The BMS is a society run for the benefit of its members by a committee
elected from those members. If there is something you think we should be
doing, or should not be doing, don't keep it to yourself; please tell a
committee member. They should all be wearing their badges and they do
want to hear from you.
Ocr'd Text:
Gavotte
BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY of YORK
74th Season
Clarinet Sonata
Friday, 25 November 1994
Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall
3 Romances, Op.94
Grand duo concertant, J.204
3 Preludes
EMMA JOHNSON clarinet
GORDON BACK piano
Fantasy on Verdi's Rigoletto
INTERVAL
Rameau (arr. Ettlinger)
Schumann
For the sake of others in the audience,
please turn off all alarms on watches, calculators etc.
before the concert starts,
and use a handkerchief when coughing.
Weber
Gershwin (arr. Cohn)
Poulenc
Bassi
Ocr'd Text:
EMMA JOHNSON and GORDON BACK
Emma Johnson was born in London and began to study the clarinet at the
age of nine.
In 1984 she won the BBC Young Musician of the Year
Competition, followed by the bronze award at the European Young
Musician Competition televised throughout Europe. She is one of the very
few woodwind players to have made an international career as a soloist,
regularly appearing in the USA, the Far East and throughout Europe.
Indeed, she is just back from her third tour of Japan and the Far East.
Emma Johnson plays on a Peter Eaton clarinet.
Gordon Back was born in Wales and studied at the Royal Northern College
of Music and then in Italy with Guido Agosti and Sergio Lorenzi. He
joined the staff of the Guildhall School of Music in London in 1974,
becoming head of the Accompaniment and Chamber Music Department six
years later.
He is in international demand as an accompanist, both in
recitals and in international competitions, such as the famous Tchaikovsky
Competition in Moscow. Along with Julius Drake, he is a frequent recital
partner of Emma Johnson and has made several recordings with her.
Emma Johnson records exclusively for ASV, for whom she has recorded
many of the works on tonight's programme:
Weber Duo on Emma Johnson plays Weber (CD DCA 747)
Poulenc Sonata on La clarinette française (CD DCA 621)
Gershwin Preludes/Rigoletto Fantasy on Encores (CD DCA 800)
The first two with Gordon Back, the last with Julius Drake
All these recordings are also available on cassette: for the numbers simply
replace the CD of the above prefixes with ZC.
If
you don't want to pay shop prices, ASV CDs can be obtained for £10.98
post free (pounds below list price) from The Music Group, West Iaddon,
NN6 7AA (tel/fax 0788 510 693).
Ocr'd Text:
PROGRAMME NOTES
Gavotte with 5 doubles
Jean Philippe Rameau
(1683 - 1764)
arr. ETTLINGER
"The search for pre-classical music of high artistic value is a permanent
problem for the clarinettist" wrote Yona Ettlinger in the preface to his
11-movement Suite for clarinet and piano arranged from harpsichord pieces
by Jean Philippe Rameau.
Rameau, a close contemporary of Bach, Handel and Domenico Scarlatti, is
famous in three principal areas of music: keyboard picces, opera and
theory (in particular, the study of harmony). His early career was as an
organist, but it is for the harpsichord (clavecin in French) that his
keyboard works are written.
Rameau published four collections of harpsichord pieces, only moving into
the field of opera after the third of them had appeared. It is from this
third set, the most ambitious of the four, that the Gavotte is taken, the
Nouvelles suites de pièces de clavecin published in Paris in 1728 or
thereabouts.
In its original version, the Gavotte, in A minor, is followed by six doubles
(variations) and may well have been influenced by the Air and Variations
in Handel's D minor Harpsichord Suite published in London in 1720..
Mr Ettlinger, an Israeli clarinettist and celebrated teacher, has transposed
the Gavotte down into G minor and omitted the grandiose sixth double
whose figuration would be hard to transcribe for clarinet to make a more
fitting ending than the fifth.
3 Romances, Op.94
Nicht schnell
Einfach innig
Nicht schnell
Robert Schumann
(1810 - 1856)
Over the last couple of BMS seasons these notes have had many oppor-
tunities to remark on Schumann's astonishing outflow of creativity
Ocr'd Text:
between the years 1840 and 1843. But on someone so neurotic, such
pressure was bound to take its toll. A concert tour of Russia with Clara
in the opening months of 1844 (he felt it to be a waste of his time),
professional disappointments, and then the difficulties encountered in
writing music for Goethe's Faust all sapped his nervous energy and led to
a serious breakdown at the end of August 1844. A few weeks later the
Schumanns retreated from Leipzig to the comparative musical backwater of
Dresden, which became their new home in December.
Schumann
Schumann's recovery was slow, and his creativity dropped off alarmingly.
Two things above all helped his revival. The first was an opera project,
based on Hebbel's play about the life of St Geneviève Genoveva; the
second was the choral society Schumann formed, the Verein für Chor-
gesang, which met for the first time on 5 January 1848.
finished the opera in August 1848, and this ushered in a new, richly
creative period. Many of the works, naturally enough, were for chorus,
but there were also the Conzertstück for four horns and orchestra, the
Introduction and Allegro appassionato for piano and orchestra, and several
chamber works, including a staple of the clarinet repertory, the Op.73
Fantasy Pieces. The three Romances, Op.94 belong to the end of this
creative rush, to the middle weeks of December 1849.
It should be remembered that 1848/9 was also a time of grave political
unrest in Europe. When the barricades went up in the streets of Dresden
in May 1849, Schumann fled with his children and heavily pregnant wife to
nearby Maxen. He strongly sympathised with the rebels, but refused to be
active; unlike Wagner (then a comparatively unknown figure working as
second conductor at Dresden Opera) who was forced to flee to Paris.
The Op.94 Romances were originally composed for oboe and piano, though,
as often with wind chamber music at this time, it was published with
alternatives for violin or clarinet and piano. The three Romances are
marked: not fast; simply, with deep, genuine feeling; not fast.
Grand duo concertant, J.204
Carl Maria von Weber
(1786 - 1826)
Allegro con fuoco
Andante con moto
Rondo: Allegro
The clarinet as an instrument has a long and not uncomplicated history.
Ocr'd Text:
It is held to have become distinct from its forebears at the end of the
17th century, but it really came of age in the second half of the 18th
century. The innovative and influential Mannheim Orchestra numbered
clarinets amongst its woodwind section from the 1750s onwards, but it is
only the later symphonies of Haydn (1732-1809) and Mozart (1756 -
1791) that had parts for the instrument. The first great symphonist who
could take them for granted in his orchestra was Beethoven (1770-1827).
Music was written or adapted for the clarinet almost as soon as it
existed, of course, but the first "great" composers to write music that
made a feature of the instrument were Mozart (who wrote a concerto, a
quintet and the Kegelstatt Trio) and Weber (with two concertos and a
concertino, a quintet, this Duo and a couple of other pieces plus one
for clarinet and piano).
now lost
Mozart and Weber, incidentally, were related by marriage: Mozart's wife
Constanza, was Weber's first cousin. Weber, however, was a child of his
father's second marriage and a generation younger: he was only four when
Mozart died.
Both men were inspired by particular performers Mozart by Anton
Stadler, Weber by Heinrich Baermann. It was Baermann's playing of the
Clarinet Concertino and Concertos that went a long way to establishing
Weber's reputation as a composer in the 1810s. Weber became director of
the German Theatre in Prague, the theatre Mozart had written Don
Giovanni for some 26 years earlier. Weber needed great energy and
organisation, not to mention a thick skin, to get the Theatre out of the
doldrums, but he achieved it. This was a difficult time for him, made
worse by his protracted and frustrating courtship of the singer Caroline
Brandt: he proposed early in 1814, but they were not betrothed until late
in 1816 or married until 4 November 1817.
To these years belongs the Grand duo concertant. Weber began it in
Munich in the summer of 1815. He was on leave from then Theatre and
had parted from Caroline on poor terms, though they wrote to each other
warmly enough. He returned to Prague, but work on the Grand duo
concertant and the cantata Kampf und Sieg had so re-convinced him of his
powers as a composer that at Easter 1816 he tendered his resignation
from the Theatre with effect from the autumn. And so it was in Berlin at
the end of 1816 that Weber completed the Grand duo concertant, alongside
two piano sonatas (the Ab and D minor).
Ocr'd Text:
The Grand duo concertant was the last of Weber's extant clarinet pieces
and the only one not specifically written for Baermann. (For pedants, the
lost works of 1815 were for a visiting clarinet virtuoso Simon Hermstedt.)
The "Grand" of the title was a booster word frequently added to pieces of
the late 18th and early 19th centuries and referring to increased sig-
nificance rather than anything to do with size. "Duo" in this context is
synonymous with "sonata", except that it implies equal importance for the
two instruments - an important consideration in an age that could print
Beethoven's Op.30 Violin Sonatas as "sonatas for the piano with violin
accompaniment". "Concertant" is a more complex word: it was used (eg. in
the quatuor concertant) to indicate a piece where each performer's
contribution is of equal importance, but it was also used (eg. by Weber's
contemporary Spohr) to mean the opposite, a work where the spotlight is
definitely on one instrument in other words, a work in concerto-style.
Weber almost certainly intended the former meaning here, though he would
not have been unaware of the sense of "display" that lingers round the
word "concertant"; or indeed that Beethoven's virtuoso Kreutzer Sonata
was described on its title page as a "sonata for piano and violin obbligato
written in a very concertante style almost like a concerto".
The Duo's three movements are far more straightforward for listeners
than for the performers: the first movement, in E flat, a typical mix of
drama and lyricism; the C minor slow movement dark and passionate by
turns; and the final E flat Rondo playful and light-hearted, but bristling
with difficulties enough for two concertos.
INTERVAL
Coffee and drinks are available in the foyer. Coffee is 50p a cup: to find
it, go past the bar on to the landing and turn to the left.
Tickets for Anthony Hewitt's piano recital on Thursday 15 December (for
programme details, see Forthcoming Concerts at the end of this book) are
now on sale at the Members Desk. This can be found in the foyer at the
opposite end to the bar, to your left as you leave the auditorium.
If you are interested in becoming a Patron or Benefactor of the BMS, or
have any queries about the Society, come and see us at the Members Desk.
Ocr'd Text:
)
)
1
}
Sonata for clarinet and piano
Allegro tristamente: Allegretto Très calme
Romanza: Très calme
Allegro con fuoco: Très animé
Francis Poulenc
(1899 - 1963)
Tempo allegretto
Wind players have good reason to be grateful to Francis Poulenc, who
contributed more fine and effective music to their repertories than
virtually any other 20th-century figure. The earlier music includes: a
Sonata for 2 clarinets (1918); Sonata for clarinet and bassoon (1922); Trio
for oboe, bassoon and piano (1926); and the famous Sextet for piano and
wind quintet, which the Aeolian Ensemble played for us last December.
But his crowning glory was the series of three sonatas he wrote in what
were his last years: the Flute Sonata of 1956 and the Clarinet Sonata and
Oboe Sonata, both composed in 1962. Unfortunately for bassoonists,
Poulenc died before he got round to their sonata: we know from his
friends that he was planning one.
Friends were particularly important to the gregarious Poulenc, so much so
that he entitled his autobiography Moi et mes amis [= me and my friends].
The three woodwind sonatas are all dedicated to friends who died in the
1950s: the Flute Sonata to the American patroness Elizabeth Sprague
Coolidge, the Oboe Sonata to Sergey Prokofiev and the Clarinet Sonata to
Arthur Honegger. This accounts for the way the sonatas frequently dip
into melancholy. Honegger (1892-1955) and Poulenc were fellow members
of Les six back in the 1920s: the notion of "Les six" was more a marvel-
lous publicity device, but the composers in question were never in any
sense a school or even a close-knit group, except maybe for a couple of
years, though Poulenc remained friends with several of the "members",
particularly Auric and Honegger.
The Clarinet Sonata contains a little joke at the expense of people like
me, a joke to do with movement nomenclature. In music, movements or
picces are called by the titles given by the composers, which are
Most
customarily printed in the centre of the page, above the music.
movements and many pieces, though, don't have titles as such, in which
case they are often referred to by their tempo marking, the words printed
immediately above the first bar(s) of the music as an indication of how (in
particular how quickly) the music goes. A bit like poetry: some poems
have titles (Ode to a nightingale); others are just known by their first
lines (Do not go gentle into that good night). So with music: a movement
Ocr'd Text:
that is not Prelude or Scherzo, Elegy or Intermezzo is called by its
tempo marking Allegro vivace, say, or Adagio.
Poulenc's joke is that the titles of the outer movements are phrased
exactly like tempo markings they are indications of how to play the
music and yet they are slightly at odds with the actual tempo markings.
So, the first movement has the title Allegro tristamente [= fast with
sadness] while the tempo marking at the beginning is plain Allegretto [=
fastish]. Similarly, the finale which is entitled Allegro con fuoco [= fast,
with fire] has the tempo marking Très animé [= very animated].
Despite its abrupt opening, the first movement is predominently melan-
choly, even its jollier moments tinged with sadness. By contrast, the
placid central section is tinged with grief that borders on the plangent.
The Allegretto music returns, but as a pale shadow of its former self.
After the clarinet introduction, the Romanza is almost an extension of the
central part of the first movement, even sharing its tempo marking - Très
calme, Its main idea is a melody of unusual beauty and a Mozartean
(Poulenc was a big fan) simplicity.
The finale is fast and furious, full of Poulenc's mordant wit and the
lightning changes of mood that are so characteristic of him, from the
funster of the opening to the sophisticated Parisian boulevardier of the
movement's lyrical heart.
3 Preludes
Allegro ben ritmato e deciso
Andante con moto e poco rubato
Allegro ben ritmato e deciso
George Gershwin
(1898 - 1937)
George Gershwin came to music in relatively late childhood. He was a
typical streetwise kid from an immigrant Russian-Jewish family in the
lower east side of Manhattan. It was not until 1910 that the family
bought an upright piano, ostensibly for George's older brother and later
lyricist Ira (1896 - 1985). George quickly outstripped not only Ira but also
the neighbourhood piano teacher and was soon having lessons with Charles
Hambitzer, who introduced him to the music of Chopin, Liszt and even
Debussy. Gershwin also had some lessons in theory, at various times
Ocr'd Text:
throughout his life, but was never at home in this area and, indeed, could
never read music at all quickly.
The piano figured large in his output. He wrote at the piano and was a
renowned improviser: at parties it was easy to get him to play the piano
and virtually impossible to get him to stop. His first job as a teenager
was as a song-plugger for the Tin Pan Alley publisher Remick, playing
Remick-published songs to potential customers. Under this influence he
began to write his own songs, some of which wound up in Broadway
shows. His first big hit was Swanee in 1919: the 1920 recording by Al
Jolson sold hundreds of thousands of copies. The band leader Paul
Whitemean's desire to bring musical respectability to jazz led to the
commission that became Rhapsody in Blue, after which Gershwin wrote
several works for the concert hall alongside his Broadway musicals. This
"serious" output culminated in what many regard as his masterwork, the
opera Porgy and Bess.
The three Preludes for piano belong to 1926, two years after Rhapsody in
Blue and a year after the [Piano] Concerto in F. 1926 was also the year
which saw the musical Oh, Kay!, which includes the songs Do, do, do and
Someone to watch over me: the lyrics were by Ira and Howard Dietz, and
the book was written by, of all people, PG. Wodehouse. When Gershwin
gave the first performance of the Preludes (4 December 1926, Hotel
Roosevelt, New York) there were actually five in all, but two were
suppressed before publication.
The first Prelude is in Bb major, the same key as Rhapsody in Blue,
though it belongs more to the world of the Concerto in F. As does the
second Prelude, in F sharp major, which could almost have been extracted
bodily from the Concerto's slow movement. The last Prelude, in E flat
minor, is the most ambitious of the three: it is also closer in spirit to one
of the piano elaborations of his famous songs (an album of 15 of these
was brought out in 1932).
The transcription for clarinet and piano is by J. Cohn.
Fantasy on themes from Verdi's 'Rigoletto'
Luigi Bassi
(1833-1871)
In the late 18th and 19th centuries, one type of piece most often found on
Ocr'd Text:
the programmes of travelling virtuosi was the "fantasy" or "variations" on
an operatic hit of the day. Such pieces were designed to show off both
the technique and the compositional skill of the performer. Originally
such things were often done extempore
Beethoven and Liszt were both
famous for this but the written form came to predominate: there are
many examples by Mozart and Beethoven before the form reached its
apogee in the great operatic fantasies of Liszt for the piano. The 20th
century has seen a dccline of this type of display vehicle, with the signal
exception of jazz, where the technique flourishes as never before.
Luigi Bassi's Fantasy is based on themes from Verdi's opera Rigoletto,
which was first produced in Milan in 1851. It uses several of the opera's
hits, including the celebrated Quartet and the aria Caro nome, but ignores
what many would see as the work's most famous number, the Duke's Act
III aria La donna è mobile. Even so, the Fantasy gives the clarinettist
every opportunity to display her command of the instrument.
Programme notes by David Mather
Floral decorations by Sue Bedford.
TI
pr
ar
be
lu
Als
Wo
Ocr'd Text:
FORTHCOMING CONCERTS
The next concerts in the 74th Season of the British Music Society,
presented in association with the Department of Music at the University,
are as follows. They take place in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall,
beginning at 8.00 pm.
§ Thursday, 15 December 1994
ANTHONY HEWITT (piano)
NFMS/Esso Young Artist
Fantasy in C major, Hob.XVII:4
Piano Sonata in E major, Op.109
Abegg Variations, Op.1
Mephisto Waltz No.1
4 Ballades
§ Thursday, 12 January 1995
Also in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall at 8.00:
NOSSEK STRING QUARTET
Quartets by Mozart, Janacek (No.1) and Schubert (A minor)
§ Wednesday, 7 December 1994
Haydn
Beethoven
Schumann
UNIVERSITY ORCHESTRA
Liszt
Chopin
Works by Britten, Saint-Saëns and Brahms (Symphony No.4)
Ocr'd Text:
BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY of YORK
OFFICERS OF THE SOCIETY
President
Dr Francis Jackson
Vice-Presidents
Joan Whitworth
Jim Briggs
Rosalind Richards
Chairman: Barbara Fox
Vice-chairman: Derek Sutton
Hon. Treasurer: Albert Ainsworth
Hon. Asst. Treasurer: John Petrie
Hon. Secretary: Nigel Dick
Hon. Publicity Secretary: Stephanie Kershaw
Hon. Programme Secretary: Brian & Rosalind Richards
NFMS Representative: Dr Richard Crossley
Hon. Auditor: Derek Winterbottom
Members of the Committee: Andrew Carter, Amanda Crawley, Lesley &
David Mather
BENEFACTORS AND PATRONS
The BMS manages to maintain the high standard of its concerts largely
through the generosity of its Benefactors and patrons. Without their
covenanted gifts to the Society, we could not hope to balance our books.
Our Benefactors(8) and Patrons are as follows:
Mr A. Ainsworth§
Mrs P. J. Armour
Mr R. A. Bellingham
Mr & Mrs J. Briggs
Mrs M. Danby-Smiths
Mr C. G. M. Gardner
Mr G. Hutchinsons
Mrs E. S. Johnsong
Mrs F. Andrews§
Dr D. M. Bearparks
Mr & Mrs D. A. C. Blunt
Dr R. J. S. Crossley
Mr N. J. Dicks
Mr A. D. Hitchcocks
Dr F. A. Jackson
Mr J. C. Josling
Ocr'd Text:
Professor R. Lawtong
Mr P. W. Millers
Mr G. C. Morcoms
Mr L. W. Robinsons
Mrs I. G. Sargent
Mr & Mrs N. Sexton
Dr G.A.C. Summers
Mr O. S. Tomlinsons
Mr J. I. Watson
Mr R. Wilkinsons
Mrs H. B. Wright
If you would like to become a Benefactor or Patron, or have any queries,
recommendations, criticisms or even praise, please come and see us at the
Members Desk and make your feelings known.
Mr R. P. Lorrimang
Mrs A. M. Morcom§
Mr B. Richards§
Mrs D. G. Roebuck
Mr J. B. Schofields
Mrs D.C. Summers
Mr D. A. Sutton
Dr M. J. Turner§
Miss L. J. Whitworth
Mr & Mrs A. Wright
In addition to the generosity of our Benefactors and Patrons, the activities
of the BMS are supported by grants from Yorkshire and Humberside Arts.
The Society also gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Royal Bank
of Scotland.
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Yorkshire & Humberside
ARTS
Registered Charity No.700302
NATIONAL FEDERATION
OF MUSIC SOCIETIES
NEMS
Compiled by David Mather and published by the British Music Society
of York. Reproduced by Wright Design of Easingwold.
Ocr'd Text:
INSTITUTE
SORTHWICK
BMS 3/2/2 (3)
OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH