Overture to Manfred, Op. 115
Robert Schumann
b. Zwickau, Germany / June 8, 1810
d. Endenich, Germany / July 29, 1856
The vivid, fanciful works of English poet George Gordon Byron (1788-1824, known as Lord Byron), have inspired many first-rate composers; you’ll hear two such works tonight. Schumann felt an intense identification with Manfred, Byron’s character who wanders through the Alps in search of consolation for his broken heart. Schumann’s musical setting of Manfred resulted from a request from Franz Liszt, who asked for over a dozen selections – including an overture, entr’actes, and brief sections of musical underscoring – to be performed as part of a dramatized recitation of the poem. Schumann composed his score during the summer of 1848. Problems with staging the production in an effective way delayed its presentation. Two performances finally did take place, four years later in Leipzig, but neither of them presented the material successfully. Only the overture from Schumann’s score is still performed regularly, its survival based on its considerable musical merits. Filled with equal parts drama and lyricism, it paints a compelling character portrait. Like Byron’s melancholy hero, it captures the spirit of its era with considerable power.
Symphony No. 83 in G minor
Joseph Haydn
b. Rohrau, Lower Austria / March 31, 1732
d. Vienna, Austria / May 31, 1809
During Haydn’s first 30 years as director of music to the aristocratic Esterhazy family (1761-1790), he remained a virtual prisoner on their estates, in and around Vienna. His music traveled for him. One center where it became exceptionally popular was Paris, where his symphonies had been performed as early as the 1760s.
In 1785, the Concert de la Loge Olympique, one of the city’s most prestigious orchestras, commissioned six new symphonies. Reflecting the continent-wide reputation he had earned by that time, they offered him five times their usual fee: 25 louis d’or each, plus a further five for the publishing rights (this translates to about $65 thousand per symphony in modern currency).
He composed the pieces which have become known as symphonies 83, 85 and 87 in 1785; Nos. 82, 84 and 86 followed over the next year. First performed to great acclaim during the Loge Olympique’s 1787 concert season, they have been known ever since as his “Paris” symphonies.
No. 83 is the only one of them in a minor key. This proves to be a purely nominal designation, as the rather stern first theme of the opening movement is the only melody in the entire symphony that is not in the major. The opening restfulness of the slow movement is interrupted from time to time by sharp but non-threatening outbursts. After a genial minuet, Haydn caps the symphony with a bounding romp of a finale.
Harold in Italy, Op. 16
Hector Berlioz
b. La Côte-Saint-André, France / December 11, 1803
d. Paris, France / March 8, 1869
Winning the Paris Conservatoire’s Prix de Rome competition in 1830 entitled Berlioz to a fully subsidized stay in the Italian capital. Rapidly becoming bored with Rome and its musical life, he often sat in the cool shade inside St. Peter’s Cathedral devouring the very romantic works of one his favorite authors, Lord Byron. During the 15 months he spent in Italy, he also traveled extensively throughout the country, soaking up the atmosphere and meeting numerous colorful people. In this, he mirrored the title character in Byron’s popular book, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.
In 1834, renowned violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini asked him to compose a concerto with which he wished to show off the fine Stradivarius viola he had just acquired. Berlioz accepted the commission, but as he worked on it during the summer of 1834, his conception evolved from the straightforward display piece Paganini had requested into something more symphonic, poetic, individual and autobiographical. In it, he combined impressions of a recent stay in Italy with his love for the writings of Byron. He called it Harold in Italy.
In his words, it became “a series of scenes for the orchestra, in which the viola should find itself mixed up, like a person more or less in action, always preserving his own individuality. The background I formed from my recollection of my wanderings in the Abruzzi Mountains, introducing the viola as a sort of melancholy dreamer, in the style of Byron’s Childe Harold.” The viola and its theme may be taken to represent Berlioz, as well.
Examining the first movement, Paganini was shocked to discover the secondary nature of the solo viola’s role. He refused to perform the music. Once he heard it four years later, however, it so impressed him that he publicly knelt and kissed Berlioz’ hand. A check for 20 thousand francs followed. Berlioz used this princely sum to pay off his debts and to subsidize the composition of a piece he had longed to compose for years: a dramatic symphony based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. He dedicated it to Paganini.
The creation of Harold in Italy flowed more quickly and easily than many of Berlioz’s other major works. The fact that he wrote it during the blissful early days of his marriage may help account for this, as well as for the music’s plentiful warmth and exuberance. It is one of his more traditional symphonic works, cast in recognizable variations of Classical forms. Narcisse Girard conducted the premiere at the Paris Conservatoire on November 23, 1834, with Chrétien Urhan as the viola soloist.
In this composition, Berlioz continued a practice he had begun in his Symphonie fantastique: the movements are bound together by a recurring theme. Introduced by the solo viola (and re-cycled from the Rob Roy Overture he composed in Italy in 1831), it goes the “idée fixe” from the Symphonie fantastique one better, generating much of the score’s other material, as well.
The first movement begins with a restless, brooding introduction. It evokes a misty, pre-dawn landscape. After a rather muted climax, the viola, bedecked with harp, enters quietly with the gently melancholy "Harold" theme. This leads to a broadly scaled, largely high-spirited Allegro. The second movement is a leisurely march, cast in the shape of an arch. In this highly evocative, almost pictorial exercise in tone-painting may be heard the measured tramp of the pilgrims’ footsteps as they approach and retreat, in tandem with their devout hymn-singing. All this is punctuated by the horns’ imitation of bells tolling softly as dusk falls.
The third movement, Serenade, opens with a lively, charming salute to the strolling wind bands Berlioz encountered in the Abruzzis. The main section centers on an amorous, very Italianite melody introduced by the English horn. Harold’s theme appears midway through, in combination with the serenade.
Berlioz launches the finale with a brusque opening flourish. Taking his cue from the finale of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony (which he had heard for the first time a short time before), he first reviews, then rejects the principal themes of the previous movements. The riotous ensuing bacchanal portrays a fierce band of mountain robbers. In this central portion of the movement, the solo viola falls silent and Berlioz adds a percussion battery to the orchestra. After a particularly frenetic passage, the pilgrims’ hymn returns briefly, and the viola makes what proves to be a futile effort to restore calm and order. The music then hurtles forward to a blazing conclusion.
© 2010 Don Anderson. All rights reserved.
