Please note: program notes updated April 26, 2011 due to a change in the program for this concert.
Francesca da Rimini, Op. 32
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
b. Kamsko-Votkinsk, Russia, May 7, 1840
d. St. Petersburg, Russia, November 6, 1893
In 1876, Tchaikovsky read Dante Alighieri’s epic 13th-century poem The Divine Comedy. An episode from the Inferno section fired his imagination: the pathetic tale of Francesca, a young woman from the Italian town of Rimini who has been condemned to eternal damnation because of an illicit love affair. Tribulations of the heart were very much on Tchaikovsky’s mind at the time. The homosexual composer longed to be married in order to conceal his sexual preference from the public. His wish would be granted within a year of Francesca’s composition, to his eventual and severe dismay.
He first thought of using Francesca’s story as the basis for an opera, but the lack of a satisfactory libretto and his brother Modest’s opinion that an orchestral setting would be preferable changed his mind. After visiting Bayreuth to hear the first complete performance of Wagner’s Ring Cycle (he didn’t care for it), Tchaikovsky set to work on his new “symphonic fantasy after Dante.” He completed it in November, after just five weeks’ intensive labor. “I wrote it with love and that love, it seems, has come out quite well,” he wrote to Modest. Nikolay Rubinstein conducted the first performance, in St. Petersburg on March 9, 1877.
The music follows Dante’s narrative closely. The poet’s spirit is guided towards the second circle of hell. After a somber, unsettling introduction, Tchaikovsky vividly depicts the harsh winds that howl relentlessly through this region. Once the second circle has been reached, the music dies away to a whisper. A pathetic theme on solo clarinet launches Francesca’s tale. In love with the handsome Paolo, she was given in marriage to his hateful, hunchbacked brother Gianciotto instead. Francesca and Paolo continued their affair for years, unbeknownst to Gianciotto, until one day he came upon them together and killed them. This expansive central portion of the music builds a long crescendo of passion, and displays Tchaikovsky’s mastery of orchestral color at its most effective. A violent episode depicts the lovers’ deaths. The driving winds of hell return, eventually bringing the piece to a stark conclusion.
Shéhérazade
Maurice Ravel
b. Ciboure, France / March 7, 1875
d. Paris, France / December 28, 1937
In the Arabian Nights fables, a sultan became convinced that all women are fickle. He took a new bride each day, then put her to death the next. Princess Scheherazade, his latest consort, came up with a clever strategy designed first to postpone, then hopefully to evade her fate. Every evening she told him a spellbinding tale, one leading suspensefully into the next. Finally, after 1001 nights, the sultan relented and settled down to a happily married life with her.
The most famous music inspired by her stories is the scintillating orchestral suite that Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov composed in 1888. Ravel deeply admired the music of Rimsky-Korsakov and his fellow Russian nationalists. In 1898, while he was still studying at the Paris Conservatoire, he began an operatic treatment of the Arabian Nights legends. He progressed no further than the overture, which remains his earliest surviving orchestral work.
He returned to the same territory in 1903, bearing increased self-confidence and more modest ambitions. He composed a three-part song cycle based on poems from a large, recently published collection, entitled Shéhérazade, by Tristan Klingsor, the pen name of his friend, Arthur Justin Léon Leclère. These free-meter verses, inspired by a recent French translation of the Arabian Nights stories, conjure the sights, sounds, and philosophies of the east. Ravel was so concerned with understanding Leclère’s intentions that he had the author read the poems aloud, the better to grasp the correct rhythms and emphases. Ravel’s settings were premiered in Paris on May 17, 1903, under the baton of the respected pianist and conductor, Alfred Cortot.
Asie (Asia), the first and longest song, offers a dream-like journey through eastern lands. Ravel evokes them in dazzling orchestral colors, while alternating moods of excitement and languor. La Flûte enchantée (The Magic Flute), the second song, captures the stillness of a warm afternoon. A girl listens sadly to the haunting sound of a distant flute, played by her lover. The cycle concludes with a portrait of a potentially amorous, but eventually unfulfilled encounter between total strangers. Ravel scores L’Indifférent (The Indifferent One) in soft, muted colors, but ones which, like the words, suggest levels of deeper, unspoken passions.
Scheherazade, Op. 35
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
b. Tikhvin, Russia / March 18, 1844
d. Lyubensk, Russia / June 21, 1908
Surely it was destiny that led Rimsky-Korsakov to compose a piece inspired by the Arabian Nights legends. He spent decades acquiring the necessary skills to do the material justice, above all a mastery of colorful orchestration and a flair for composing sweeping, exotic melodies.
During a summer holiday in 1888, when he and his family withdrew to a quiet lakeshore in the Russian countryside, he set down the music that had been burning feverishly within him since the previous winter. Three weeks was all the time he needed to finish the symphonic suite Scheherazade to the last note.
Like many composers who write music inspired by outside sources, he suggested that audiences not listen too closely for specific events or characters in the music. He gave each movement a sub-title, but then he removed them. However, he did include in the printed score the following introduction, drawn from the original stories: “The Sultan Shakriar, convinced of the falsehood and inconstancy of all women, had sworn an oath to put to death each of his wives after the first night. However the Sultana Scheherazade saved her life by arousing his interest in the tales which she told during the 1001 nights. Driven by curiosity, the Sultan postponed her execution from day to day, and at last abandoned his bloodthirsty design.”
The orchestration of Scheherazade is masterly, drawing the maximum in color from an ensemble that is not particularly large. Much of this brilliance is achieved by continuously dotting the score with passages for solo instruments. The suite is bound together by a recurring motive, a bewitching melody sung by the solo violin: the voice of Scheherazade.
The first movement gives a strong impression of the sea, complete with the swell of ocean breezes, the roll of the waves, and the adventurous call of foreign ports. Rimsky knew such an atmosphere well, having served in the Russian navy for several years. His voyages brought him as close to us as Niagara Falls.
At the start of the second movement, Scheherazade’s theme again declares, “Once upon a time...” Solo bassoon launches the tale, sinuously, like the chant of an ancient storyteller. A war-like fanfare introduced by trombones and tuba plays an important role in the fantastic proceedings.
The third movement can’t be anything but a love scene. A dance, tinged with light percussion, appears at the core. The Scheherazade violin theme puts in an appearance, leading to a brief, ecstatic climax – a first kiss? The central dance theme returns, warmed by recent experience, before the tranquil close.
The Finale will really get your blood racing. It opens with alternations of furious orchestral outbursts and passionate violin solos. Rimsky then kicks off a boisterous carnival, where themes heard earlier in the suite jostle for attention. At the height of festivities we appear to return to the sea, sailing majestically until a colossal climax is reached. The Scheherazade theme returns one last time, keening softly in the heights to close her storytelling – for tonight.
© 2011 Don Anderson. All rights reserved.
