[1/15/2011] Preview: Warming up with Rimsky-Korsakov (continued)

As if the bayan performance wasn't thrilling enough, here's the "Flight of the Bumblebee" played all at once by eight pianists (including some pretty famous ones). Why, you ask? Apparently: because it can be done.


AS PROMISED, HERE'S SOME SPECIALLY FILCHED
COMMENT ON THE RUSSIAN EASTER OVERTURE

Background

The tunes in the overture are largely from the Russian Orthodox liturgy, based on a collection of old Russian Orthodox liturgical chant called the Obikhod. Rimsky-Korsakov includes several biblical quotations in the score to guide the listener as to his intent, including Psalm 68 and Mark 16.

In this overture, the composer, as he says in his autobiography, is eager to reproduce "the legendary and heathen aspect of the holiday, and the transition from the solemnity and mystery of the evening of Passion Saturday to the unbridled pagan-religious celebrations of Easter Sunday morning". Rimsky-Korsakov always had a great interest in - and enjoyment of - liturgical themes and music, though he was himself a non-believer (see main article Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and notes).

Structure

The opening Andante lugubre alternates two themes: the first is intoned solemnly by woodwind "Let God Arise, let his enemies be scattered" (from the beginning of the Paschal Vigil); while the second is the hymn "The Angel cried" (Zadostoinik from the Paschal Divine Liturgy), after a solo violin cadenza, first heard on solo cello. Trombones and strings then repeat the first theme antiphonally. The allegro section, led by a second solo violin cadenza, has a very lively and syncopated theme, which quotes the line "Let those that hate Him flee before His face", and the mood builds up to one of exultation. A calm melody, which is based on a famous Russian Easter chant "Christ is Risen" (the Troparion of Pascha), also appears. All these themes appear at the climax, and the chant "amidst the trumpet blasts and the bell-tolling, constituting a triumphant coda".

A feature of the work is its use of short violin cadenzas to separate some of its sections. They represent the light shining from the Holy Sepulchre.

The opening section is written in 5/2 time, and is one of the more famous works in 5 for orchestra. The final section of the piece is notated in 2/1 time, making occasional use of 3/1, and is one of very few orchestral works to use either of these time signatures.

So we're ready to hear it again, right? I chose our earlier performance, the one conducted by composer-conductor Manuel Rosenthal (1904-2003), partly for the French connection that was so important to Russian high culture in the 18th and 19th centuries, partly because it's a recording a lot of people won't have heard, and partly because, well, Rosenthal was an awfully good conductor. (He was one of our heavy lifters for Debussy's orchestral music.) For our second recording, regular readers won't be surprised to find me going back, for this kind of grand orchestral showpiece, to the glory days of Eugene Ormandy (1899-1985) and the Philadelphia Orchestra. (Ormandy joined the orchestra as associate conductor to Stokowski in 1936, but soon edged him out and remained as music director until his retirement in 1980.)

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Russian Easter Overture, Op. 36

Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy, cond. Columbia/CBS/Sony, recorded Apr. 1, 1959


MOVING ON TO THE CAPRICCIO ESPAGNOL

The Wikipedia article on the Capriccio espagnol offers this interesting comment from Rimsky-Korsakov himself:

The opinion formed by both critics and the public, that the Capriccio is a magnificently orchestrated piece — is wrong. The Capriccio is a brilliant composition for the orchestra. The change of timbres, the felicitous choice of melodic designs and figuration patterns, exactly suiting each kind of instrument, brief virtuoso cadenzas for instruments solo, the rhythm of the percussion instruments, etc., constitute here the very essence of the composition and not its garb or orchestration. The Spanish themes, of dance character, furnished me with rich material for putting in use multiform orchestral effects. All in all, the Capriccio is undoubtedly a purely external piece, but vividly brilliant for all that. I was a little less successful in its third section (Alborada, in B-flat major), where the brasses somewhat drown the melodic designs of the woodwinds; but this is very easy to remedy, if the conductor will pay attention to it and moderate the indications of the shades of force in the brass instruments by replacing the fortissimo by a simple forte.

While we're poaching from Wikipedia, we might as well go all the way. (Lots o' links in the original.)

Structure

The work has five movements.

1. The first movement, Alborada, is a festive and exciting dance, typically from traditional asturian music to celebrate the rising of the sun. It features the clarinet with two solos, and later features a solo violin with a solo similar to the clarinet's.

2. The second movement, Variazioni, begins with a melody in the horn section. Variations of this melody are then repeated by other instruments and sections of the orchestra.

3. The third movement, Alborada, presents the same asturian dance as the first movement. The two movements are nearly identical, in fact, except that this movement has a different instrumentation and key.

4. The fourth movement, Scena e canto gitano ("Scene and gypsy song") opens with five cadenzas — first by the horns and trumpets, then solo violin, flute, clarinet, and harp — played over rolls on various percussion instruments. It is then followed by a dance in triple time leading attacca into the final movement.

5. The fifth and final movement, Fandango asturiano, is also an energetic dance from the Asturias region of northern Spain. The piece ends with an even more rousing statement of the Alborada theme.

We're going with Ormandy again, and also with a conductor who provides another bridge between Russian and French culture, the Ukrainian-born and largely French-trained Igor Markevitch (1912-1983), who served up wonderfully dramatic performances of all kinds of music but was especially known in -- what else? -- the Russian and French repertories. (We last heard him conducting Berlioz's Harold in Italy.)

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Capriccio espagnol, Op. 34

i. Alborada: Vivo e strepitoso
ii. Variations: Andante con moto
iii. Alborada: Vivo e strepitoso
iv. Scene and Gypsy Song: Allegretto
v. Asturian Fandango: Vivace assai; and Coda: Presto

Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy, cond. Columbia/CBS/Sony, recorded Feb. 17, 1966

London Symphony Orchestra, Igor Markevitch, cond. Philips, recorded 1962


IN TOMORROW'S SUNDAY CLASSICS POST

I can't promise you that we aren't going to hear any of tonight's music again. (Actually, I can tell you that we will. Sorry, I can't help myself. But our main business will be the beloved symphonic suite Scheherazade.


NOTES ON (REVISED) SCHEDULING

1. Sunday Classics: A shuffle and a (rare) forecast

For those keeping track, tonight's preview was supposed to be part 2 of a "flashback/preview" devoted to soprano Valerie Masterson, following last night's part 1 -- all leading to an eventual proper post on the subject. That's all still going to happen, just in a different time frame. I'm thinking the Flashback/Preview Part 2 for next week, and maybe even the main post, though I think that's likelier to be farther in the future. I want to make sure that those records I mentioned ordering have time to arrive.

I think next week's main post is going to be the first of two devoted to Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, which we'll hear concurrently in (a) the composer's original piano-solo version, (b) the Ravel orchestration in which it has become an international standard, and (c) the very different orchestration of Leopold Stokowski. Although there isn't that much music in the suite (pretty much everyone can get through the whole thing in not much more than half an hour), a two-parter may seem an extravagance, but since we're going to be hearing in bits in the three formats, I thought it would be sensible to split the thing into more manageable work units.

2. Thurber Tonight: Where's "Walter Mitty"?

I did say Thursday night, as we finished up with Thurber's My Life and Hard Times, that tonight we would be having perhaps his best-remembered piece, the story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty." Back then I had what I thought was a pretty clever idea for accommodating it. I wish I could say this was the first of my ideas, even the pretty clever ones (sometimes especially the pretty clever ones), that didn't work out.

Not to worry, though -- "Walter Mitty" is on the schedule for tomorrow night. And he's rarin' to go.


RETURN TO THE BEGINNING OF THE POST

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