"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross."
-- Sinclair Lewis
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Sunday Classics: Born to tell stories, Rimsky-Korsakov spins music's best yarns in "Scheherazade"
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"The Sea and Sinbad's Ship":In 1978, near the end of his 44-year tenure with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy conducts the opening movement of Scheherazade. The violin soloist is Norman Carol, the orchestra's concertmaster from 1966 to 1994. (The whole performance can be found in customarily time-limited chunks on YouTube.)
by Ken
In last night's preview we heard Rimsky's Russian Easter Overture and Capriccio espagnol. As I threatened at the time, that wasn't the last we were going to hear of them; I can't resist starting off with one more quick hearing of each. (I couldn't resist including the performance of the Capriccio espagnol from the intriguing four CDs' worth of Rimsky, including the three symphonies and most any other orchestral work you're apt to think of, nicely done by the Malaysian Philharmonic under Dutch conductor Kees Bakels. I suppose the note of Eastern exoticism might have been more appropriate for Scheherazade, which the Malaysians in fact play very nicely, but I didn't have any openings on my Scheherazade card.)
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Russian Easter Overture, Op. 36
Concertgebouw Orchestra, Igor Markevitch, cond. Philips, recorded 1968
Sunday Classics preview: Warming up with Rimsky-Korsakov
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Admit it, you've had a secret desire to hear Rimsky-Korsakov's "Flight of the Bumblebee" played on the bayan (an accorion to us). Am I right?
by Ken
It seems kind of unfair to remember a composer as important both historically and artistically as Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov for works that most often find their way onto pops concerts. It would be a lot more unfair, though, to fail to show proper respect for these works. There's a reason why they're as popular as they are.
Some other time we can try to explore the rest of Rimsky's output. For tonight we have the Russian Easter Overture and Rimsky's homage to Spain, the Capriccio espagnol. Why don't we just plunge right in with the Russian Easter Overture, than which there isn't much better music to get the blood racing?
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Russian Easter Overture, Op. 36
Orchestra of the Théâtre National de l'Opéra de Paris, Manuel Rosenthal, cond. Adès, recorded c1967
I suppose I should have said something insightful, or in some way helpful, about the piece, and I'm sure as I was getting to know it I must have read a bunch of program and liner notes, which probably did help me in some way get "into" it. But mostly it was a matter of listening to the thing repeatedly, so that after a while it became part of my basic consciousness.
Still, in the interest of general consciousness-raising, we've got a bit of background, cribbed from the Wikipedia article on the piece, as well as antoher performance of it, on the other side of the click-through.
[1/16/2011] Born to tell stories, Rimsky-Korsakov spins music's best yarns in "Scheherazade" (continued)
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In Scene 4 of Rimsky-Korsakov's opera Sadko, the hero asks three merchant guests -- one Varangian (bass), one Hindu (tenor), and one Venetian (baritone) -- to sing about their homelands. (One of these weeks we'll come back to the Songs of the Varangian [Viking], Hindu, and Venetian Guests.) The Song of the Hindu (or Indian) Guest in time morphed, for better or worse, into the "Song of India."
ONCE WE HEAR OUR MALAYSIAN PERFORMANCE OF THE CAPRICCIO, IT'S ON TO SCHEHERAZADE
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
Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra, Kees Bakels, cond. Bis, recorded November 2003
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SCHEHERAZADE: THE LEGEND
IMPORTANT NOTE TO READERS: Please don't feel obliged to study, or even read, all of the following background and commentary -- or even any of it.You're not responsible for any of this material on the midterm. It's only the listening that matters.
But the better we listen, the more we hear, and the richer the experience that's available to us. So I feel I ought to provide some possibly useful information. And as I wrote last night, I'm sure that the reams of comment on these pieces I've taken in over the years have in various fashions filtered into my relationships with the pieces. However, all of this has value only insofar as it feeds into the listening experience, directly or indirectly. Often, in fact, it's the indirect ways in which this stuff filters into our consciousness that matters most. It's a maddeningly imprecise, disorderly, and generally uncontrollable process, but what're you gonna do? This is the way the mind works.
What's more, as we're going to find out below, Rimsky-Korsakov was adamant that his symphonic suite Scheherazade doesn't attempt to tell actual stories, but rather paints sound pictures evocative of the Arabian Nights tales. Musical story-telling often plugs directly into the imagination rather than attempting to trace neat narrative lines.
Still, we really ought to know who Scheherazade is, oughtn't we? For what it's worth, here is some Wikipedia-supplied background on the legend:
Scheherazade (pronounced /ʃəˌhɛrəˈzɑːdᵊ/), sometimes Scheherazadea, Persian transliteration Shahrazad or Shahrzād (Persian: شهرزاد Šahrzād, Arabic Šahrazād), is a legendary Persian queen and the storyteller of One Thousand and One Nights.
The frame tale goes that every day Shahryar (Persian: شهريار or "king") would marry a new virgin, and every day he would send yesterday's wife to be beheaded. This was done in anger, having found out that his first wife was betraying him. He had killed one thousand such women by the time he was introduced to Scheherazade, the vizier's daughter.
In Sir Richard F. Burton's translation of The Nights, Shahrazad was described in this way:
"[Shahrazad] had perused the books, annals and legends of preceding Kings, and the stories, examples and instances of by gone men and things; indeed it was said that she had collected a thousand books of histories relating to antique races and departed rulers. She had perused the works of the poets and knew them by heart; she had studied philosophy and the sciences, arts and accomplishments; and she was pleasant and polite, wise and witty, well read and well bred."
Against her father's protestations, Scheherazade volunteered to spend one night with the King. Once in the King's chambers, Scheherazade asked if she might bid one last farewell to her beloved sister, Dinazade, who had secretly been prepared to ask Scheherazade to tell a story during the long night. The King lay awake and listened with awe as Scheherazade told her first story. The night passed by, and Scheherazade stopped in the middle of the story. The King asked her to finish, but Scheherazade said there was not time, as dawn was breaking. So, the King spared her life for one day to finish the story the next night. So the next night, Scheherazade finished the story, and then began a second, even more exciting tale which she again stopped halfway through, at dawn. So the King again spared her life for one day to finish the second story.
And so the King kept Scheherazade alive day by day, as he eagerly anticipated the finishing of last night's story. At the end of one thousand and one nights, and one thousand stories, Scheherazade told the King that she had no more tales to tell him. During these one thousand and one nights, the King had fallen in love with Scheherazade, and had three sons with her. So, having been made a wiser and kinder man by Scheherazade and her tales, he spared her life, and made her his Queen. Scheherazade is one of literatere's greatest female grifters in history.
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Scheherazade, symphonic suite after the Thousand and One Nights, Op. 35
Initially, Rimsky-Korsakov intended to name the respective movements in Scheherazade: Prelude, Ballade, Adagio and Finale. However, after weighing the opinions of Anatoly Lyadov and others, as well as his own aversion to a too-definitive program, he settled upon thematic headings, based upon the tales from The Arabian Nights.
The composer deliberately made the titles vague, so that they are not associated with specific tales or voyages of Sinbad. However, in the epigraph to the finale, he does make reference to the adventure of Prince Ajib. In a later edition, he did away with titles altogether, desiring instead that the listener should hear his work only as an Oriental-themed symphonic music that evokes a sense of the fairy-tale adventure. He stated "All I desired was that the hearer, if he liked my piece as symphonic music, should carry away the impression that it is beyond a doubt an Oriental narrative of some numerous and varied fairy-tale wonders and not merely four pieces played one after the other and composed on the basis of themes common to all the four movements.” Rimsky-Korsakov went on to say that he kept the name Sheherazada because it brought to everyone’s mind the fairy-tale wonders of Arabian Nights and the East in general.
i. The Sea and Sinbad's Ship
This movement is composed of various melodies and contains a general A B C A1 B C1 form. Although each section is highly distinctive, aspects of melodic figures carry through and unite them into a movement. Although similar in form to the classical symphony, the movement is more similar to the variety of motives used in one of his previous works Antar. Antar however, used genuine Arabic melodies as opposed to Rimsky-Korsakov’s ideas of an oriental flavor.
Hermann Krebbers, violin; Concertgebouw Orchestra, Kirill Kondrashin, cond. Philips, recorded June 27-28, 1979
ii. The Tale of the Kalendar Prince
This movement follows a type of ternary theme and variation and is described as a fantastic narrative. The variations only change by virtue of the accompaniment, highlighting the Rimsky-ness in the sense of simple musical lines allowing for greater appreciation of the orchestral clarity and brightness. Inside the general melodic line, a fast section highlights changes within both tonality and structure of the fanfare motif, played by trombone and muted trumpet.
Anshel Brusilow, violin; Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy, cond. Columbia/CBS/Sony, recorded Feb. 11, 1962
iii. The Young Prince and the Young Princess
This movement is also ternary, and is considered the simplest movement in form and melodic content. The inner section is said to be based on the theme from Tamara, while the outer sections have song-like melodic content. The outer themes are related to the inner by tempo and common motif, and the whole movement is finished by a quick coda return to the inner motif, balancing it out nicely.
Hugh Maguire, violin; London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Eugene Goossens, cond. Everest, recorded 1959
iv. Festival at Baghdad; The Sea; Shipwreck (The ship goes to pieces against a rock surmounted by a bronze warrior); Conclusion
This movement ties in aspects of all the proceeding movements as well as adding some new ideas Including but not limited to: an introduction of both the beginning of the movement and the Vivace section based on Sultan Shakhriar’s theme, a repeat of the main Sheherazade violin theme, and a reiteration of the fanfare motif to portray the shipwreck. Coherence is maintained by the ordered repetition of melodies, and continues the impression of a symphonic suite, rather than separate movements. A final conflicting relationship of the subdominant minor Shakhriar theme to the tonic major cadence of the Scheherazade theme resolves in a fantastic, lyrical, and finally peaceful conclusion.
Sidney Harth, violin; Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Fritz Reiner, cond. RCA/BMG, recorded Feb. 8, 1960
NOW FOR THE WHOLE THING --
Now I'm sure you want to hear the whole thing put together, and for that I thought we would go with perhaps the most famous of all Scheherazade recordings, Sir Thomas Beecham's.
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Scheherazade, Op. 35
i. The Sea and Sinbad's Ship ii. The Tale of the Kalendar Prince iii. The Young Prince and the Young Princess iv. Festival at Baghdad; The Sea; Shipwreck (The ship goes to pieces against a rock surmounted by a bronze warrior); Conclusion
Steven Staryk, violin; Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Thomas Beecham, cond. EMI, recorded 1957
SHH! DON'T TELL ANYONE, BUT WE'VE GOT A BONUS PERFORMANCE OF SCHEHERAZADE
I voiced regret above that all our Scheherazade performance slots were filled, leaving no room for the Malaysian Philharmonic, whose four-CD set of Rimsky-Korsakov orchestral works was instead represented by their Capriccio espagnol, meaning that we've got a Dutch conductor leading a Malaysian orchestra in a Russian composer's evocation of Spain. On consideration, I thought we might just sneak their Scheherazade in. Is it my imagination that it really does have a distinct flavor of the East? I'm thinking of a relaxed, sinuously singing quality. (It's well to remember that Russian cultural sensibilities have long included, voluntarily or otherwise, resonances from the East.)
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Scheherazade, Op. 35
i. The Sea and Sinbad's Ship ii. The Tale of the Kalendar Prince iii. The Young Prince and the Young Princess iv. Festival at Baghdad; The Sea; Shipwreck (The ship goes to pieces against a rock surmounted by a bronze warrior); Conclusion
Markus Gundermann, violin; Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra, Kees Bakels, cond. Bis, recorded November 2002
[1/15/2011] Preview: Warming up with Rimsky-Korsakov (continued)
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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
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.
