PROGRAMME NOTES
for Keith JOHN @WhiteCUBE, Shiroishi — Sunday 24th August, 2003
The Water Music is famously associated with the royal boat trips on London's river Thames in July 1717. His Majesty George I 'liked the music so well that he caused it to be played over three times in going and returning' and the greatly impressed Prussian ambassador reported back to Berlin also referring to three performances and the time span of an hour. It is unclear from the two statements whether there were three performances on the way and three on the way back, or three performances each lasting an hour. If the latter interpretation were true, all twenty of the known pieces comprising The Water Music may have been played. This might also have been especially interesting as the pieces fall into three distinct categories: 1) 'Horn' suite in F 2) 'Trumpet' suite in D 3) 'Flute' suite in G major and G minor. To perform all three suites would have required many players and may fit in with a report in the Daily Courant that 'a City Company's Barge was employed for the Musick, wherein were 50 instruments of all sorts'.
The movements chosen for today's performance represent a contrasting selection of some of Handel's finest and most approachable music ranging from the most delicate minuet to lively gigues and vigorous music for full orchestra - or in this case, all the stops (or nearly all) of the organ.
William Mathias wrote the Partita in 1962 following a commission from Allan Wicks, a former Organist of Canterbury Cathedral and great champion of contemporary British music at that time. It was the first of his more substantial organ works and features many of the hallmarks of Mathias' individual style, particularly the dancing, often syncopated rhythms and the harmony in which the interval of a fourth is often more prominent than the traditional third.
The work opens with a modest fanfare heralding the two thematic motifs on which much of the piece is based. After this introduction the first movement proper begins: it is in a lively 12/8 time and its infectious, lilting rhythm is present in every rise and fall of the music. The movement ends quietly.
The slow, second movement forms the core of the whole work and is intensely powerful and expressive. It is essentially a funeral march with a relentless rhythm steadily driving the music forward from its tentative beginning to a tremendous climax and away into the distance again. There is undoubtedly a strong Russian flavour here and, with music of such stature, it would not be difficult to believe that Shostakovich was the composer.
The Finale is full of lively rhythmic interest with a mixture of time signatures (some uneven) and much syncopation. The movement builds towards a grand statement of the fanfare material heard at the very opening and an exciting coda ends the work in triumphant style.
This work dates from 1873 with the 2 piano version first introduced in August by the composer and Clara Schumann at a private gathering in Bonn. In November, Brahms himself conducted the orchestral première with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. It was one of Brahms' earliest orchestral works (predating Symphony No.1) and shows not only a mastery of orchestration but also of form, representing one of the finest examples of Theme and Variations ever written.
Brahms is faithful to the original Chorale - a movement from a set of 6 Divertimenti for wind band now proved not to be written by Haydn - in many respects. For instance, the harmonic structure remains the same in all variations as does the simple binary form including repeats. Within this framework there are some inspired technical devices notably in two of the Bb minor variations e.g. Variation 4 where there is invertible counterpoint at the twelfth flowing so naturally that it is hardly noticeable, and Variation 8 with bars of perfect imitation in inversion. The final passacaglia's five bar theme is clearly derived from section A of the Chorale and its surprising 5 bar phrasing: there are 17 statements of this theme, the majority in the bass and in the major key before a final grandiose statement of the chorale itself and highly effective coda.
|
|
INTERVAL |
|
'The Albinoni Adagio', as we know it, owes a great deal to Remo Giazotto who discovered a Sonata à Trois by Albinoni when he was writing the composer's biography. All that survived of this work was a figured bass and two short fragments of melody, so it is clear that a substantial amount of the material was created by Giazotto. As such, it has become a well loved Romantic classic. In a similar way to Bach's 'Air on the G string', a gentle pizzicato bass jumps up and down the octave before moving stepwise to its next note while a legato melody sings out on top. Unlike the Bach, the regular momentum of the bass line does sometimes stop to allow some 'recitative like' utterances; and in the fortissimo climax of the piece, the drama is conveyed by full textured chords and a strong, double dotted rhythm.
Composed in 1850, this is the first, finest and largest in scale of Liszt's organ works. It was dedicated to Meyerbeer and is based on a chorale from his opera 'Le Prophète'. Liszt made a piano duet version of the work and, in 1897, the virtuoso pianist and composer Busoni published a transcription for solo piano which embellishes Liszt's original often to great effect.
There are three clear sections: the Fantasia proper, a central slow section and the final Fugue. Only the first two phrases of Meyerbeer's theme are used in the Fantasia and it is not until the very soft, calm opening of the Adagio that the whole chorale is first heard. The Fantasia is full of contrast from very agitated music to flowing, cantabile melodies sometimes in a strict rhythm , sometimes freer and in the manner of a recitative. The theatrical element is never far away and the blast of virtuoso display which serves as an introduction to the fugue (in a Mazurka type of rhythm) is a good example. As with many of Liszt's fugues (compare the one in the Piano Sonata), it does not remain strict for very long, a freer approach soon taking over. There is much rapid passage work and more fanfare before a brief pedal cadenza leads into the final triumphant statement of the chorale in a glorious C major on full organ.