Program Notes for May 1 and 4, 2008

Overture to Ruslan and Ludmilla............................Mikhail Glinka (1804 – 1857)

Russian composer Mikhail Glinka was considered by many, both now and in his own time, to be the father of Russian nationalist music. His original voice strongly influenced the chief members of the school of nationalist composers in the second half of the nineteenth century. Glinka achieved popularity following the immediate success of his unabashedly patriotic opera A Life for the Tsar in 1836, after which he agreed to compose another opera after Pushkin’s mock-epic poem Ruslan and Ludmilla. The opera tells the story of Ludmilla, who is abducted by the evil sorcerer Chernomor. Three of her suitors, including the hero Ruslan, embark on a quest to save Ludmilla, and in the process encounter a variety of supernatural characters and scenarios. The fantastical and exotic elements of the plot allowed Glinka to exploit the same motivic construction found in A Life for the Tsar. Glinka employed Russian, Finnish, Tartar, and Persian folk melodies to symbolize the exotic, while whole-tone scales indicated certain supernatural elements.   

Ruslan and Ludmilla was finally completed in 1842. Although the opera was later recognized as masterfully orchestrated and thematically inventive, it received poor reviews following its premiere. The public’s general disapproval can be partially attributed to a rambling and haphazardly constructed plot – unsatisfied with the original librettist’s work, Glinka wrote many of the sections himself – but also a general shift in Russian musical taste: in 1843 an extremely popular Italian opera company was established in one of Russia’s Imperial theatres. The overture to the opera, however, remains popular among Western orchestras. Glinka wrote the overture after completing the opera and, according to his autobiography, did so between rehearsals for its premiere. The initial theme introduces Presto scalar passages in the violins, featuring music from the last scene of the opera. This is contrasted with the warmer and more lyrical second theme in the violas and cellos, which is borrowed from Ruslan’s second-act aria in which he dreams of Ludmilla on the battlefield. Glinka incorporates the two themes in sonata form, employing an energetic coda that foreshadows the opera’s happy ending.

Cello Concerto No. 1 in A Minor, Op. 3..……Camille Saint-Saëns (1835 – 1921)

                             Ken Freudigman, cello (click here for link)

During his career, composer, pianist, organist, and writer Camille Saint-Saëns contributed to every available genre of French music. Though he was known as a versatile composer, he showed a particular affinity for concertos throughout his career. When he began work on his first cello concerto in 1872, he had already composed one concerto for piano and two for violin. A gifted performer himself, Saint-Saëns’ earlier concertos were primarily virtuosic showpieces that were irrefutably charming although relatively light works. The Op. 33 Cello Concerto might be considered a more “serious” work in its experimentation with form and sophisticated palate of orchestral coloring, though it still provides plenty of opportunities for virtuosic display.                      

The concerto is presented as a single movement, arguably reflecting the influence of Franz Liszt, with whom Saint-Saëns communicated throughout his career. In the first movement, Allegro non troppo, Saint-Saëns presents one dramatic chord in the orchestra before immediately introducing the turbulent theme in the solo cello. The theme’s rushing triplet motive lends itself particularly well to variation and development, as it recurs in various sections of the orchestra. The movement’s secondary theme is more simplistic; the lyrical solo line is supported by chordal accompaniment in the strings. This serene departure comes to an end as the opening theme returns with developmental fervor. After a series of variations, the frenetic rhythmic energy defuses and imperceptibly gives way to the second movement. In contrast to the first movement, the Allegretto con moto features a thematic orchestral introduction before the soloist’s entrance. The movement establishes a delicate, dance-like theme in the muted strings, after which the cello enters softly and alone. The cello part embellishes the orchestral theme with a lyrical descant until, as in the first movement, the mood is interrupted by the rushing triplet theme. The principle theme from the first movement acts as a transition to the concerto’s brilliant finale. This Allegro non troppo maintains its intensity; the soloist continuously developing the dramatic theme until the entire ensemble begins a mad dash to an exciting conclusion.

 In the Steppes of Central Asia........................Alexandr Borodin (1833 – 1887)    

Alexandr Borodin was a member of the “Mighty Five” (moguchaya kuchka which literally means “mighty little heap.”), a faction of Russian nationalist composers which also included César Cui, Mily Balakirev, Modest Mussorgsky, and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. With the exception of Balakirev, none of the members of The Five were exclusively composers by trade; Cui and Rimsky-Korsakov were military officers, and Borodin was a successful research chemist. In 1858 he defended his dissertation for the degree of Doctor Medicine, entitled On the Analogy of Arsenic Acid with Phosphoric Acid in Chemical and Toxicological Behavior, and would go on to teach at the Medical-Surgical Academy in St. Petersburg. The Five were centered in St. Petersburg where, following the example of Glinka, they strove to create a distinctively Russian school of music. By having a “day job,” the members of The Five pointedly eschewed the Western conservatory tradition and, subsequently, Western forms. In achieving a Russian aesthetic, they commonly incorporated folk tunes into their compositions or imitated folk instruments in their orchestrations.            

Borodin composed Vsredney Azii (In the Steppes of Central Asia) in 1880, which was the twenty-fifth anniversary of Tsar Alexander II’s reign. Borodin’s short, one-movement work was one of twelve pieces commissioned for the anniversary celebration in St. Petersburg. The production, however, was canceled after an assassination attempt on the tsar two weeks before it was scheduled. In the Steppes of Central Asia was instead premiered later that year under the baton of Rimsky-Korsakov. The piece reflects Borodin’s fascination with the far reaches of the Russian empire, which he saw as a source of exoticism that appealed to many nineteenth-century composers. The piece is not necessarily programmatic, though it does paint a specific picture. Borodin described the musical scene in the score.

Borodin portrays the two aesthetics through two distinct melodies, which combine contrapuntally toward the end of the piece. The first, signifying Russia, is simple and tuneful with diatonic orchestration. The “Oriental” melody is more embellished and chromatic, and the use of a solo English horn immediately suggests the exotic “other.”

“Polovtsian Dances” from Prince Igor..........Alexandr Borodin (1833 – 1887)    

Borodin’s fascination with the Eastern exotic is also apparent in his opera Prince Igor, which he was composing at the time of his commission for In the Steppes of Central Asia. Borodin began the opera in 1869 following the success of his first symphony, and would continue to work on it until his death in 1887. The opera tells the story of Prince Igor Svyatoslavich, who was captured in the twelfth century by Khan Konchak of the Polovtsï, a race of Tartars in Central Asia. Borodin based his libretto on a scenario by Vladimir Vasil’yevich Stasov, which was based on the anonymous twelfth-century epic Slovo o polku Igoreve (“The Lay of the Host of Igor”). Although the opera was far from finished at the time of Borodin’s death, Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexandr Glazunov used the composer’s own manuscripts to prepare a finished work, supplementing their own music to fill any lacunae. Though scholars have published other editions of Prince Igor, the version submitted by Rimsky-Korsakov and Glazunov remains the standard performance edition.   

The opera was finally premiered in 1890 at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg and is considered by many to be the composer’s masterpiece, despite the hand other composers may have had in it. The celebrated Polovtsian Dances, however, were performed as a suite in 1879 and continue to appear orchestral concert programs. The dances achieved popularity independent of the opera in 1909, when Sergei Diaghilev choreographed them for his Paris troupe. More recently, the soaring melody of the opening dance appeared as the song “Strangers in Paradise” for the 1953 musical Kismet. The dances are largely excerpted from a ballet sequence the second act of Prince Igor. In this scene, Khan Konchak magnanimously entertains his captive Igor with dancing by male and female slaves. The dances, which vary from sensual, to lyrical, to vivacious, climax in a robust musical salute to the Khan.