Welcome back to orchestra season! (I'm playing a concert on the 19th)
Hello friends! It is orchestra season once more, which means that summer is officially over, so get out your wool pumpkin-spice everything and come on down to First Free Methodist on October 19th for an excellent evening with LUCO.
It's our first full concert with our new music director, Nik Caoile. I've been enjoying the energy he brings to rehearsal and his precise musical ideas. We also have a cool new logo!
Our program on the 19th is called Vienna Waits for You, so all of these pieces have some tie to that city:
KORNGOLD Theme and Variations
Korngold was from Vienna originally, which explains its inclusion in the program. The theme of the piece evokes an Irish folk tune, though. It's a pleasant little journey through the countryside, and very evocative of different scenes; Korngold ended up composing music for a lot of Hollywood films, and this is definitely one that conjures up mental images. His work on films probably saved his life - he was living in Los Angeles to write the score for Robin Hood when Hitler invaded Austria, and since he was Jewish, the Nazis seized his home there, and would probably have killed him if he'd gone back. He lived in Los Angeles for the rest of his life.
BERG Seven Early Songs - Elisabeth Zharoff, soprano
Berg was also from Vienna, and unlike Korngold, spent his entire life in Austria (although he died from an infected bug bite!? Bummer). This song cycle is a sweet set of short songs that bring a chamber music feeling to a full orchestra - we all play during this piece, but not all at once. We take turns accompanying Elisabeth, who is the only constant voice in this piece. Each song features a different set of instruments and has text by a different poet; they're all a little different and they're all lovely.
SCHUBERT Symphony No. 8, Unfinished
Another Vienna native, Schubert only lived to the age of 31 - but that isn't why this symphony went unfinished, or at least it isn't the only reason, because he stopped working on it at the age of 25. It's possible that he got bored or distracted or contracted syphilis (yes, really). In spite of the fact that only half of it exists, it's one of his most famous works. The themes are catchy. It has that cool foreboding introduction. It's popular for youth orchestras to play, because it's short (I first played this in middle school). It's just really good, because Schubert really knew how to string a melody together.
Traditionally, a symphony has four movements:
1. A sonata (which means that it has an introduction, a second theme sometimes, a squishy middle bit where the introduction comes back but gets all broken down and weird, and then an ending)
2. A slow, tender or sad movement
3. Something you can kinda dance to, like a waltz, minute, or scherzo
4. A rondo (round, like Row, Row, Row Your Boat is a round) or another sonata
This one only has the first two of those. So what needs to happen next?
RAVEL La valse
"HA!", you have probably said. "Ravel is definitely not Viennese! So what is he doing here!? As the finale, no less?"
We're finishing Schubert's Unfinished Symphony with Ravel's deconstruction of a Viennese waltz, is what. How were we supposed to have a Vienna-themed concert without a waltz? We're going to act like this is the third (and fourth) movement of the symphony before it and go straight into it after the Schubert, so buckle up, this is a RIDE.
La valse is what Ravel wrote when Diaghilev, the guy in charge of the most famous ballet company at the time, asked him to write a waltz so that he could choreograph it and have ballet dancers do their thing. But Diaghilev hated it so much that he later challenged Ravel to a duel. To be fair, Ravel took Viennese tradition, made it his own, put in several Herbie Hancock moments, and stuck two middle fingers up at the form by ending it with what is basically a 4/4 bar.
I love this piece. It's classic Ravel with its weird noodly bits and logistically complicated part divisions and extended techniques and instructions in French that I have to use Google Translate for and hard to coordinate pizzicato. Some composers do that stuff and the end result doesn't feel like it's worth the effort - putting a Ravel puzzle together is worth the trouble, every single time.
The concert is at 7:30, but Nik likes do pre-concert talks, so show up at 6:30 to hear about this music from his perspective as well as mine!
Get your tickets in advance here or at the door. As always, come say hi if you do attend!
The next concert I'm playing after this one is the Michi Hirata North Beiju celebration on November 10th, at Town Hall.
It's our first full concert with our new music director, Nik Caoile. I've been enjoying the energy he brings to rehearsal and his precise musical ideas. We also have a cool new logo!
Our program on the 19th is called Vienna Waits for You, so all of these pieces have some tie to that city:
KORNGOLD Theme and Variations
Korngold was from Vienna originally, which explains its inclusion in the program. The theme of the piece evokes an Irish folk tune, though. It's a pleasant little journey through the countryside, and very evocative of different scenes; Korngold ended up composing music for a lot of Hollywood films, and this is definitely one that conjures up mental images. His work on films probably saved his life - he was living in Los Angeles to write the score for Robin Hood when Hitler invaded Austria, and since he was Jewish, the Nazis seized his home there, and would probably have killed him if he'd gone back. He lived in Los Angeles for the rest of his life.
BERG Seven Early Songs - Elisabeth Zharoff, soprano
Berg was also from Vienna, and unlike Korngold, spent his entire life in Austria (although he died from an infected bug bite!? Bummer). This song cycle is a sweet set of short songs that bring a chamber music feeling to a full orchestra - we all play during this piece, but not all at once. We take turns accompanying Elisabeth, who is the only constant voice in this piece. Each song features a different set of instruments and has text by a different poet; they're all a little different and they're all lovely.
SCHUBERT Symphony No. 8, Unfinished
Another Vienna native, Schubert only lived to the age of 31 - but that isn't why this symphony went unfinished, or at least it isn't the only reason, because he stopped working on it at the age of 25. It's possible that he got bored or distracted or contracted syphilis (yes, really). In spite of the fact that only half of it exists, it's one of his most famous works. The themes are catchy. It has that cool foreboding introduction. It's popular for youth orchestras to play, because it's short (I first played this in middle school). It's just really good, because Schubert really knew how to string a melody together.
Traditionally, a symphony has four movements:
1. A sonata (which means that it has an introduction, a second theme sometimes, a squishy middle bit where the introduction comes back but gets all broken down and weird, and then an ending)
2. A slow, tender or sad movement
3. Something you can kinda dance to, like a waltz, minute, or scherzo
4. A rondo (round, like Row, Row, Row Your Boat is a round) or another sonata
This one only has the first two of those. So what needs to happen next?
RAVEL La valse
"HA!", you have probably said. "Ravel is definitely not Viennese! So what is he doing here!? As the finale, no less?"
We're finishing Schubert's Unfinished Symphony with Ravel's deconstruction of a Viennese waltz, is what. How were we supposed to have a Vienna-themed concert without a waltz? We're going to act like this is the third (and fourth) movement of the symphony before it and go straight into it after the Schubert, so buckle up, this is a RIDE.
La valse is what Ravel wrote when Diaghilev, the guy in charge of the most famous ballet company at the time, asked him to write a waltz so that he could choreograph it and have ballet dancers do their thing. But Diaghilev hated it so much that he later challenged Ravel to a duel. To be fair, Ravel took Viennese tradition, made it his own, put in several Herbie Hancock moments, and stuck two middle fingers up at the form by ending it with what is basically a 4/4 bar.
I love this piece. It's classic Ravel with its weird noodly bits and logistically complicated part divisions and extended techniques and instructions in French that I have to use Google Translate for and hard to coordinate pizzicato. Some composers do that stuff and the end result doesn't feel like it's worth the effort - putting a Ravel puzzle together is worth the trouble, every single time.
The concert is at 7:30, but Nik likes do pre-concert talks, so show up at 6:30 to hear about this music from his perspective as well as mine!
Get your tickets in advance here or at the door. As always, come say hi if you do attend!
The next concert I'm playing after this one is the Michi Hirata North Beiju celebration on November 10th, at Town Hall.
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