Four Centuries of Great Music February 12, 2023 Chamber Music That Must Be Programmed Episode 6

Tonight on Four Centuries of Great Music we are continuing our series of Chamber Music Works that Need to be Programmed with our 6th episode in this series.  The theme today is sonatas for solo instruments and piano.

We open chamber music for the Trumpet - yes trumpet. The trumpet as a solo instrument was mostly ignored during the classical and romantic periods, but has gained traction again in the 20th and 21st centuries.  We are going to 1939 with Sonata for Trumpet and Piano op. 137 by Paul Hindemith.

Hindemith was born in 1895 in Hanau, near Frankfurt, to a father who was a painter.  He studied violin and viola as a child and studied violin, conducting and composition at conservatory.  He was the violist of the touring Amar Quartet and concertmaster of the Frankfurt Opera Orchestra along with his composing.  He had constant battles with the Nazi’s and emigrated to Switzerland in 1938 partly because his wife had Jewish ancestry

In 1939, the year he composed this sonata, Hindemith was living as an exile in Switzerland, where he watched his own country annex Austria, occupy Czechoslovakia and finally ignite World War II by invading Poland, while its leaders were intensifying their obsession with anti-Semitism and moving determinedly toward full-scale genocide. The Trumpet Sonata, perhaps to Hindemith’s own surprise, became a protest and a profound lamentation.  Perhaps as a reflection of these ominous events, Hindemith’s Trumpet Sonata took on a rather somber hue. Hindemith held this sonata in high esteem. To a friend he wrote that “it is maybe the best thing I have succeeded in doing in recent times.”

The sonata opens with the trumpet proclaiming a sturdy theme over piano figuration to the performance direction mit Kraft (with strength). Two more ideas are presented, with the movement’s eventual form set out in the neatly symmetrical arrangement of A-B-C-A-C-B-A. The second movement has a quirky, whimsical air to it, somewhat like a comical march but with a pronounced undercurrent of tension. The last movement is the longest and the sonata’s center of emotional gravity. Entitled Trauermusik (music of mourning), it takes the trumpet, so often used as an instrument of brilliance and pomp and celebration, on a troubled, meditative journey that culminates in the somber intoning of the chorale-theme Alle Menschen müssen sterben (all men must die), which Bach had set as a chorale-prelude (BWV 643).


Paul Hindemith: Sonate für Trompete und Klavier  I. Mit Kraft
Paul Hindemith: Sonate für Trompete und Klavier  II. Mäßig bewegt
Paul Hindemith: Sonate für Trompete und Klavier  III. Trauermusik   
Valentin Garvie, trumpet and Ueli Wiget,piano


Next is Erwin Schulhoff’s second violin sonata.  Erwin Schulhoff was born in 1894 in Prague.  Antonín Dvořák encouraged Schulhoff's earliest musical studies, which began at the Prague Conservatory when he was ten years old. He studied composition and piano there and later in Vienna, Leipzig, and Cologne.  He toured Europe as a pianist.  He lived in Germany after the war before returning in 1923 to Prague, where he joined the faculty of the conservatory in 1929.  He was one of the first generation of classical composers to find inspiration in the rhythms of jazz music.  His life ended in a Nazi concentration camp, Wülzburg prison near Weißenburg, Bavaria.  

The Sonata No 2 for violin and piano was composed in November 1927, right after the Esquisses de jazz (which includes a Charleston, Tango and Black Bottom). But it’s not jazz that is the strongest influence here but the music of Béla Bartók, which Schulhoff greatly admired.

The first movement marked Allegro impetuoso opens with an energetic, rhythmical violin theme which generates further ideas as the movement progresses—the contrasting second theme has some of the same rhythmic fingerprints, and the results are cohesive and compelling.

The short second movement marked Andante begins with slow, tolling, piano chords, but the violin starts with the same rhythmic motif as the first movement—two accented semiquavers followed by a long note—and this idea pervades the whole sonata.

The third movement Burlesca marked Allegretto opens with the self-same rhythm, albeit in a very different context.

At the start of the finale marked Allegro risoluto, Schulhoff reprises the opening of the first movement before moving in new directions that are propulsive and exciting. At the very end, it is the same group of three notes that drives the music to its close, marked molto feroce.


Erwin Schulhoff: Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2  I. Allegro impetuoso
Erwin Schulhoff: Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2  II. Andante (GBSLT2211920)
Erwin Schulhoff: Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2  III. Burlesca_ Allegretto (GBSLT2211921)
Erwin Schulhoff: Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2  IV. Finale  IV. Allegro risoluto



We will conclude this first hour of the 6th episode of Chamber Music works the need to be programmed on Four Centuries of Great music with Ernest Bloch’ Suite No. 3 for solo cello written toward the end of his life in 1957.

Ernest Block was born in Geneva Switzerland in 1880 and was educated in Europe.  He moved to the United States in 1917 to take several teaching positions over the years at the Manne School of Music in New York, the Cleveland Institute of Music, the San Francisco Conservatory and eventually the University of California, Berkeley.  He became an American citizen in 1924.

Ernest Bloch’s Suites for Solo Cello contain a melodic-harmonic
language unlike any other twentieth-century unaccompanied work.  Each movement within these three works has its own distinct dancelike character, much like J.S. Bach’s Suites for Solo Cello (BWV 1007-1012). The melodies contain a persistent lyrical quality, and the harmonies are modal and reminiscent of folk music.  

Bloch’s love for the cello is evident as is his love for the cello repertoire – Bach and Brahms particularly. The Solo Suites are different to the vast orchestral canvases of Schelomo and Voice in the Wilderness. They were written at the other end of Bloch’s life, on the other side of the world.  They were written for a very specific cellist in mind, Zara Nelsova.  
They demand real stamina and Nelsova had almost unrivalled strength (many disgruntled male colleagues thought she must be a man in disguise to have such power!) and yet what is probably most important about these suites is that all three have the sense of intimacy and loneliness.


The third suite has five movements and is mostly written in A Minor.  This piece contains wide register leaps and swift passages incorporating all fingerboard positions.

The first movement, titled “Allegro decisio,” has a joyful character.

This first movement ends with an ‘attacca’ indication to continue without a break into the second movement, marked Andante.  This movement begins with large leaps outlining an F-sharp chord. Each phrase uses some inversion of the initial intervals but in various keys and modes, creating a sense of tonal ambiguity. There is a rich legato character of this movement.

The third movement is marked “Allegro” and is in triple meter with a character similar to a gigue. The beginning is in C Phrygian, and there is an exploration of various other modes before ending in C Major.

The fourth movement also marked, “Andante,” has the character of a bourrée written mostly in triple meter. Much like the Andante of the second suite, there is a sense of tonal ambiguity as each phrase is in a different key area. The movement ends with a descending passage in G Dorian mode.

This suite's final movement, marked “Allegro giocoso,” begins in D Dorian mode and ends in D Phrygian mode. It has a light bouyant character.


Ernest Bloch: Suite No. 3 for solo cello_ I. Allegro deciso
Ernest Bloch: Suite No. 3 for solo cello_ II. Andante
Ernest Bloch: Suite No. 3 for solo cello_ III. Allegro
Ernest Bloch: Suite No. 3 for solo cello_ IV. Andante
Ernest Bloch: Suite No. 3 for solo cello_ V. Allegro giocoso


We are opening this second hour of the 6th episode of Chamber Music works the need to be programmed on Four Centuries of Great music with music by violinist and composer Eugene Ysaÿe who was a teacher of Ernest Bloch. 

Eugene Ysaye: Sonata for Solo Violin Op. 27/5

Eugene Ysaÿe born in 1858 was a Belgian virtuoso violinist, composer, and conductor. He was regarded as "The King of the Violin", or, as Nathan Milstein put it, the “tsar".  He began his violin studies with his father at the age of 5 and at the age of 9  entered the Royal Conservatory of Liège,  After his graduation from the Royal Conservatory of Liège, Ysaÿe was the principal violin of the Benjamin Bilse beer-hall orchestra, which later developed into the Berlin Philharmonic. Many musicians of note and influence came regularly to hear this orchestra and Ysaÿe in particular, among whom figured Joseph Joachim, Franz Liszt, Clara Schumann, and Anton Rubinstein, who asked that Ysaÿe be released from his contract to accompany him on tour.  Claude Debussy, Camille Saint-Saëns, César Franck, and Ernest Chausson all dedicated works to him.  Franck’s Violin Sonata in A and Poeme were written for him and his quartet premiered the Debussy String quartet.  He continued as a solo performer while teaching at the Brussels Conservatoire, and for four years was the music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra from 1918-1922.  He died in 1931 of complications from diabetes.

Ysaÿe was inspired to compose solo violin works that represent the evolution of musical techniques and expressions of his time in 1923, following hearing Joseph Szigeti perform Johann Sebastian Bach's sonata for solo violin in G minor.

As Ysaÿe claimed, "I have played everything from Bach to Debussy, for real art should be international.”  In this set of sonatas, he used prominent characteristics of early 20th century music, such as whole tone scales, dissonances, and quarter tones. Ysaÿe also employed virtuoso bow and left hand techniques throughout, for he believed that "at the present day the tools of violin mastery, of expression, technique, mechanism, are far more necessary than in days gone by. In fact they are indispensable, if the spirit is to express itself without restraint." Thus, this set of sonatas places high technical demands on its performers. Yet Ysaÿe recurrently warns violinists that they should never forget to play instead of becoming preoccupied with technical elements; a violin master "must be a violinist, a thinker, a poet, a human being, he must have known hope, love, passion and despair, he must have run the gamut of the emotions in order to express them all in his playing.”  
Let’s listen to the 5th suite of the 6 suites which was dedicated to Mathieu Crickboom, a Belgian violinist, who was a student of Ysaÿe. which is in two movements:

Eugene Ysaye: Sonata for Solo Violin Op. 27/5: L’Aurore
Eugene Ysaye: Sonata for Solo Violin Op. 27/5: Danse rustique    roo-steek


Next is Manuel Ponce’s Sonata for Violin and Viola.  Manuel Ponce was born in Mexico in 1882.  He was famous for being a musical prodigy; according to his biographers, he was barely four years of age when, after having listened to the piano classes received by his sister, Josefina, he sat in front of the instrument and interpreted one of the pieces that he had heard. Immediately, his parents had him receive classes in piano and musical notation.  In 1901 Ponce entered the National Conservatory of Music, already with a certain reputation as a pianist and composer.  He continued his education in Europe before returning to Mexico to teach piano and music history at the National Conservatory of Music.


His Sonata a dúo for violin and viola was written between 1936–1938 and is in three movements
Manuel Ponce: Sonata for Violin and Viola  I. Allegro Piutosto Moderato
Manuel Ponce: Sonata for Violin and Viola  II. In Tempo Di Sarabanda
Manuel Ponce: Sonata for Violin and Viola  III. Allegro


We are going to close today’s Four Centuries of Great Music’s sixth episode of the series Chamber Music Works that Need to be Performed with Rebecca Clarke’s Viola Sonata. 

Viola Sonata:  I. Impetuoso
Viola Sonata:  II. Vivace
Viola Sonata:  III. Adagio

Rebecca Clarke (1886-1979) was a British-American composer and musician who wrote a frustratingly small but dazzlingly brilliant body of work.

She studied violin at the Royal Academy of Music in 1903 (but her family withdrew her from the course when one of her teachers proposed to her) and composition at the Royal College of Music in 1907 (though this, too, came to an abrupt end).

Clarke became the first woman to play in Henry Wood’s Queen’s Hall Orchestra in 1912 and embarked on a jet-setting life of touring and performing.

Clarke wrote what has become her best-known work for a composition competition in 1919. It didn’t win the competition because of reasons we can categorise as **sketchy**. Instead first prize went to Ernest Bloch, and in fact there was a rumour that Clarke’s Viola Sonata was by Bloch. Here’s what the composer herself said:

“the rumour went around, I hear, that I hadn’t written the stuff myself, that somebody had done it for me. And I even got one or two little bits of press clippings saying that it was impossible, that I couldn’t have written it myself. And the funniest of all was that I had a clipping once which said that I didn't exist, there wasn't any such person as Rebecca Clarke, that it was a pseudonym for Ernest Bloch.”

Movement I: Impetuoso
The opening movement is vibrant and highlights the viola as a powerful solo instrument. The cadenza-like solo fanfare is bold, and revolves around chromatic movement. There is a strong sense of syncopation throughout many of the sequences in this movement, and the relationship between the viola and piano is somewhat tumultuous at times, but it always comes back together harmoniously.

Moving slightly away from chromatic harmony at times, Clarke’s harmonic language shifts to the use of modes and the whole-tone scale. This shift in sound produces the mysterious nature of the middle section. After dying away in sound the movement is resurrected back into the faster paced syncopated sequence.
 
Movement II – Vivace
The exciting and speedy second movement is marked ‘Vivace’. The opening piano melody is then transferred and developed in the viola part. Throughout this short movement, Clarke utilises some extended techniques on the viola which includes harmonics and pizzicato.

After the strong opening, the music begins to come down in dynamic and speed, with a lyrical section being at the centre of this movement. The tempo begins to pick up again, and the opening theme is proclaimed again many times by both the viola and piano. There is a real sense of folk-dance melodies in this movements, with the viola often resembling the sound of a fiddle. This complex and fast-paced movement highlights the viola’s flexibility as a solo instrument.
 
Movement III – Adagio
The longest and the slowest of the this three-part work, the third movement is pensive throughout. With the piano opening the movement with a simple melody, the viola enters with an echo which then carries throughout the movement. Clarke heralds back to the opening movement with the use of long flowing syncopated melodic lines.

The dynamic begins to grow around half way through the movement, with an explosion of sound taking over. Repeated tremolos from the viola build the tension to the bigger climax slightly later on. There is deep-rooted strength in this movement, with the core of the music being taken and developed from the other two prior movements.
After returning to the syncopation, Clarke has one surprise left for us at the end of the movement. After one final climax, the melody shifts back to a restatement of the opening themes from the first movement. The sonata then ends with a display of virtuosity from both the viola and piano.