Four Centuries of Great Music February 19, 2023 Chamber Music That Must Be Programmed Episode 7

Today on Four Centuries of Great Music is the seventh episode of the series Chamber Music Works that Need to be Programmed.  Everyone plays Bach, Handel and Vivaldi so I want to begin with baroque composer Joseph Bodin de Boismortier.

Joseph Bodin de Boismortier: Sonata No. 3 in A Major, Op.7 

Joseph Bodin de Boismortier was born in 1689 and studied music with Joseph Valette de Montigny, a well-known composer of motets. When he moved to Paris in 1724 he became very prolific composing chamber music, cantatas, opéra-ballets, and vocal music.

He wrote his sonata for 3 flutes opus 7 was published in 1725.  It is in A major and in 4 movements

Joseph Bodin de Boismortier: Sonata No. 3 in A Major, Op.7   I. Allemande: Gravement
Joseph Bodin de Boismortier: Sonata No. 3 in A Major, Op. 7  II. Legerement
Joseph Bodin de Boismortier: Sonata No. 3 in A Major, Op. 7  III. Lentement
Joseph Bodin de Boismortier: Sonata No. 3 in A Major, Op. 7  IV. Gavotte

Reinhold Glière: Eight Pieces for violin and cello Op. 39
Next we go to the early 20th century with music by Reinhold Glière.  Glière was a Russian composer of German and Polish descent.  Born in Kiev in what is now Ukraine and studied at the Kiev school of music before entered the Moscow Conservatory.   In addition to composition he was a teacher and his students included Sergei Prokofiev and Aram Khachaturian.  Most known for his Red Poppy ballet but he also composed chamber music including his Eight Pieces for violin and cello Op. 39

The eight movements are: I. Prélude; II. Gavotte, III. Berceuse, IV. Canzonetta, V. Intermezzo, VI. Impromptu, VII. Scherzo, VIII. Etude

Germaine Tailleferre: Sonate No. 1 pour Violon et Piano
Next is music by Germaine Tailleferre.   Tailleferre's First Violin Sonata was written for Jacques Thibaud, a French Violinist with whom she had a close friendship and was premièred in 1922 by Thibaud and Alfred Cortot in Paris.  It is in four movements:
Germaine Tailleferre: Sonate No. 1 pour Violon et Piano  I. Modéré sans lenteur
Germaine Tailleferre: Sonate No. 1 pour Violon et Piano  II. Scherzo
Germaine Tailleferre: Sonate No. 1 pour Violon et Piano  III. Assez lent
Germaine Tailleferre: Sonate No. 1 pour Violon et Piano  IV. Final. Très vite

Bohuslav Martinů: Duo No. 2 for Violin and Cello
Lets close this first hour of 4 centuries of Great Music with Bohuslav Martinů.  Bohuslav Martinů was a Czech composer born in 1890.  He was a sickly and shy youth but who excelled at the violin presenting his first public recital at 15 in 1905.  He toured Europe as a violinist with the National Theatre Orchestra, and in 1920 became a member of the Czech Philharmonic.  He studied composition with Czech composer and violinist Josef Suk and composed in a mostly neoclassical style.  Today we will be listening to his Duo No. 2 for Violin and Cello which was written in shortly before his death in 1958 and premiered in 1963,  It is in three movements I. Allegretto, II.  Adagio and III. Poco Allegro.

Here is a performance of Bohuslav Martinů: Duo No. 2 for Violin and Cello by Mika Yonezawa & Kleif Carnarius from their album Mika Yonezawa and Kleif Carnarius Play Martinu, Schulhoff, Gliere and Honegger.  Ballhorn Records


Samuel Coleridge-Taylor – Quintet in G minor for Piano and Strings

The first movement marked Allegro con moto has an assertive principal subject played by all the strings in octaves with an almost orchestral sonority; the second subject, in the relative major key of B flat, is introduced by the piano and while its shape and apparent simplicity might be Schubertian, it represents an early flowering of Coleridge-Taylor’s own exceptional melodic talent.

The Second movement marked Larghetto, in E flat major, begins serenely with a reflective cello solo gently woven around by languid piano tracery; with the entry of the other strings the tonality hovers beguilingly between the home key of E flat major, G major, and E major. A forceful, rhetorical episode emerges, the strings in octaves declaiming powerful incantations over widely leaping sforzando chords in the piano. The opening mood of tranquillity is restored in the coda and extended by means of a long tonic pedal supporting delicate piano arabesques and sustained string chords.

The first half of the third movement a Scherzo has a driving energy which all but overspills in the second half: chains of syncopations, alarming (but perfectly controlled) tonal swerves, contrapuntal forays which are interrupted before they have a chance to make progress, and juxtapositions of extreme dynamics leave one grateful for the respite offered by the trio.

The mood of the finale marked Allegro motto is initially much darker than those of the earlier movements: textures are more spare and lines more angular. The second subject has a positively sinister aspect: its dominant minor mode, its instrumentation (viola leading, thick chords in the lower registers of the piano, seemingly disembodied violin scales)—even the harmony has an eerie, unsettling quality. After the exposition repeat, perhaps concerned that the atmosphere has become too oppressive, the composer suddenly effects a transformation to something altogether sunnier: instead of a development section he gives us a perky fugato setting off in D major, the subject of which is a variant of the trio melody from the third movement—an early example of his gift for clever thematic metamorphosis.
The recapitulation is telescoped, the composer dispensing with that baleful second subject until the coda, where it is briefly developed as the basis of an exciting ‘alla breve’ final run-in which resolves triumphantly in the major mode.

Hajime Komatsu: Four Japanese Folk Songs (Suite No. 2)

Four Japanese Folk Songs (Suite No. 2) is a collection of folk songs arranged for string quartet by Japanese composer Hajime Komatsu. Komatsu pursued private studies in violin, conducting, and composition while working towards a business degree at Waseda University.  He later became a producer for Toshiba/EMI, specializing in string quartet recordings.

His settings of traditional Japanese folk music for Western style instruments and with Western notation evokes the folk songs in their original form. Komatsu stays true to the original folk song material in his arrangements, and uses extended techniques such as pizzicato, snapping the string on the fingerboard, finger slides, and slapping the side of the instrument to better imitate the sonic capabilities of traditional Japanese instruments.
 
The first song, "Yagibushi," is a popular folk song and dance performed at Japanese festivals and sporting events. Dancers with broad hats called ‘kasa’ circle counter-clockwise around a portable Shinto shrine. The dance is very energetic and ends with the dancers throwing their hats in the air. "Nanbu Ushioi Uta" is a melancholy cattle herding song that was sung by farmers as they plowed the soil with oxen and horses. "Otemoyan" was originally performed during parties that involved geisha girls and alcohol consumption, usually accompanied by shamisen, taiko drums and other percussion. "Aizu Bandaisan" is a well-known folk song about a famous Japanese volcanic mountain in the Fukushima prefecture.

Henry Thacker Burleigh:  Plantation Melodies, Old and New

Henry Thacker Burleigh was born in Erie, Pennsylvania in 1866. His mother began his musical training at an early age and his grandfather taught him old ‘sorrow songs’ (now known as spirituals).
 
In 1892, Burleigh received a full scholarship to the National Conservatory of Music, where he met Czech composer Antonin Dvořák.  Dvořák soon became Burleigh’s most influential mentor, their relationship blossoming into one of mutual admiration and friendship over time. Burleigh shared with Dvořák his wealth of knowledge of spirituals which had a profound influence on Dvořák and that influence is heard in Dvořák’s “From the New World” Symphony #9.
 
Plantation Melodies, Old and New  published in 1901, represents Burleigh’s earliest arrangements of spirituals for solo voice and piano. Apollo presents original arrangements, for string quartet, of two of these spirituals – "Negro Lullaby" and "An Ante-bellum Sermon" (Joshua fit de Battle ob’ Jericho) - dedicated to the memory and lasting influence of Henry T. Burleigh.


Thank you for joining us today on Four Centuries of Great Music and join us again next week for more Chamber Music Works that need to be Programmed.