St. Louis Symphony Program - Oct. 12-14, 2012

7/31/2019 St. Louis Symphony Program - Oct. 12-14, 2012

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CONCERT PROGRAMOctober 12-14, 2012

Rafael Frhbeck de Burgos, conductor

Pascal Rog, piano

BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 6 in F major, op. 68, Pastorale(1808)(1770-1827)

Awakening o cheer ul eelings on arriving in the country(Allegro ma non troppo)Scene by the brook (Andante molto mosso)Merry gathering o country olk (Allegro)Thunderstorm (Allegro)Shepherds Song: Happy and grate ul eelings a ter the storm

(Allegretto)

INTERMISSION

RAVEL Piano Concerto in G major(1929-31)(1875-1937)

AllegramenteAdagio assai

Presto

Pascal Rog, piano

DEBUSSY La Mer (1903-05)(1862-1918)

De laube midi sur la mer (From Dawn to Noon on the Sea)Jeux des vagues (Play o the Waves)Dialogue du vent et de la mer (Dialogue o Wind and the Sea)


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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Rafael Frhbeck de Burgos is the Laura and Bill Orthwein Guest Artist.

Pascal Rog is the Ellen Atwood Armstrong Guest Artist.

The concert of Friday, October 12, is underwritten in part by a generous gift from Mr. and Mrs. Barry H. Beracha.

The concert of Saturday, October 13, is underwritten in part by a generous gift from Mr. and Mrs. David A. Baetz.

The concert of Sunday, October 14, is underwritten in part by a generous gift

from Mrs. Clinton W. Lane Jr.Pre-Concert Conversations are presented by Washington University Physicians.

These concerts are part of the Wells Fargo Advisors Series.

Large print program notes are available through the generosity of Mosby Building Arts and are located at the Customer Service table in the foyer.


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TIMELINKS

1808BEETHOVENSymphony No. 6 inF major, op. 68, PastoraleHaydns The Seasons premieres in Vienna

1903-05DEBUSSYLa Mer

Picasso creates hisBlue Period paintings

1929-31RAVELPiano Concerto inG majorStock market crashprecipitates worldwideeconomic depression

It was the feeling they had of the inner structure

of Nature, Thomas Carlyle observed admiringly of the ancient Greeks, that the soul of all her voicesand utterances was perfect music. The Scottishpoet concurred with this Hellenic view. See deepenough and you see musically, Carlyle wrote, theheart of Nature being everywhere music.

Carlyle is hardly unique in sensing an af nity between music and the natural realm. Musicianshave long intuited a connection between their art and the natural world. Since at least the Renaissancecomposers have sought to make that connectionevident, evoking natural phenomena in their work.

Some of these phenomena can be renderedexplicitlythe singing of birds or the fury of astorm, for exampleand the most famous examplesof nature music have used a repertory of musical

gures signifying these and other concrete aspects

of the natural world. But some composers havesought to go beyond the super cial manifestationsof nature apparent to our senses, seeking insteadto express what we might call the soul of nature,as well as a spiritual bond between nature andmankind. Last week, the St. Louis Symphony performed Gustav Mahlers Third Symphony, acomposition conceived by its author as a hymn tonature, even though it contains nothing in the way

of picturesque guration suggesting rustling leaves,the voices of birds, or other natural events.This concert presents two more works inspired

by the natural world. Beethovens PastoraleSymphony employs familiar sorts of musicalmimicry to indicate birdsong, rain, and thunder. Yet Beethoven himself declared that this work has lessto do with such tone painting than with his feelingsfor nature. Claude Debussys symphonic seascapeLa Mer is even more abstract. Yet it capturessomething of the ever-changing appearance of theocean and, in the end, its violent majesty.

In contrast, many compositions evince anurbane outlook. Such a work is Maurice RavelsPiano Concerto in G. With its French suavity andreferences to jazz, this piece serves as a contrastinginterlude between the nature-inspired music that

opens and concludes the program.

NATURES SONGBY PAUL SCHIAVO


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LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVENSymphony No. 6 in F major, op. 68, Pastorale

EXPRESSING THE ECSTASY OF THE WOODSBeethovens love of the outdoors has been amply documented. He loved to be alone with nature,to make her his only con dante, reported oneof Beethovens closer companions. Anotheracquaintance con rmed that he had never met anyone who so ... thoroughly enjoyed owers orclouds or other natural objects. Each summerBeethoven moved his lodging to a rural areaoutside of Vienna, where he took long walksthrough the elds and forests, an activity that rarely failed to lift his spirits. It seems as if inthe country every tree said to me Holy! Holy!the composer once confessed. Who can givecomplete expression to the ecstasy of the woods?

Who, indeed, if not Beethoven himself? In1803 the composer made preliminary sketchesfor a symphony intended to convey the gloriesof a sylvan landscape, but he did not complete

this, his Sixth Symphony, for another ve years.The composer himself devised the title PastoraleSymphony, or a recollection of country life.He also provided the descriptive headings that precede each of the ve movements. Even without these guides, there could hardly be any mistakingthe pictorial qualities of this composition. It draws on a well-established repertory of musicalonomatopoeia to convey natural bird calls, astorm, and more.

Yet Beethoven evidently worried that listeners would give too much attention to these pictorialelements. He therefore appended a caveat to thesymphonys title: More an expression of feelingsthan tone painting. The quali cation is important.Nature clearly meant more to Beethoven than just a pleasing landscape or woodland sounds that

could be imitated through clever musical imagery.It was, rather, a wellspring of purity and beauty,something to be held in reverence. And it is thecomposers great feeling for nature, far more thantonal allusions to brooks and birds and storms, which lie at the heart of the Pastorale Symphony.

LANDSCAPE, DRAMA, EMOTIONThe rst movement, entitled Awakening of cheerful

Born

Bonn, December 16, 1770DiedVienna, March 26, 1827

First PerformanceVienna, December 22,1808, in Vienna; BeethovenconductedSTL Symphony PremiereDecember 16, 1910, Max

Zach conductingMost RecentSTL Symphony PerformanceMarch 15, 2009, NicholasMcGegan conducting atthe Touhill Per orming ArtsCenterScoring2 futes

piccolo2 oboes2 clarinets2 bassoons2 horns2 trumpets2 trombonestimpanistringsPerformance Timeapproximately 39 minutes


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MAURICE RAVELPiano Concerto in G major

IN THE SPIRIT OF MOZART AND SAINT-SANSRavel composed his G-major Piano Concerto

late in his career, following a concert tour of the United States he undertook in 1928. That visit proved so successful that the composerimmediately began planning for a second one,during which he hoped to perform a concertoof his own with American orchestras. Afterreturning to his home, near Paris, Ravel began writing the new work toward the end of 1929.

Ravel was a painstakingly slow worker. As aresult of his habitual diligence and the necessity to complete other projects, the concerto was not

nished until November 1931. By this time Ravelhad abandoned his plans for a second Americantour. He therefore presented the concerto to hisfriend Marguerite Long, a well-known Frenchpianist, who gave the rst performance.

Ravel described the piece as a concerto inthe strict sense, written in the spirit of Mozart andSaint-Sans. I believe that a concerto can be gay and brilliant without necessarily being profoundor aiming at dramatic effect. He added that themusic uses certain effects borrowed from jazz,but only in moderation.

IN THE SPIRIT OF GERSHWIN AND SATIEThe jazzreferences mentioned by Ravel are evident in the

rst movement. Here, several passages call to mindGershwins Rhapsody in Blue , which the composerhad heard in New York. Still, with its Gallic wit and iridescent orchestration, the movement as a whole is vintage Ravel. The proceedings includea substantial solo cadenza late in the movement.

There follows a leisurely Adagio that begins with a long meditation for the piano.The simplicity and modal avor of the melody,

the slow triple-pulse meter, the lack of dynamiccontrast, and the unchanging rhythm of thechordal accompaniment all bear an obviousresemblance to the famous Gymnopdies of Erik Satie, a composer Ravel had known andadmired. When at last the orchestra takes upthe melody, the accompanying gurations in thepiano take on a more classical gravity. The nale,by contrast, conveys a sense of raucous satire andoffers further hints of jazz.

Born

Ciboure, southwest France,March 7, 1875DiedParis, December 28, 1937First PerformanceParis, January 14, 1932;Marguerite Long wasthe soloist, and Ravelconducted the LamoureuxOrchestraSTL Symphony PremiereFebruary 17, 1945, LeonardBernstein was soloistand conducted rom thekeyboardMost RecentSTL Symphony Performance January 16, 2010, Ingrid Fliterwas soloist, with SusannaMlkki conductingScoringsolo pianofutepiccolooboeEnglish hornclarinetE-fat clarinet2 bassoons2 hornstrumpettrombonetimpanipercussionharpstringsPerformance Timeapproximately 23 minutes


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CLAUDE DEBUSSYLa Mer

MEMORIES OF THE SEA I am working on threesymphonic sketches under the title La Mer ... You may not know that I was supposed tohave been a sailor, and only by chance did fatelead me in another direction. But I have alwaysretained a passionate love for the sea. So wrote Claude Debussy to a friend in September1903. Two more years would pass before thecomposerwho indeed had been urged by his father to consider a career in the merchant marine servicecompleted the great symphonicseascape to which his letter refers.

The sea was a natural subject for Debussy.He carried, he once said, an endless store of memories of the ocean gleaned from childhoodsojourns on the Mediterranean and later visits tothe Brittany coast. The movement of the waves,the play of sunlight on the water, the vast expanseof sea and sky surely would have impressed

someone of Debussys manifest sensitivity tonatures colors and rhythms.

IMPRESSIONISM AND WATER SCENES Althoughthis attraction to the sea certainly had its rootsin personal experience, it mirrored certaincreative concerns that Debussy shared with otherFrench artists of his day, particularly the FrenchImpressionist painters. Water provided theseand other artists of the day with ever-changingpatterns of light and form. They delighted inits visual ambiguitiesits soft and shimmeringre ections, its tremulous motionand waterscenes appear frequently in their work.

Debussy similarly was fascinated by harmonic ambiguities and uid, subtle rhythms. And like the Impressionist painters, he found

inspiration in the irregular movement andmuted colors of water. Far from being an isolatedexample, La Mer crowns a body of water music by Debussy that includes the Sirnes movement from his orchestral Nocturnes and piano piecesbearing such titles as In the Boat, Re ectionsin the Water, Gardens in the Rain, and TheSunken Cathedral.

Born

Saint Germaine-en-Laye,near Paris, August 22, 1862DiedParis, March 25, 1918First PerformanceParis, October 15, 1905,Camille Chevillardconducted the LamoureuxOrchestra

STL Symphony Premiere January 23, 1914, Max ZachconductingMost RecentSTL Symphony PerformanceFebruary 3, 2007, SusannaMlkki conductingScoring2 futes

piccolo2 oboesEnglish horn2 clarinets3 bassoonscontrabassoon4 horns3 trumpets2 cornets3 trombonestubatimpanipercussion2 harpsstringsPerformance Timeapproximately 23 minutes

F l i x

N a d a r


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A SYMPHONY IN ALL BUT NAMEThe composers description of the threemovements of La Mer as sketches is an understatement that belies thetrue nature of the piece. Although it sounds nothing like the symphonies of Beethoven or Brahms, let alone those of Debussy contemporaries Mahler andSibelius, the workings of this composition justify our thinking of it, at least tosome extent, as symphonic. Each of its three movements is carefully executedon a large scale, and the important thematic cross-references that occur withinmovements, and between the rst and third movements, reveal a uni ed, over-arching conception.

The opening measures, besides being a musical picture of dawn, present several motifs that prove to be the musical seeds from which the entire work springs. The rising-and-falling contours of melodies that Debussy fashionsfrom these motivic kernels frequently suggest the shape or movement of

waves. (A notable example is the cello theme that appears midway throughthe rst movement.) Each movement has a distinctive character. The rst features pentatonic melodies and other oriental references, and it is telling inthis regard that Debussy chose a quintessentially Japanese image, Hokusaisfamous print The Wave, to appear on the cover of the rst edition of the LaMer score. There follows a sprightly and dance-like second movement, whereasthe third is, for Debussy, surprisingly violent. Together these sketchesform a convincing triptych that remains, even today, remarkable in both itscompositional craftsmanship and its originality.


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PASCAL ROGELLEN ATWOOD ARMSTRONG GUEST ARTIST

Pascal Rog exempli es the nest in Frenchpianism. As the last student to be mentoredby the great Nadia Boulanger, his playing of Poulenc, Satie, Faur, Saint-Sans and especially Ravel, is characterized by its elegance, beauty,and stylistically perfect phrasing. A native of Paris, Rog has performed in almost every major concert hall in the world and with majororchestras across the globenotably every majorLondon orchestra. International engagments

include Orchestre National de France, Orchestrede Paris, Orchestre National de Lyon, LeipzigGewandhaus Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, NHK Symphony Orchestra Tokyo, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic,Sydney Symphony; and in North America, theorchestras of Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles,Philadelphia, and Toronto.

He has collaborated with such distinguishedconductors as Lorin Maazel, Michael TilsonThomas, Alan Gilbert, David Zinman, Yan PascalTortelier, Sir Andrew Davis, and others.

Rog became an exclusive Decca recordingartist at the age of 17. Since then, he has wonmany prestigious awards, including twoGramophone Awards, a Grand Prix du Disque,and an Edison Award for his interpretations of the concertos of Ravel and Saint-Sans. Otherrecordings include the complete piano works of Poulenc and Ravel, four albums of Satie, two of Debussy, one of Faure, and a Bartk cycle withthe London Symphony Orchestra

Several years ago, Rog began an ambitiousrecording project for Onyx called the RogEdition. This includes ve CDs of his rst complete Debussy piano music cycle. With the

Vienna Radio Symphony under Bertrand deBilly, he has recently recorded two CDs of both of the Ravel piano concertos, as well as GershwinsConcerto in F and Rhapsody in Blue .

For more information, visit pascalroge.com.

Pascal Rog most recentlyper ormed with the St. LouisSymphony in March 1996.


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A BRIEF EXPLANATION You dont need to know what andante means or what a glockenspiel is toenjoy a St. Louis Symphony concert, but its always fun to know stuff. Here isRavels Piano Concerto in G, movement by movement.Allegramente:brightly, which is a nice way to begin a concertoAdagio assai:a slow movement is often referred to as adagio, Ravels secondmovement is very slow Presto:you know how this works, contrast the slow second movement with the very fast, or quick, nal movement

STUFF MUSICIANS SAY:If you dont know what it means (allegramente, for example) just watchthe conductor.

STEVE J. SHERMAN


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CORPORATE DONOR SPOTLIGHTTHE BOEING COMPANY

Boeing is the worlds largest aerospace company and leading manufacturer

of commercial jetliners and defense, space and security systems.Boeing Defense, Space & Security (BDS), headquartered in St. Louis with nearly 15,000 employees, is the largest manufacturer in the state andthe second largest employer in the region.

Employees at BDS perform work and build products that are crucialto national security and global markets. But a company the size and scopeof Boeing does not succeed by resting on its laurels; company leaders and

employees are constantly re-examining capabilitiesand processes to ensure thecompany is as strong and vital as its heritage. In fact,Boeings culture mirrors theheritage of aviation itself,built on a foundation of innovation, aspiration, andimagination.

In addition, Boeing also has a responsibility to its stakeholdersincluding the communities where its employees live and workto be agood corporate citizen and lead by example. Corporate citizenship at Boeing means creating positive changes in all the company doesthroughthe products and services it provides and the way employees operate theirbusiness in the interconnected world in which they live.

Boeings relationship with the St. Louis Symphony goes back several years and re ects company values promoting arts and culture amongits employees and also within the community. Recent Boeing corporategrants to the Symphony include the 2012 funding for Music of Led Zeppelin and support for the symphonys Classical Detours program. Boeing alsosupports a program that encourages local college students to becomepatrons of the symphony

The St. Louis Employee Community Fund (ECF) has supported bothExpress the Music (ETM) and Picture the Music (PTM) in recent years.ECF is a unique employee-owned and directed giving program that allows employees to support the needs of the St. Louis community via tax

deductible recurring payroll deductions or one-time gifts. Boeing pays alladministrative costs for the ECF so that 100 percent of every employeedollar contributed goes to support the community.

ETM and PTM are competitions for area students involving creativeresponses to listening to a selection of music. Both programs areadministered by the Symphony Volunteer Association.


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B O U T I Q U E

WHEELCHAIR LIFT

BALCONY LEVEL(TERRACE CIRCLE, GRAND CIRCLE)

GRAND TIER LEVEL

(DRESS CIRCLE, DRESS CIRCLE BOXES,GRAND TIER BOXES & LOGE)

MET BAR

TAXI PICK UPDELMAR

ORCHESTRA LEVEL(PARQUET, ORCHESTRA RIGHT & LEFT)

WIGHTMANGRANDFOYER

TICKET LOBBY

CUSTOMER SERVICE

LOCKERS

WOMENS RESTROOM

MENS RESTROOM

ELEVATOR

BAR SERVICES

HANDICAPPED-ACCESSIBLE

FAMILY RESTROOM

POWELL HALL

Documents

St. Louis Symphony Program - Oct. 12-14, 2012