Conductor's Knowledge, pt. 2: String Harmonics, Counterpoint basics

being a string player i didn't think that i would really need to brush up on these, but when they showed up on the test i was embarrassingly unsure of everything and ended up not really writing any harmonics. here is a brief tutorial on their notation and sounding pitches.

natural harmonics: the ones you can get by placing only one finger on the string. these have basically the most confusing notation ever, but here is the clearest way of laying it out.
you can think of the natural harmonic in two ways in terms of finger placement: you are either dividing the string into one of several simple ratios which produce the natural harmonic, or you are putting your finger lightly upon a place which would produce a different pitch if you held it down firmly. most string musicians tend to just think of it in this latter way, which is why we get so confused when we don't see a clear notation. when we think of it like this, it's difficult to remember whether what we're seeing is the finger configuration or the actual sounding pitch.

the clearest notation i have found so far is to put a solid notehead on the *open string* that one is using, and a harmonic diamond notehead on the *place on the string* that one would put the finger. if one wants to be super clear, they can put the sounding pitch in parentheses above that.

here's a pretty good diagram of the g string on the violin, using this notation.

an alternative would be to not include the g string real notehead, but instead to label the string above the staff; for example "sul G."
for a more tabulated form of the same information in the picture:
string division (finger at the _____) - sounding pitch above open string/fundamental
1/2 (finger at octave) - octave above
1/3 (finger at fifth OR octave + fifth) - octave + fifth above
1/4 (finger at fourth OR two octaves) - two octaves above
1/5 (finger at major third OR two octaves + major third) - two octaves + major third

artificial harmonics are made by stopping the string with one finger (acts as if the string were shortened) and usually use the 1/3 or 1/4th string division (i.e. placing the harmonic finger either a fifth or fourth above the stopped note. the 1/5th division (placing the finger a major third above the note) is also possible, but doesn't get used so much in violin playing because it's so fuzzy. the 1/2 division is not really possible on any instrument unless you shorten the string so much you can reach halfway across it. the noise that comes with this usually makes it a pretty bad idea.
so we can obtain generally, with stopped harmonics, pitches that are either an octave + fifth or two octaves above the fundamental (the stopped pitch). these are easier to notate; the same as above, with a solid note on the fundamental/stopped pitch, and the open diamond head on the touched place.

i was going to do counterpoint but i really can't remember most of the rules so far. i just sort of guess. my feeling is that there are way too many rules for me to learn in one week's time, so for basics:
a "cantus firmus" is a given melodic phrase that is to be "given contrapuntal treatment" in the form of counterpoint. counterpoint is any other part other than the cantus firmus.
intervals (both melodic, between two notes of the same voice, and harmonic, between two notes at the same time in different voices) are classed as follows:
   perfect consonance: unison, fifth, octave
   imperfect consonance: third, sixths
   dissonances: second, fourth, seventh
generally all of these in all forms (major/minor, dimished/augmented) are allowed for melodic progression except the major/minor seventh. all of them are allowed as harmonic intervals within about a billion guidelines.
there are five species, and the number generally refers to how many notes the counterpoint has per note of the cantus firmus.
   first species: one note per cantus firmus note
   second species: two notes per
   third species: four notes per (three notes per, for example when the cantus is given in a 3/2 bar and there are three half notes in the counterpoint per cantus note, is a category of second-species)
   fourth species: two notes syncopated (perhaps think of as one note, offset by half the value of the cantus firmus)
   fifth species: any combination thereof
there is also a type where there is no cantus firmus and instead two equally moving lines. since the cantus firmus is almost always given in whole notes, it'll be fairly obvious when this is the case (and not just a first species counterpoint). this is known as second species in both parts.

general voice leading rules apply, but usually they are taken to the extreme - for example it's usually forbidden to cross voices, and there shouldn't ever be too many steps or skips in a row (the safest way to write is whenever there is a skip, leave it by step in the opposite direction. avoid tritones; avoid perfect intervals except in the beginning and last bars, open and end with perfect intervals.
too many to learn in a week, so i'll just leave it at this and do the rest by guessing... i'll have to take a real counterpoint class at some point.

Conductors' Knowledge

i solemnly swear that regular posts will begin again after march 8th (the day after my only other audition).

for now, i am concentrating on learning the Wagner Tannhauser Overture, the Sacrificial Dance from Rite of Spring, and all the material that was covered in the test last week (wow it has been a whole week since that day).

today's post includes the following material:
trombone slides
harp charts
twelve-tone rows

trombones are strange instruments. this graphic is pretty clear on what they can do.

the question that likes to come up on conductors' exams, apparently, is usually regarding their most atypical of traits, the slide. so in the above picture you can see that in any one position a trombone can only hit the notes of a harmonic series, the same as any other wind/brass instrument that couldn't change the fundamental by using keys or valves. trombones don't have valves, so the slide changes the fundamental by adjusting the length. the higher the position (in number), the lower the fundamental note of the series it can play in that position.
the lowest a trombone can play is the low E (it's an E2) in 7th position. by adjusting lips, one can obtain the higher notes in that harmonic series, in other words B2, E3, G#3. (just for the sake of clarity/thoroughness, the trombone has a range of E2 to about F5, and reads music in alto, tenor, and bass clefs. it does not usually transpose.)
slides are obtained by keeping the lips in the same embouchure but continually adjusting the slide/changing the position. the fact that the largest slide a trombone can perform is a tritone is a matter of practicality - since the first interval in the harmonic series (other than the octave) is the fifth, you only need a range of diminished fourth in the fundamental to be able to cover basically all the notes within your range. (it also happens to be just about how long people's arms are...)
i don't actually know what i would have written for the answer to the question last week if i had known all this. what i remember him asking was, are these slides possible? (and to this i just marked Y to the ones in which the range of the slide was tritone or less) and then if we could state what position the trombone had to be in to do the slides. since slides cover several positions (all of them if the interval is a tritone), i guess i would have put the starting position-ending position.

the harp:
this is basically a recap of the information i posted last week. the harp has a total of 47 strings, ranging from Cb1 to F#7. the lowest two notes, a C and D, and the F, are technically not attached to the pedals which alter the accidentals chromatically for every octave of a given note. they can, however, be pre-tuned. otherwise their usual tuning is just C1 to F7.
notes on harpists: they only use four fingers of the hand (exclude the pinky). generally one hand can have the range of a tenth. and since the right arm wraps around the instrument, it generally plays nothing lower than a G2.
the seven pedals are: D C B | E F G A.
pushing the pedals down makes them sharp; raising them makes them flat.
after you know this, the pedal diagram becomes instinctive...

twelve-tone rows:
12 tones in a sequence. these use of the tones is rather rigid: no altering the fundamental order of the row, no repeating previously stated notes (unless you are merely repeating one note over directly afterwards) unless you have gone through the rest of the row first. but there are a number of provisions which make this marginally less binding.
first, you're allowed to use repeated notes (as long as the note you are repeating has no other notes in between)
second, you don't have to use all the notes exactly in the same rigid order. for example, you might have multiple lines going, and you have to use all the notes in one bar including all the parts, before you can start repeating notes in the next bar. in other words, one voice doesn't have to hit all twelve tones.
third, and most likely to come up on an exam because of its formulaic nature, is the process of inversion and retrograde.
retrograde is the easier of the two; it's merely your twelve tone row backwards. start with the last note, end on the first note.
inversion is more or less what it sounds like. you start on the same note as the original note, but you go in all the opposite directions. so if your row has the first three notes: Eb, (downwards minor third) C, (upwards perfect fourth) F, then your inversion will have the first three notes: Eb, (upwards minor third) Gb, (downards perfect fourth) Db. your result should still be a twelve tone row. unfortunately when i did this last week i ended up with a repeat somewhere. it's easy to mess it up if you are under time pressure and don't have time to write numbers and that sort of thing. but the concept is simple.
retrograde inversion is an inverted row, backwards. i guess there could also be an inverted retrograde, but i'm not sure anyone uses it :P

coming up soon - some transposition notes, counterpoint 101, and various other notation details regarding particular instruments.

Wagner: Overture to Tannhäuser, WWV 70

ughhhhhh i have to do double entries for like a week before i catch up.

ok, here is tannhäuser overture (pronounced TAN-hoy-sehr), the opera of which was written by wagner in 1842-43. it was significantly amended through 1846-47 after its initial lukewarm reception, and then again for a Paris performance in 1861. the "paris version" is closest, i think, to the one that gets performed today. by this point he had just done tristan and isolde and was looking to do a big coming out party in paris that would include tristan and lohengrin. unfortunately tannhauser caused the strongest reactions and didn't last long in paris.


i have to conduct this in a week and half OMG.


i will avoid going through too much of an opera synopsis since this is just the overture. but this being wagner, it's impossible to go through the components of the piece without telling you what they relate to in the opera's scheme, so briefly, the story is about tannhauser (heinrich), a man who disappears from his original life in favor of love from venus and her unearthly pleasures. after staying there for a long time he manages to escape the spell by declaring his salvation lies in mother mary, and he is allowed to return to his home. his love elisabeth has been living in seclusion, but once she hears that tannhauser has returned, looks forward to hearing the song contest of men seeking her love. during the contest tannhauser hotbloodedly reveals his belief in the sensual pleasures due to his journey to see venus, and is threatened by the other men. elisabeth protects him, but he has to make a pilgrimage to seek forgiveness. the third act starts some undefined stretch of time later, during which elisabeth has been seeking news of tannhauser in vain. he finally returns in rags having given up his quest for absolution, saying that the pope's staff would sooner sprout leaves than he be forgiven. tannhauser is about to give everything up and return to venus, but then notices a funeral procession which happens to be carrying elisabeth. he rushes to her and throws himself over her dead body just as he receives the news that the pope's staff has sprouted leaves.

the overture is written in a sort of mirror/sonata form.
we open with a chorale which includes bassoons, clarinets, and of course horns. this is the "pilgrim's chorus," which occurs in his journey with the pilgrims. wagner writes "nicht schleppend, gehended Bewegung" which means not dragging; continually flowing. this grows into a massive brassy triumphant song.
at 5:16 we hit a brisker tempo and duple meter, beginning with an ascending diminished motif that is introduced by the violas. this is music from the venusburg, venus's mountain (literally). it is the setting of the entire first act which tannhauser spends lounging in her embrace. this section is written in B major, the dominant key (original is in E major). the music is sprightly and suspenseful (literally as well... lots of suspensions :P) he indicates to hold off getting too energetic, because he wants a big build up into the next section.
6:45 is where a new motif comes in; this is the "ode to venus," which tannhauser sings in hotblooded passion after hearing what he feels is a load of crap about love being pure and undisturbed. march-like and triumphant. wagner writes "nicht eilen. breit" which just means unhurried and broad. this theme is woven back into venusburg motifs which dissipate into the next section.
at about 8:00 we hit a very slow middle section, the interlude which is actually more music from the venusburg; violins are divided into 8 parts, and there is a mysterious floating clarinet solo above the texture. here he indicates "ruhig," calm and quiet. 
and now we start progressing backwards through the sections; we have the return of brisker venusburg music which leads us through several weird chromatic shifts until we get back to the ode to venus, which is now in the correct key of e major. from here it's basically a straight shot and accelerando towards the super brassy end.


as with basically all of wagner, super cheesy and still super fun.

Conducting exam recap

so since people are so cagey and unspecific when they tell us how to prepare for this test, here is a complete recap of all the exams, insofar as i can remember it.

PART 1: conductors' knowledge

I. writing music
1. counterpoint: given a cantus in alto clef (which before this morning i did not know the definition of =/ it's just a series of notes/one part of a counterpoint) write a two species counterpoint above it in treble clef and a three species counterpoint below in bass clef. think of it as two separate counterpoints which both happen to have the middle line as part of it, not a single counterpoint with three parts.
2. here is the first part of a fugal subject. given the first note of the voice which comes in next, give the "tonal answer" of the next bar (i have no idea what this means).
3. write a melody for the viola (or whatever other instrument he chooses), 4 bars, include fingerings if possible.
4. here are some notations for violin harmonics. what are the sounding pitches?
5. here is a partial harmonization. complete it following four part harmony rules.
6a. here is a 12-tone row. write (notate) the inversion.
6b. hopefully your inversion is correct. now write, for the 4th, 6th, 9th, and 12th notes of your inverted row, the notation that would allow a cello to produce those notes in harmonics (in the correct octave).
7. drawing of a series of slides in various intervals. are these slides possible on the trombone? if yes, what position does the trombone have to be in?
8a. here is a sample harp pedal chart. which one is correct?
| | | | | | | |
or
 | | | | | | | |  (this is like such an ass question because you would only have ever seen this chart if you were a harp player...)
8b. given a series of sharps/flats for the notes, how would the harp chart look? (for those of you unacquainted with the harp, a harp has seven strings per octave representing (in the non-pedal positions) the notes of a diatonic major scale. there is a pedal that controls a particular pitch in every octave, so 7 pedals. each pitch can be raised or lowered by one half step to achieve all the notes in a chromatic 12 note scale. for those of you unacquainted with harp charts, which i was before this morning, the vertical lines represent each pedal in the order: D C B (divider to indicate which side of the harp the pedals are on physically) E F G A. for a given accidental, for example D sharp, the first line would be lowered so it was completely below the horizontal bar. sharps go down; flats go up, non intuitively.)

II. notate A440 in the following instruments:
what you'd expect. i don't remember all the instruments, but they came in all languages, transposing and non transposing, and they don't provide a clef (so you have to know which clef they all play in and which way they transpose/sound). did anyone know that ottavino is "piccolo" in italian? yea wtf. also he wanted us to notate for the oboe da caccia, a random baroque oboe that is the predecessor of the english horn (in F, sounds a fifth down).

III. written questions
A. 34 random vocabulary. a LOT of german. i can't remember all the words =/
pousaune: trombone (ger)
hervortretend: emphasized, marked (ger)
allmahlich: gradually (ger)
ausdrucksvoll: with expression (ger)
flatterzunge: fluttertongue (ger)
am griffbrett: at the fingerboard (ger)
am steg: at the bridge (ger)
bestimmt: with decision, distinct (ger)
ab. dampfer: no mute (ger)
al tallone: at the frog (it)
l'istesso tempo: the same tempo (it)
lo stesso tempo: the same tempo (it) fricking trick question
muta in re: change instrument to key of re (D) (it)
gran cassa: bass drum (it)
bouche: stopped or muted, for horns (fr)
pavillons en l'air: bells up, for horns (fr) apparently every year there is one guy who just has no idea and writes "pavilions in the sky."
pressez: accelerando (fr)
otez le sourdines: without mutes (fr)
sur le chevalet: on the bridge (fr)
un peu en dehors: somewhat prominently (fr)
cuivrez: brassy, literally "copper" (fr)
ok upon going through an entire music dictionary this is what i remember.
G.P.: grand pause (eng)
B. random trivia. this is something i'm going to have to edit as i remember the questions.
1. name three "major" choral works by j.s. bach (random cantatas do not count): st. matthew passion, st. john passion, b minor mass, christmas oratorio, magnificat, easter oratorio, ascension oratorio
2. how many concerti did beethoven write? name them: 7; 5 for piano, 1 for violin, 1 for violin/cello/piano
3. name a 20th-century hungarian composer other than bela bartok: dohnanyi, goldmark, hubay, kodaly, lehar, ligeti are some of the better known ones. i missed this question, guessing gorecki, who is polish.
4. name two czech operas: rusalka, devil and kate (dvorak), bartered bride, dalibor, two widows (smetana), jenufa, from the house of the dead (janacek) among others
5. name two operas by carl maria von weber: der freischutz, oberon, euryanthe
6. what is a furiant, and from what country did it originate?: bohemian dance in 2/4 and 3/4 time, czech.
7. name all the keys of all the brahms symphonies AND the keys of the second movements: 1 - Cm/EM, 2 - DM/BM, 3 - FM/CM, 4 - Em/EM.
7b. besides timpani, did brahms use any other percussion in his symphonies? which and which movement(s)?: triangle, in 3rd mvt of symphony 4.
8. what nationality is composer carl nielsen? danish. totally guessed (correctly :D) on this one.
9. how many symphonies is mozart generally agreed to have written (not including recent scholarship disputes, etc)?: 41
10. not counting symphony 100, name 3 of haydn's nicknamed symphonies and their keys: 94 GM (Surprise), 96 DM (miracle), 101 DM (clock), 103 EbM (drumroll), 104 DM (london) (these are just from the last 12 which were the only ones i studied, there are like 30 others.)
11. name two violin concerti NOT in D, and their keys: mozart 3(G) and 5(A), saint-saens (Bm), bruch (Gm), dvorak (Am), mendelssohn (Em), shostakovich (Am)
12. name two ballet scores by stravinsky: petrushka, rite of spring, firebird

ok that was the first 2 hrs. it was miserable btw :(


PART 2: dictations
I. wind dictation: here is your friendly wind quartet, flute (soprano), clarinet (alto), horn (tenor), and bassoon (bass). they play a four part harmony that is 14 bars long. every other bar has a fermata in it. they play in four bar chunks, 4 times each.
II. piano dictation: here is your friendly pianist. she will play some chords, some melodies, and some two-part harmonies. most of them are in one key/meter but a couple are atonal.


PART 3: theory test
1. harmonize a given bass in four parts, realize figured bass, perform roman numeral analysis.
2. write some second/third/fourth species counterpoint over a given cantus.
3. here is a segment of some piano piece.
a. describe the form of the segment
b. provide roman numeral analysis for the first system
c. name/analyze the chord in bar x beat y
d. what chord is "extended" throughout the second system?
e. what is the function of z chord/key area?
f. don't remember, there were six parts.
4. harmonize the given notes/add bass notes where indicated, use applied dominant/diminished seventh chords where appropriate.
5. given a soprano line, write a modulation into d major (from g major)


PART 4: ear training personal interview
mercifully short, i think this was only for placement purposes and had no effect on the actual score/interview. they had me sing some song by sight and play some two-line harmonies in various clefs on the piano.


PART 5: score reading i.e. get owned time
1. here is second movement of a beethoven string quartet! D: (it was op 134)
2. here is beginning of ein deutsche requiem! D: D: D:
we had to play these on the piano. i can't play the piano :(

okkkk and that was my day. how was yours

Orchestration history and notation: a short tutorial

 an assignment from my conducting teacher. this is sort of an outline of the basic history of orchestration in very dry terms, i.e. when they started adding specific instruments. i won't really go into what the theory behind the sounds these composers were attempting was, or even be super exact, but these are sort of "quintessential" examples of certain orchestrations.

for those of you who aren't used to reading orchestrations as i wasn't when i started having to be able to say/memorize them, the typical listing is

flute/oboe/clarinet/bassoon   horn/trumpet/trombone/tuba   percussion+strings

picc = piccolo

cor ang = english horn

bass = bass clarinet (when right after the clarinet number)

es = e-flat clarinet (")

contra = contrabassoon

hp = harp

d[#] = doubling, as in, if you have 2d1 in the first slot, it means 2 flutes, one of which doubles on picc. basic assumption if no instrument specifics follow a d or a + are: piccolo, english horn, bass clarinet, and contrabassoon, respectively.

+ = the number of a related instrument (picc, english horn, etc) follows a plus sign if nobody playing the core instrument doubles as the player for said related instrument i.e. if the instrument requires a dedicated player. 

after a while, maybe by the time we get to strauss and definitely when we get to stravinsky, the shorthand isn't especially helpful anymore, just confusing.

str = strings

for the rest, look up this very nice and clear wiki article on orchestrational shorthand.

1. Handel concerto grossi (1730s and 40s): 4 string parts + basso continuo.

   *bach liked to add oboes (2), bassoon, horns (up to 2) and trumpets (up to 3), sometimes even a flute. but usually no more than two of these at once.

2. Late Haydn symphonies (1791-95): 2/2/0/2 2/2/0/0 timp, str

   *typical classical orchestra, no clarinets yet, horns and trumpets only in the brass.

3. Beethoven 1 (1800): 2/2/2/2 2/2/0/0 timp, str

    Beethoven 9 (1824): 2+picc/2/2/2+cb 4/2/3/0 timp, bass drum, triangle, cymbals, str, SATB

   *SATB is soprano alto tenor bass choir.

   *Beethoven 3 adds a third horn to the original 2; Symphony 5 adds three trombones and a piccolo and contrabassoon.

4. Mendelssohn symphonies (1820s-40s): 2/2/2/2 2/2/0/0 timp, str

   *he uses more horns in symphony 3, his latest composed (1842)

5. Schumann symphonies (1830s-50s): 2/2/2/2 4/2/3/0 timp, str

   *solidifies the place of 4 horns in the symphony orchestra

6. Brahms symphonies (1870s-80s): 2/2/2/2 4/2/3/0

   *same, but he starts to use contrabassoon as well, in symphs 1 and 3; and bass trombone in 2.

7. Strauss tone poems (1880s-90s, mostly): 

   winds: 3d1/3d1/3d1/3d1 or thereabouts. earlier ones had 2+1; later ones had 3+1.

   brass: 4/3/3/1 is typical, later he throws in two and even four more horns, sometimes an extra tuba or a tenor tuba.

   host of percussion, almost always includes timp, cymbals, at least 1 harp (sometimes 2), and at alternating times a bass drum, tamtam, triangle, tamborine, and snare drums.

   *basically between strauss and wagner, many secondary instruments related to core wind instruments become standard, especially piccolo, contrabassoon, and bass clarinet. english horn and picc clarinets (in d and eb) are somewhat rarer (in the broader scope of things), as are wagner tubas/tenor tubas (usually played in part by lower horns).

8. Debussy's La Mer (1905): 2+1/2+1/2/3+1   4/3+2cornet/3/1 timp, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tamtam, glock, 2 hp, str

   *french take... pretty similar

9. Stravinsky Petrouchka (1910-11): 4d2/4d1/3d1/4d1   4/2d2(picc tpt)+2(cornet)/3/1    timp, bass drum, cymbals, 2 snare, tambourine, tambourin, tenor drum, triangle, tamtam, glock, xylophone, pno, celesta, 2hp, str

   Stravinsky Petrouchka (rev 1947): 3d2/2+1/2+1/3d1   4/3d2(picc tpt)/3/1   one fewer snare, one fewer tambourine, no glock, one fewer harp.


10.  Bartok Concerto for Orchestra (1943): 3d1/3d1/3d1/3d1 4/3/3/1 timp, side drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tamtam, 2hp, str


and just as a bonus, you also get stravinsky's rite of spring (1913)
3 fl, 2 picc, 1 alto fl (picc2 = fl3)
4 ob, 2 eng hn (eng hn2 = ob4)
3 cl, 2 bass cl, 1 sop cl (basscl2 = cl2)
4 fg, 2 cb (cb2 = fg4)
8 hn, 2 wagner tubas (wt 1 and 2 = hn 7 and 8)
4 tpts, 1 bass tpt, 1 picc tpt (bass tpt = tpt 4)
3 tb
2 tuba
percussion: timp (small & large), triangle, tambourine, guiro, antique cymbals, cymbals, bass drum, tam-tam
strings

Stravinsky: The Rite of Spring

this is almost definitely not what you think it is considering the general arc of this blog, but i am having difficulty letting myself explore music that isn't the music i'm supposed to be preparing, so here you get something a little different. below is a written guide to all the non-italian (and some rarer italian) written-language instructions you find in stravinsky's masterpiece score, in the order they first appear in the score, usually with some indication as to where. it's surprising to me that there isn't a list out there already for this, but maybe my googling skills just aren't that great. you certainly find them all over the place for mahler and strauss. i'm not sure of some of the longer ones, so if you find any discrepancies leave a note. maybe this will help the next aspiring conductor trying to learn this piece. and since for some reason this piece seems to now be a total favorite for people to assign during mere graduate school auditions, there will probably be (or already are) a lot of people running around like myself trying to learn this piece when by all rights we have no place attempting it.




colla parte: with the soloist (as directed to the clarinets and horns accompanying the bassoon solo in the beginning)
un peu en dehors: a little outside, maybe slightly more extraverted (as to the piccolo clarinet that enters in the fifth bar, among other places)
très en dehors: very prominent
flatterzunge: fluttertongue
come sopra: as above/before
per tutto quat.: all four (when there is a part divided into four, etc., followed by some instruction, in this case, a crescendo)
tube tenori/ tenori: wagner tubas
cuivrez: brassy (literally, copper), when he wants a sound brash and shiny
très lointain: vert distant, as for the horn soli at 89
accordèz la corde do en si: adjust/tune the string to play, as for the 2nd cello solo at 91 which has to play a d-sharp harmonic
pavillons en l'air: bells up! for the horns
colla bacch. di ______: with the sticks of (some instrument). lots of directions to play one instrument with the mallets/sticks of another. when it appears with [triangolo] it is usually telling you to run the triangle's stick over the surface of the gong, giving it a zzzzzing. when it appears with [tamburo] or [timp.] which both mean drum, use the according mallet to strike as normal. apparently tamburo usually refers to the snare drum, so it would seem that while doesn't need the snare drum for this whole monster of a piece, you still need the sticks...
au bord: on the rim, meaning to play where the sound is drier, on the rim of the timpani (as at 114)
tres serrè: very tight, as with the repeated violin notes at 134
bouchè: mouth. he writes this for the horns three times, just around 137-8. honestly, your guess is as good as mine.
ouvert: open (as for the sustained notes at 138)
avec la baguette en boin: with the stick (as for the bass drum at 139, meaning to flip the mallet around and play with the wood end instead of the covered end)
ordinairement (avec la mailloche[...]): as normal; directive about two bars later, signaling to flip the mallet back around. apparently the covered end of the stick is called a "beetle" (mailloche) in french... um.
des cordez le "la" un demi-ton plus bas: the A string tuned a half-step lower, as for the celli in order to play the four note chord at the very end of the piece which includes a g-sharp as the high note. i don't think anyone actually does this. the celli have like a bar in order to try to fix their strings like this.

Beethoven: Symphony No. 4 in B-flat Major, Op. 60 - II. Adagio

this is the other movement i would be expected to conduct if i made it to the third round this weekend.

this movement is classic sonata form. the dotted rhythmic cell introduced by the seconds is something that goes on through almost the whole thing. over that we have a songful primary theme in Eb major introduced by the firsts. this whole phrase is reiterated by the flute (and a wind chorale accompanying it).
there is a bridge which modulates us to the key of the second theme. this bridge features swelling string arpeggios, and the modulation begins after a G7 chord leads us to C minor; then F7 into Bb, the dominant key and key of the second theme. the secondary theme is a stretched out line played by the clarinet over diminished arpeggios rising in the strings. everyone joins in, and a wind chorale voices repeated chords over a river of gentle string notes. but the rhythmic cell which exists this whole time in the basses grows to overtake the entire orchestra, and we cadence back in Eb to begin the development.

the development sounds like the first theme, with some triplet ornamentation. but instead of the winds reiterating this time, we get a gigantic dramatic e-flat minor chord, which sinks and sinks, step by step, diatonically in e-flat minor. at last we end up with a wandering motif in the lonely firsts which is outlined by a D7 chord. where are we going anyway? it turns out after an exchange between violin sections that stretches out this D7 chord forever, we are going to Gb Major, which is rather far away. he teases us with a trace of the opening rhythm and snatches of the opening bar of the main theme, but then with a small alteration of a half step interval, the horns can outline an e-flat chord and pave the way for a flute to rise, bringing us back to the intended wind statement of the theme in e-flat.

this second statement of the main theme of course goes on to "redevelop" the harmony so that the clarinet can put its second theme in the right key this time. all is well right up through the coda, which allows a gentle e-flat major arpeggio to rise up through the winds and to the violins, which rapidly crescendoes into a grandiose end.

i found a szell recording of this on youtube but it was so fast i decided not to post it. here instead is some of one of my favorite conductors ever (who only ever agreed to record/publicly perform very very few works, so it's always great when one finds recordings by him).

you can even watch the little analysis which goes on on the bottom... :P

Dvorak: Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95 - III. Scherzo: Allegro vivace

i can't remember the last time i actually updated this thing on consecutive days :( ok, here is some dvorak. the reason i am not updating well these days is because i am having an audition this weekend that has sort of been taking precedence. this post covers the movement that i would conduct in the third round, assuming i made it that far.

since everyone basically already knows this symphony probably, i'll just post some interesting recordings and comment on the form (a standard ternary form). this movement is your standard scherzo, basically: ternary form, ABA.
the A part, the scherzo itself, is itself a rounded binary form: a skittering first theme firmly in e minor, which builds upon itself into something that includes the entire orchestra. it cadences in the original key, then slows down a bit into a poco sostenuto, and we get a second theme in e major, which is more lilting, the other side of the classic dvorak coin. this is played by all the winds, and finally the celli at the end. then theme a comes back for a repeat, rounding off the binary first half.
the trio is heralded by a creepy little arpeggio begun in the celli and continued (after some interjections by the winds) by the violas. then the violins take over a tail end of that arpeggio and raise an a-flat into an a, segueing gracefully into a dancelike c-major section which itself is also a rounded binary (in which the first half, a series of dotted wind chords above the violin arpeggios, comes back after the second trio theme, which is a series of rapid plays on the interval of the sixth). then a bridge section leads us back to the top and we repeat the scherzo.
the second time through we skip to the coda, which holds suspense by emphasizing unstable tremolo chords in the strings starting with a weird C7. horn and wind solos play on the main motif of eighth-eighth-quarter quarter quarter, and then the strings take a half step up, giving us a Db major chord. then one more step up: D major, which morphs into f-sharp minor (one note difference), B-Major, and a cadence in E major, during which the trumpet recalls the main theme from the first movement. the triumph rapidly decays into E minor, though, which is the end of that.
ahem, if you can't tell, i'm studying a lot of vocab terms. see my other blob for what else i've been studying.
here's celibidache. so slow. but i'm using this as inspiration, hope i have the guts to not rush like this this weekend.

Rameau: Rondeau from Les Indes Galantes

i have to admit that i am doing this piece mostly just because it is so accessible and fun, even though there are definitely other things that rameau wrote that might fit better in the arc that i have created with handel and albinoni. not much, though: rameau dedicated himself mostly to operas and harpsichord music. he was also a dedicated theorist about harmony, even though he remained loyal to traditional forms. he replaced lully as the dominant opera composer in france, and was forever embroiled in a debate with them about how complex harmony should be - he made steps that were considered revolutionary.

this opera-ballet was written in 1735, around the beginning of the last forty years of his life he dedicated to writing operas. it was the first work of his which introduced his harmonies into a lighter genre. it is a collection of four acts which depict disjoint scenarios rather than a coherent plot. this rondo is from the fourth act, les sauvages (the savages of america), which is set in north america. a spaniard and a frenchman (alvar and damon respectively) compete for the love of zima, the daughter of a native chief.

unfortunately for them, zima happens to prefer adario, one of her own people. this rondeau is sung in scene 6, after which she has pretty much rejected the other two suitors. they sing of the innocence of their undisturbed love in their undisturbed land, and about their independence from others' wishes and laws.

ok, all i really have to say about this piece in particular is that it actually reminds me quite a bit of the fugue in the albinoni i just posted. isn't it awesome?

Albinoni: Sonata a Cinque in G minor, Op. 2 No. 6

tomaso albinoni was venetian, and wrote fifty some operas, most of which have been largely forgotten. today most of what gets air is his instrumental music.

there are books that are written on stylistic differences between nationalities of baroque composers, but it is still hard for me to tell, not having really given most of it a really good hard listen.
anyway, having perused this debate on a couple forums, stylistic generalizations (beyond the direction of ornamentations and such) tend to agree that the germans were, in terms of complexity and cerebral-ness, in a league of their own (mostly owing to bach, but handel does some of this as well). handel also brought a sort of height to english music, an elegance all his own.
the rest of this realm was largely just a big competition between the italians and the french, and sometimes it's generalized that italians do more songful writing, and the french emphasize their courtly dances instead.

there are also generalizations based on the instrumentations that the various composers liked. it's hard to draw nationalistic lines here, though; usually whatever instruments a composer enjoyed writing for were either the ones that were readily available, or the ones for which an individual composer had an affinity for - albinoni wrote a lot of oboe music. the organ is pretty decidedly bach and handel-ian. that sort of thing.

ok, here is your albinoni.

written for strings and basso continuo. the first two movements are french overture style, but a bit simpler in form and rhythm than the handel:
adagio, stately, melodious introduction in 4/4
allegro in 4/4. incidentally this is a fugue as well, like the handel i just posted.
grave, 3/4. this might be hindsight vision but for me this is quite a great example of writing which is characteristically more songful than it is dancelike. the melodies are quite prominent and surprisingly longwinded.
allegro, a brisk 12/8. here we have another fugue. this movement's lightness may make me have to sort of eat my words about the dance thing, but it's obviously not supposed to be an across the board generalization.

albinoni is most well known today for his oboe concerti (the first italian to write any oboe concerti at all) and for an adagio that apparently he didn't even write. he was a great inspiration to bach!

Handel: Concerto Grosso in D Minor HWV316 (Op. 3 No. 5)

for today's triple post: a trio of great baroque composers from different corners of europe. fair warning, the posts for the next week will not be great, owing to the audition next weekend... i mean, of course the music will be great, but i will want to avoid doing anything truly dear to me for lack of the time to do a proper entry.

handel wrote a number of concerti grossi for strings and continuo. this is Op. 3/5, the fifth in his first set. (the second set is Op. 6, another set of twelve which is slightly more popular and forms a bit more coherent whole.) this opus was published in 1734, though this particular work dates to 1717-8.
since it's so short i'll just do it in its entirety.
five movements: the largo; a fugue (allegro); adagio; allegro, ma non troppo; and allegro.
when it was published, originally only the first two movements were released, and this might remind some of you of a sort of french overture style. there is quite a lot of content in the fugue movement, which is a three part fugue for oboe and strings.

enjoy

Saint-Saens: Symphony No. 3 in C minor, Op. 78 "Organ" - Maestoso

the movements in this well-known symphony are not usually very well divided. this section, what many would probably call the fourth movement, is actually the second half of the second movement. the symphony was conceived in two movements but saint-saens said that it "retains the 4-movement form" of a symphony, so... yea.

this is the only orchestral work of saint-saens (that is non-soloist) besides maybe danse macabre and the carnival of animals, which gets any sunlight at all. he wrote two other symphonies and a handful of suites, but i've never heard them. other repertoire that gets played ad nauseum is the intro/rondo capriccioso for violin/orchestra, havannaise for the same ensemble, the cello concerto, and the piano concerto no. 2. oh and violin concerto no. 3. i have a composer-friend who liked to say that he thought saint-saens would probably be completely embarrassed and kind of depressed to know that his most popular legacy to the world was the carnival of the animals. the truth is he did compose a lot of silly light virtuosic music, and he was very good at it. but he gets looked down on sometimes because things that are supposed to be a little more serious still sound like playful light music (see his pc no. 2... which is awesome and fun btw).

anyway so here is his one symphony which he sort of poured his all into, and he claimed that he would never again attain what he had attained in writing it. it was written/premiered in 1886 and dedicated to liszt who died that same year. shortly thereafter he basically had his ties in france cut (via removal from the national society of music and his mother's death), so he spent the rest of his life travelling the world before dying in algeria in 1921.

what's remarkable about this symphony is, of course, the organ part (and maybe only marginally less noticeably, the piano, for which some parts require four hands). of course it's not an organ concerto, the organ is just included as part of the instruments. for this particular movement there is a low pedal of a frequency so low that is more felt than heard, and you can imagine how this might transform one's experience of the symphony if one were listening to it live.
after the gigantic organ chords that open this movement you can hear sparkling piano writing along with the theme, which is a C Major version of the theme that appears in the first movement. the theme is reaffirmed by the organ (complete with brass fanfare interjections).
right afterwards we begin a fugal section which takes us through to a more gentle theme and mood, with some lyrical string and wind writing. but then we are returned to a more militant version of the theme, with insistent tattoos of b-flat from the trumpets. the apex is put off by a brief little pastoral section with an arpeggio motif, lots of string and wind solos. but after that the march is on again; lots of chromatic muttering in the strings and brass fanfares on top build up into a towering climax which pretty much makes as much use of the organ as you'd expect.
i am a little sad that part of me, when listening to this, still feels like, man, that is so silly/sappy. after all this is the guy's magnum opus. but for me that's just what saint-saens's music sounds like a lot of the time - it's good though, because he manages to do it in ways that are still satisfying and even surprising. one other thing about this symphony in particular is it's awfully loud with the organ and everything. in fact at some points i just sort of wanted to turn it down and not listen too closely. but actually if there's one thing i actually really do like about this symphony it's that i feel it does incorporate the organ as successfully as it's possible to do, considering it produces just as much sound as the rest of the orchestra put together and then some. to the degree that it's possible, the organ is actually written as just another instrument in the orchestra, with its share of accompanying chordal stuff and random grandiose solo passages. if i were to sort of mentally concoct my own version of thus spake zarathustra after that famous opening, it would sound something like this. i was always disappointed when that big organ c chord just bottoms out without becoming anything.

ok, see you tomorrow.

Liszt: Symphonic Poem No. 5, S. 99 "Prometheus"

S stands for humphrey searle, who compiled a catalogue of liszt's compositions in 1966 - no small task, for a composer who composed almost a thousand works. but the catch of this is that the catalogue is organized typologically - the operas and choral works come first, then all the symphonic poems (13 of them, S. 95-107), works on "national themes" (organized by nation), solo piano stuff, original and transcribed... etc. 

liszt gets most of the credit for inventing the symphonic poem genre, a process about which you can read here. but for all that, only one of his symphonic poems has actually entered the standard repertoire, the completely overplayed les preludes.

the kernel of the symphonic poem, if you don't feel like clicking that link (it's kind of a long article, but if you're interested it's good reading) is that it have the scale of the first movement of a symphony but also be infused with a program. heftier than an overture, but not quite a symphonic movement. it doesn't like sonata form and generally just goes with the development of several different motifs.

liszt wrote prometheus in 1850 and revised it in 1855. it is based on the greek myth of prometheus (who you might remember, if your memory is better than mine for these names, is the guy who stole fire and gave it to the humans, punished afterwards by being chained to a rock while a hawk daily comes to rip his ever-regrowing entrails out). in the original version this work was not a symphonic poem but an overture, followed by eight choruses w/ orchestral accompaniment. afterwards the overture became a symphonic poem, and the choruses, a concert stage work.

apparently with this work liszt wanted to depict the pain and eventual triumph of prometheus, but the concert stage work fell flat, with the poem gaining a sort of life as a free-standing work. this can be taken as a sort of indicator of why the symphonic poem is a unique genre - expanded to a symphony, it would probably have suffered the same fate as the choral work. but it has too much material to be merely an overture, which was why liszt expanded it in the first place.

ok, on to the piece itself.

huuuuge bombastic ominous beginning. this is the beginning of the drama. liszt uses dark colors, lots of dissonances, and lots of stretched diminished chords, though he holds the harmonies long enough for us to comprehend that they don't sound quiiite atonal yet (though we definitely have a hard time finding a tonal center after the opening measures). we get a meandering theme in mid and lower strings, with a motif consisting of a falling semitone followed by falling minor and diminished thirds.

2:27 is where the upper strings come in with a furious play on that same motif, falling diminished chords. grinding semitones dominate the landscape, whether they are oscillating or moving up and down in extended chromatic scales. maybe this is all to demonstrate the drama and fear of having stolen from the gods.

middle section, starting at the beginning of the second video, hesitates with those diminished chords for a while before a luxurious cello melody comes in. still with uneasy murmurings from the inner voices, and an unstable tonal center, we go to a rising g-sharp major chord, expecting it to resolve to c-sharp major. instead we are led on to the next episode, a sort of scurrying f minor fugue that lets everyone join in section by section, including percussion. then liszt does something that he pretty much does in les preludes - he progresses back through all the sections he's already gone through. we get a sort of recapitulation, then a rephrase of the the fury section. at 6:00 though, we get some new material - this is the coda of the piece. in the article i cited above, the writer mentions that symphonic poems usually have extended codas that affect our perceptions/recollections of the "principle" musical material. the finale tends to become an episode in itself, much like the final movement of a symphony. that's how this coda sounds to me - the material relates back to the original themes but in a very morphed way that goes on for some time, much longer than typical classical codas.

also, if you had asked me what key this was in before the last minute or so, i probably couldn't have given you an answer. liszt wrote some of the very first "atonal" music.

Hummel: Piano Concerto No. 5 in A-flat Major - I. Allegro moderato

hummel is the perfect example of a composer whom we know was great yet have a hard time remembering anything specific about. he epitomizes the importance of historical context and what it does to our memory. sometimes i've heard my friends ask questions like, why do no tchaiks and brahmses exist today - that music is still perfectly good and nobody would mind if more of it was written. and sometimes i wish too that more things in the veins of past composers would continue to be written (ok maybe just more brahms). but the truth is if anyone tries to write this stuff now, they merely consign themselves to hummel's fate, which is to be remembered mostly as "beethoven's contemporary" who wrote music that sounded more or less entirely like early beethoven.

but of course i am not giving hummel himself enough credit: he was extremely popular when he died (1837 - almost ten years after beethoven's death). he fit in great with the culture of the times - wealthy patronage, lovely, graceful, "clementi-style" classical era music. this isn't to say that he just played it safe all the time either - just that his pioneering techniques in composition and performance (he was a well-known pianist) were presented early in his career, and by the eve of his life he found his influence had faded in the face of romanticism.
this piano concerto really sparkles. i can only find one professional recording that seems *ever* to have been made, but fortunately it is a good one. it is even harder to find program notes on this piece, which nobody seems to play. but hummel's piano concerti in general were studied by several generations of the greatest piano-composers - liszt, schumann, mendelssohn, and chopin, to name a few. he never composed a symphony.

this is an expansive movement, almost 15 minutes (to the second movement's 6). it contains so many characteristics of the classical piano concerto that they almost don't seem to be worth going through.

orchestral tutti which introduces all the themes, the first one an e-flat fanfare-like theme and the second at 1:09, a tinge of mellow minor followed by a more playful section with some light graceful notes.

notice orchestration: the strings definitely play the most prominent role, as they were wont to do in early classical music, with winds providing orchestration. (remember, for instance, in bach's orchestra, where basically the only time the very few winds play are for extended solos.)

piano enters at 2:54 with harmonically active material which propels it through the entire exposition. 5:24 is a play on the second theme which was outlined by the orchestra in the introduction.
okay, i think this concerto explains itself rather well. (also, because i can't find any information on it, your guess about all the material is definitely just as good as mine). but do take my word for it that this is a fantastic classical piano concerto.

Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition - IV. Bydlo

bydlo means cattle in polish.
ok, the last and laziest bc i'm tired...
this has always been my favorite movement of the pictures, from the first time i played the suite to the third. i like the orchestral version's depiction of the ox coming, hulking by, and disappearing down the street (apparently the piano version does not have quite that range of color or movement).
here are both arrangements, mussorgsky's original for piano solo and ravel's orchestration.

it's a pretty simple depiction of an oxcart apparently hulking down the road. but i just looked up the picture of hartmann's that is apparently associated with this terrifically impressive little musical painting, and i'm actually kind of confused,

please leave a comment if you can find the ox, or its cart...

Borodin: Prince Igor - No. 17, Polovtsian Dances

borodin seems to have been a bit of a pain to work with as a musical colleage/fellow composer (like all the mighty five except for balakirev, he was not a professional musician). it seems almost half of his stuff was either finished or orchestrated by glazunov and/or rimsky, and rimsky actually writes about the difficult night before the orchestration of polovtsian dances was due for rehearsal by the orchestra. apparently borodin had put off doing this so much that on the night before it was needed for copying/distribution, he hopped over to rimsky's house and the two of them plus anatoly liadov spent the whole night writing orchestra parts by hand.

if you know anything by borodin, it's either the very famous dance of the maidens from this little set of dances, or the nocturne from his string quartet no. 2.

ozawa/berlin.

there are several different dances, each ascribed to the different groups of people dancing. the first theme, in flute solo, with the distinctive triplets, is given in a slow 4/4 andantino, and is an introduction. it's followed by the most famous tune, at 0:58. this represents the dance of maidens. this theme plays with the a major key and its relative minor, giving a sort of modal feel. the diminished fourth in the second half of the phrase is a bit of "exotic" flavor to the melody.
at 3:10 we suddenly go into 3/4 with a more rambunctious galloping dance, which is representative of a general dance by everyone. it's actually got hints of ravel for me (or i guess it would be more accurate to say that ravel has traces of this type of festiveness and sliding chromatic scales in some of his colorful orchestral music).
5:17 goes back into duple meter, but is a brisk 6/8. this is apparently a dance of the boys, in presto. it builds to a sort of minor climax, but then all of a sudden we are back with the dance of the maidens at 6:40 or so. but then at 7:37 he decides to incorporate the theme from the dance of the boys in as well. they work well simply superimposed upon each other. then gradually the triplet rhythm takes over and we're back in the presto dance. now the tension starts building again for the second time.
now we get, in the same tempo, a running sixteenth note theme which i think that this particular recording skips the first time it's supposed to come around (which is directly after the first dance of the maidens). this is supposed to be a wild dance of men that first time, but along with a very very fast version of the introduction theme, it is now just a general dance. it leads to a rather rousing conclusion.

since this piece is part of an opera, i'll say a bit about what part of the opera these dances are supposed to represent. they occur at the bottom of act 2. prince igor has been captured by the polovtsy after his failed campaign, but since he didn't ask for mercy when he was captured, the ruler, Konchak, orders that he be treated like an honored guest, even offering him freedom on the condition that igor not wage war against them again. igor refuses, saying he can't lie, and konchak regrets that they were not born to be allies. he summons polovtsian slaves to entertain igor, and these dances are that entertainment.

the opera is, of course, about igor's escape and redemption. he returns and saves his own kingdom from destruction at the hands of a neighboring prince.
the main criticism of this opera is that it's not dramatically coherent, and borodin wrote his libretto pretty much as he composed the music. as a result they weren't able to make the music and the plotline cohere as well as they should have. and it also didn't help that he died before he finished, but this work was in progress for almost 20 years. so only pieces of it have really been enduring, this being one of them and the overture being the other.

Balakirev: Piano Concerto No. 2 in E-flat Major, Op. posth. - I. Allegro non troppo

for today's triple post due to my crazy laziness this weekend, three of the russian five (the loser on this one will be, unfortunately, mr. cui, who is so difficult to find music by that it almost seems amazing to me that we even remember that there were the russian five instead of four. maybe someday in the future i will make up for this).

balakirev is almost certainly the next least well-known after cesar cui, perhaps except among pianists. the majority of his repertoire was written for solo piano, and his career was as a mentor (to many composers that we do know rather more well, like rimsky), solo pianist, and musical intellectual. he did a lot to develop the state of musical perception in the public sphere and most of his works have a flair for the nationalistic. his primary influences were tchaikovsky, chopin, and glinka, and he was the only professional musician of the russian five, so he had to be, more or less, their PR man.

this concerto was begun in 1861, but not finished or published until after his death. the first movement was finished by 1862, but he stopped writing it. he picked it up again in 1906 and had not finished the last movement by 1910 when he died. the last movement was written mostly by his friend sergei liapunov, via sketches and directions from balakirev.

here we have what i'm pretty sure is the only recording on youtube... malcolm binns with conductor david lloyd-jones and the english northern philharmonia.


this work is written in basically sonata form. its key is said to refer to that of beethoven eroica, as well as schumann rhenish (also sounds a lot to me like the beginning of beethoven emperor). more or less all of balakirev's music was quite consciously to develop a language of nationalistic music, in a rather all-encompassing way that perhaps is better applied to him than it is for sibelius and grieg, other composers who are often just called "nationalistic." 
the first subject is a folksy motif introduced by an orchestra tutti. the piano comes in at 0:50, with a continuation of that idea, and includes lots of pianistic flourishes. somewhere along the way about 3 minutes in we get hints of themes in g-flat major. development begins at about 4:40.
in sound and development this sounds to me quite a bit like tchaikovsky pc, but dale points out that the orchestration is generally a bit less pristine than it is in tchaikovsky, and that the use of folk material as main melodies a lot more for granted.
the first video ends basically just as the recap is beginning.

it's interesting that this concerto should fall so far out of the limelight when it seems to have much of the pizazz necessary for piano concerti to succeed. give it a listen and see if you think history has been unfair to it.

Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 3 in A minor, Op. 56 - IV. Allegro vivacissimo - Allegro maestoso assai

happy birthday to mendelssohn!

for him i will gladly do my first repeat-composer entry. this is the last movement of his third symphony, also known as the "scottish" symphony (because it was supposedly inspired by a trip to scotland or some such. the second movement most closely reflects this inspiration, though he doesn't directly steal any material from folk music at all).

the symphony was conceived early - 1829 - but not finished or published until 1842.

this movement is sprightly in a minor-key way. i have read a description that says it is "warlike," but i disagree a bit; it might be a bit grim and marchlike, but i hear no battle sounds. here we've got mariss jansons and the bayerischen rundfunks sinfonieorchester (three times fast please).
the snappy dotted rhythms and catchy tune are immediately accessible and i think that basically the only other thing one needs to understand about the movement to appreciate it is to hear how this super ear-wormy theme dies down after several minutes of development, a pianissimo. this transformation begins to occur around 6:50. the dotted rhythms sink and sink, and then all of a sudden we have no idea where we are anymore, and have to cling to the solo clarinet for guidance. then, suddenly, at 8:30, the uncertainty gives way to a noble hymn that mendelssohn suggested could be sung by a men's chorus. this is a sort of transformation of the tune that opens the whole symphony, and redeems the darkness that has clouded this fairly moody symphony (moody for mendelssohn, anyway).

enjoy! might have some difficulty updating on time tomorrow, we will see.

Gershwin: Three Preludes for solo piano

1926
OK once more i am sort of copping out by doing music everyone knows (and that wikipedia does a pretty reasonable entry on). who hasn't heard these preludes?

these are great examples of early 20th century american classical music, infusing jazz and coming out with all-american favorites.
here's gershwin himself.

a very unsentimental recording. turn up the volume.
here's something different:

part 1 is based on that famous five note motif with the bluesy half step at the beginning. standard a-b-a form with lots of virtuosic jazzy octave embellishments in the return.
part 2 is the paragon of bluesy blues. notice how gershwin himself doesn't even bother to swing anything (whereas virtually everything in the very cheesy bernstein recording is swung, and he even adds his own section...) the thing to notice in this movement is the bass line/accompaniment: classic blues chords (the chromatic line moving above perfect intervals, and then in the middle a sort of walking bass).
part 3 is a highly syncopated, in your face display of virtuosity that has become known as "the spanish prelude" of the three. the exposition has a recurring melody that forms a minor half answered by a major half.

Chausson: Poème, for violin and orchestra, Op.25

welcome to month 2 of music blob 365. i totally forgot about this yesterday for some reason, i guess it was because i left the apartment at 8:30 and didn't come back until after 11. ok anyway that is material for the other blog.

chausson was born in 1855 and died in 1899 apparently as the result of a freak accident involving his bicycle and a brick wall (no joke). a trained lawyer, his heart wasn't really in the law so he composed, but never really took off, though he was a big member of the artistic community at this point, playing host to such luminaries as debussy, franck, mallarme, turgenev, and monet. it was cool how back then all the artists in paris just associated naturally with each other.
he wrote only 39 opuses, influenced by wagner, franck, and his teacher, massenet. this composition was written in 1896 during the last years of his life, a period in which he was influenced by russian literature/symbolism. this was one of only three orchestral works he published, the others being a symphony in b minor and a "poem of love and the sea," a song cycle for voice and orchestra. this piece was requested by his friend eugene ysaye.

okay frustratingly enough i actually can't get blogger's youtube search to return part 2 to either of these great recordings, so just go here for the second part of oistrakh's and here for the second part of menuhin's. there are actually plenty of wonderful recordings of this on youtube. browse at your leisure.

there is some talk of a real life tale of thwarted love which is said to have inspired this work, but it's really not programmatic at all, so i will avoid talking about it.
the work is tempo'ed "lento e misterioso," and revolves centrally around the development of several recurring themes. one, a dark and moody meditation, is played right at the beginning by the solo violin, then echoed in chorale by the orchestra.
the cadenza right at the beginning is absurdly difficult. it's one melody line with accompaniment which is quite difficult to accomplish without interrupting the continuity. oistrakh does this superbly, managing the double lines without neglecting the lengths of notes, distinguishing between quarters and eighths.
then with a series of ascending scales and trills the orchestra enters, and we sense that we are off finally. there is a flighty theme with murmuring triplet accompaniment and lots of augmented small intervals, giving us a sense of harmony that sort of slithers around. (one description of chausson's overall style is that he sort of splits the difference between debussy-style impressionism and juicy romanticism.) at 5:26 we hear for the first time a hemiola/triplet based melody which recurs many many times in both the violin and orchestra parts.
the amazing thing about this piece (and most difficult to make work, as a musician) is the way the line just keeps going. it isn't all one "phrase," but there never seems to be a great conclusion, all the way from the orchestral entrance until the big outcry of passion/ridiculously hard scale (and it doesn't really stop there either).

the subsequent passage is some technically gnarly stuff which basically sends the orchestra off on a grand reprise of the opening theme, so this is sort of like a recap. the violin enters mid-phrase, and we are guided around an altered version of the first couple minutes after the first orchestral entrance. eventually the violin settles into a dark series of ascending trills, which gives us a shadowed ending that seems as if it is about to end in e flat minor, only to turn a page and give us a major chord instead.