Alderley Edge Orchestra May 2018
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 – 1958) – English Folk Song Suite (1923), arr. Gordon Jacob (1924)
Vaughan Williams’ style has been described as combining the old-world harmonies of English folk music (of which he was a prolific collector) with the influences of his contemporaries Ravel and Debussy. From his youth in Gloucestershire, he travelled the land notating, often for the first time, whatever traditional tunes he could get his ears on. His Folk Song Suite distils nine tunes into three movements. The first, headed March: Seventeen Come Sunday, begins with a crisp, dewy account of the eponymous song before the softer Pretty Caroline. Dives and Lazarus (as used in the composer’s Five Variants thereof) follows in the lower voices, with flightily dancing wind accompaniment, before returning palindromically to the earlier tunes. The Intermezzo: My Bonny Boy is in A-B-A form, placing the dance-song Green Bushes between verses of the darkly mournful My Bonny Boy. The finale, March – Folk Songs from Somerset is more optimistic in Blow Away the Morning Dew, led by solo clarinet, before the militaristic High Germany, referencing the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714). The trio consists of Whistle, Daughter, Whistle and the heavier John Barleycorn, an homage to crops and beverages brewed from them.
Béla Bartók (1881 – 1945) – Romanian Folk Dances (1917)
Stick dance – Sash dance – In one spot – Dance from Bucsum – Romanian polka – Fast dance
In his chrolonology and fondness for collecting folksong, Bartók casts a similar silhouette to Ralph Vaughan Williams, though the great Hungarian was far less sentimental in his preservation of what he found. He eschewed “The tyranny of major and minor scales”, as he put it, and the irregular rhythms of Balkan and Carpathian dance had a profound effect on him. He was affected less positively by World War I, which saw his birth town and several other regions he loved detached from Hungary (this work’s original suffix, ‘From Romania’, was removed after the annexation of Transylvainia). The short work was originally composed for solo violin in 1915, and packs seven dances into six movements (the last is in two parts), each less than a minute long, using a variety of modal scales.
Manuel de Falla (1876 – 1946) – Danse Espagnole (from La Vida Breve, act II) (1905)
Born in Cádiz, de Falla is among the most important Spanish composers, spending his life in Madrid, Paris and Granada before post-Franco exile in Argentina. His hour-long, two-act opera La vida breve, seldom heard today, describes the forbidden love between the young gypsy, Salud, and gentleman, Paco, reluctantly engaged to another woman of his own class. Paco’s anguish over Salud comes to a head on his wedding day, and just after inadvertently revealing himself, he rejects his lover, leaving her to fall dead at his feet. An uncommonly large proportion of the score is instrumental, rather than vocal, and the lively Jota dance we hear tonight is taken from the Act II betrothal ceremonies.
Camille Saint-Saëns (1835 – 1921) – Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso in A minor, Op. 28 (1863)
The pianist and organist Saint-Saëns was a great admirer of the violin, writing three concertos, two sonatas and this concertante work for the instrument. It was written to a request from the Spanish teenage violinist Pablo de Sarasate (“the faint shadow of a moustache scarcely visible on his upper lip”), who later would receive compositions from the likes of Bruch and Dvořák. The work may originally have been destined to be a vivacious finale to Saint-Saëns’ first violin concerto, but now enjoys popularity as a brief concert piece in its own right. In the reflective Introduction the soloist’s pizzicato hints at Spanish guitar music, before a dazzlingly virtuosic Rondo gives the soloist every opportunity for fireworks.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840 – 1893) – Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64 (1888)
More comprehensive programme note here
In the ten years following the publication of Tchaikovsky’s fourth symphony, the composer reached the pinnacle of his reputation, publishing Eugene Onegin, his violin concerto, second piano concerto, Manfred symphony, Capriccio Italien and 1812 overture to great acclaim. By 1888, though, composition had become more of a struggle, commenting on having “To squeeze [the music] from my dulled brain”.
The fourth symphony had taken on the mantle of Beethoven 5 in looking fate square in the eyes and commentating on an epic, darkness-to-light struggle. Tonight’s symphony does the same. Like the fourth, it has a cyclical, recurring theme which here appears in every movement. This ‘fate’ theme was taken from his compatriot Glinka’s opera, A Life for the Tsar, where it accompanies the words “Turn not into sorrow”. It is first murmured by the clarinets, mournfully, as the first notes of the piece, and its last peroration takes the symphony through its closing pages. Though more cryptic about a programme for the fifth than he was about the fourth, he labelled this theme “A complete resignation before fate, which is the same as the inscrutable predestination of providence”.
The first movement (Andante-Allegro con anima) was marked by the composer with the words “Doubts…reproaches against xxx”, where ‘xxx’ has been interpreted as his understanding of his homosexuality. Its second theme is less guarded in its boisterous wind proclamations. The Andante is built around a ravishingly poignant horn melody, though the fate motif is never far away. The brief third movement Valse is a slightly uneasy, minor-key waltz with a skittish, unsettled trio, before the fate theme is transformed into the major key for the Finale. A period of vigorous strife and turmoil follows, though, culminating in an enormous dominant chord, with thundering timpani roll – will fate drag the coda into the dark, or will it be carried nobly back to the light?
© Rohan Shotton 2019. Programme notes may not be reproduced or edited without permission. Please contact me if you would like to use these notes.