TheAiris one of Bach’s most famous melodies, a soulful religious song for strings. It can be found as the second movement of his Suite No. 3 in D major for orchestra, but is often performed apart from the rest of the work. August Wilhelmj transcribed this music for violin and piano, calling it theAir on the G String. This transcription has been severely criticized as a mutilation of the original; Sir Donald Francis Tovey described it as a “devastating derangement.” Nevertheless, it has retained its popularity in violin literature, just as the original has remained a favorite in orchestral music.
Come Sweet Death(Komm, suesser Tod) is a moving chorale for voice and accompaniment: a simple and eloquent resignation to death. It does not come from any of Bach’s larger works but can be found in Schemelli’s collection (1736). It has become extremely popular in orchestral transcriptions by Leopold Stokowski and Reginald Stewart, but is also sometimes heard in arrangements for various solo instruments and piano, as well as for the organ.
Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring(Jesu bleibt meine Freude) is probably Bach’s best known and most frequently performed chorale: a stately melody introduced by, then set against, a gracefully flowing accompaniment. This composition comes from the church cantata No. 147,Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben. Various transcriptions have popularized this composition, notably that for piano by Myra Hess, for organ by E. Power Biggs, and for orchestra by Lucien Caillet.
ThePrelude in E majoris a vigorous and spirited piece of music whose rhythmic momentum does not relax from the first bar to the last. It appears as the first movement of the Partita No. 3 in E major for solo violin. It is perhaps even better known in transcription than in the original version, notably in those for violin and piano by Robert Schumann and Fritz Kreisler, for solo piano by Rachmaninoff, and for orchestra by Stokowski, Riccardo Pick-Mangiagalli, Sir Henry J. Wood, and Lucien Caillet.
TheSicilianois a beautiful, stately song—the first movement of the Sonata No. 4 in C minor for violin and accompaniment. Stokowski has made a fine transcription for orchestra.
The Wise Virginsis a ballet-suite comprising six compositions by Bach drawn from his literature for the church and transcribed for orchestra by the eminent British composer, Sir William Walton. It was used for a ballet produced at Sadler’s Wells in 1940. Frederick Ashton’s choreography drew its material from the parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins in the 25th chapter of the Gospel According to St. Matthew;but this parable is seen through the eyes of the Italian Renaissance painters. “Ashton,” wrote Arnold Haskell, “has provided the perfect meeting place for music and painting. The inspiration was pictorial ... it is equally musical. The movement and unfolding of the narrative follow directly from the Bach music so brilliantly arranged and orchestrated by William Walton.”
All six movements of the suite are so lyrical and emotional that their impact on listeners is immediate. The first movement, “What God Hath Done Is Rightly Done” comes from the opening chorus of a cantata of the same name, No. 99 (Was Gott tut das ist wohlgetan). A lively melody is first shared by strings and woodwind and then given fanciful embellishments. A strong chorale melody for the brass is then given prominent treatment. The second movement, “Lord, Hear My Longing” is a chorale from thePassion According to St. Matthewwhich is here given the treatment of an organ chorale-prelude with a tenderly expressive chorale melody in woodwind amplified by strings. The third movement, “See What His Love Can Do” is an expansive melody for strings and woodwind against a flowing accompaniment; this music is derived from Cantata No. 85,Ich bin ein guter Hirt. This is followed by “Ah, How Ephemeral,” a dramatic page for full orchestra highlighting a chorale for brass taken from Cantata No. 26,Ach, wie fluechtig. The fifth section is the most famous. It is “Sheep May Safely Graze” (“Schafe koennen sicher weiden”) from the secular Cantata No. 208,Was mir behagt. An introductory recitative for solo violin leads to a swaying melody for the woodwind. The lower strings then present a pastoral song which soon receives beautiful filigree work from other parts of the orchestra. The swaying subject for woodwind closes the piece. Sir John Barbirolli also made an effective orchestral transcription of this composition, while Percy Grainger arranged it for solo piano, and Mary Howe for two solo pianos. The finale of the suite is “Praise Be to God,” which is also the finale of Cantata No. 129,Gelobet sei der Herr, mein Gott. This is vigorous music that is an outpouring of pure joy.
Michael William Balfe was born in Dublin, Ireland on May 15, 1808. The son of a dancing master, Michael was only six when he played the violin for his father’s classes. In 1823, Balfe came to London where he studied the violin and composition with private teachers and earned his living as violinist and singer. Additional study took place in Italy in 1825, including singing with Bordogni. Between 1828 and 1833 he appeared as principal baritone of the Italian Opera and several other French theaters in Paris. In 1835, he initiated an even more successful career as composer of English operas, withThe Siege of Rochelle, produced that year in London. He continued writing numerous operas, producing his masterwork,The Bohemian Girl, in 1843. Between 1846 and 1856 Balfe traveled to different parts of Europe to attend performances of his operas. In 1864 he left London to retire to his estate in Rowney Abbey where he died on October 20, 1870.
The Bohemian Girlis a classic of English opera. It was first produced at Drury Lane in London on November 27, 1843, when it enjoyed a sensational success. It was soon translated into French, German and Italian and was extensively performed throughout Europe. The libretto, by Alfred Bunn, was based on a ballet-pantomime by Vernoy de Saint-Georges. The setting is Hungary in the 18th century, and its heroine is Arline, daughter of Count Arnheim who, as a girl, had been kidnapped by gypsies and raised as one of them. She is falsely accused by the Count’s men of stealing a valuable medallion from the Count’s palace and is imprisoned. Appearing before the Count to ask for clemency, she is immediately recognized by him as his daughter.
Melodious selections from this opera are frequently heard. The most famous single melody is “I Dream’d That I Dwelt in Marble Halls” which Arline sings in the first scene of the second act as she recalls a dream. “The Heart Bowed Down,” the Count’s song in the fourth scene of the second act as he gazes longingly on a picture of his long lost daughter, and “Then You’ll Remember Me,” a tenor aria from the third act are also familiar.
Hubert Bath was born in Barnstaple, England, on November 6, 1883. He attended the Royal Academy of Music in London, after which he wrote his first opera. For a year he was conductor of an opera company that toured the world. After 1915 he devoted himself mainly to composition. Besides his operas, tone poems, cantatas and various instrumental works he wrote a considerable amount of incidental music for stage plays and scores for the motion pictures. He died in Harefield, England, on April 24, 1945.
TheCornish Rhapsody, for piano and orchestra, is one of his last compositions and the most famous. He wrote it for the British motion pictureLove Story, released in 1946, starring Margaret Lockwood and Stewart Granger. Lockwood plays the part of a concert pianist, and theCornish Rhapsodyis basic to the story which involves the pianist with a man in love with another woman. The rhapsody begins with arpeggio figures which lead to a strong rhapsodic passage in full chords. A bold section is then contrasted by a gentle melody of expressive beauty, the heart of the composition. A cadenza brings on a return of the earlier strong subject, and a recall of the expressive melody in the orchestra to piano embellishments. The composition ends with massive passages and strongly accented harmonies.
Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn, Germany, on December 16, 1770. He received his earliest musical training in his native city where he early gave strong evidence of genius. He published his first works when he was eleven, and soon thereafter was performing publicly on the organ, cembalo, and the viola. He also disclosed a phenomenal gift at improvisation. He established permanent residence in Vienna in 1792. Three years later he made there his first public appearance, and from then on began to occupy a high position in Viennese musical life as a piano virtuoso. His fame as a composer soon superseded that of virtuoso as he won the support of Vienna’s aristocracy. He entered upon a new creative phase, as well as full maturity, beginning with 1800, when his first symphony was introduced in Vienna. His creative powers continually deepened and became enriched from that time on. As he restlessly sought to give poetic and dramatic expression to his writing he broke down the classical barriers so long confining music and opened up new horizons for style and structure. Meanwhile, in or about 1801 or 1802, he realized he was growing deaf, a discovery that swept him into despondency and despair, both of which find expression in a unique and remarkable document known as the Heiligenstadt Testament. Deafness led to personal idiosyncrasies and volatile moods which often tried the patience of even his closest friends, but it did not decrease the quantity of his musical production nor prevent him from achieving heights of creative expression achieved by few, if any. He died in Vienna on March 26, 1827 after having ushered in a new age for music with his symphonies, concertos, sonatas, string quartets, and masterworks in other categories including opera and choral music.
The grandeur of expression, the profundity of thought, and the independence of idiom we associate with Beethoven is not to be found in his lighter music which, generally speaking, is in a traditional mold, pleasing style, and in an inviting lyric vein. This is not the Beethoven who was the proud democrat, whose life was a struggle with destiny,and who sought to make music the expression of his profoundest concepts. This is rather, another Beethoven: the one who liked to dance, though he did it badly; who flirted with the girls; and who indulged in what he himself described as “unbuttoned humor.”
Beethoven wrote twelveContredanses(Contretaenze) in 1801-1802. These are not “country dances” as the term “contretaenze” is sometimes erroneously translated. The Contredanse is the predecessor of the waltz. Like the waltz it is in three-part form, the third part repeating the first, while the middle section is usually a trio in contrasting mood. In 1801-1802, when Beethoven wrote hisContredanses, he was already beginning to probe deeply into poetic thought and emotion in his symphonies, sonatas, and concertos. But in theContredansesthe poet becomes peasant. This is earthy music, overflowing with melodies of folksong vigor, and vitalized by infectious peasant rhythms. TheContredanseNo. 7 in E-flat major is particularly famous; this same melody was used by the composer for his music to the balletPrometheus, for the finale of hisEroica Symphony, and for his Piano Variations, op. 35. The key signatures of the twelveContredansesare: C major, A major, D major, B-flat major, E-flat major, C major, E-flat major, C major, A major, C major, G major and E-flat major.
A half dozen years before he wrote hisContredansesBeethoven had completed a set of twelveGerman Dances(Deutsche Taenze). The form, style, and spirit of theGerman Danceis so similar to theContredansethat many Austrian composers used the terms interchangeably. Beethoven’s earlyGerman Dances, like the laterContredanses, are a reservoir of lively and tuneful semi-classical music with an engaging earthy quality to the melodies and a lusty vitality to the rhythms.
Few Beethoven compositions have enjoyed such universal approval with budding pianists, salon orchestras, and various popular ensembles as theMinuet in G. It is not too far afield to maintain that this is one of the most famous minuets in all musical literature. Beethoven wrote it originally for the piano; it is the second of a set of six minuets, written in 1795, but published as op. 167. It is even more celebrated in its many different transcriptions than it is in the original. The composition is in three-part form. The first and third parts consist of a stately classical melody; midway comes a fast-moving trio of contrasting spirit.
The first movement of theMoonlight Sonatais also often heard in varied transcriptions for salon or “pop” orchestras. TheMoonlight Sonatais the popular name of the piano sonata in C-sharp minor, op. 27, no. 2 which Beethoven wrote in 1801 and which he designated asSonata quasi una fantasiamainly because of the fantasia character of this first movement. The poetic and sensitive mood maintained throughout the first movement—with a romantic melody of ineffable sadness accompanied by slow triplets—is the reason why the critic Rellstab (andnotthe composer) provided the entire sonata with the name of “Moonlight.” To Rellstab this first movement evoked for him a picture of Lake Lucerne in Switzerland at night time, gently touched by the moonlight. The fact that Beethoven dedicated the sonata to Countess Giulietta Guicciardi, with whom he was then in love, leads to a legend that he wrote this music to express frustrated love, but this was not the case. Another myth about this first movement is that Beethoven improvised this music while playing for a blind boy, as moonlight streamed into the window of his room; after he had finished playing he identified himself to the awe-stricken youngster. It was the opinion of the eminent critic, Henry E. Krehbiel, that the sonata was inspired by a poem,Die Beterinby Seume, describing a young girl kneeling at an altar begging for her father’s recovery from a serious illness; angels descend to comfort her and she becomes transfigured by a divine light.
Beethoven wrote twoRomancesfor violin and orchestra: in F major, op. 50 (1802) and G major, op. 40 (1803). Rarely do we encounter in Beethoven’s works such a fresh, spontaneous and entirely unsophisticated outpouring of song—a song that wears its beauty on the surface—as in these two compositions. The twoRomancesare companion pieces and pursue a similar pattern. Each opens with the solo violin presenting the main melody (in the F major accompanied by the orchestra, in the G major, solo). Each then progresses to a pure outpouring of lyricism followed by virtuoso passages for the solo instrument. In each, violin and orchestra appear to be engaging in a gentle dialogue.
TheTurkish March(Marcia alla turca) is one of several numbers (the fourth) comprising the incidental music to a play by Kotzebue,The Ruins of Athens(Die Ruinen von Athen), op. 113 (1811). The production of this play with Beethoven’s music was intended for the opening of a theater in Pesth on February 9, 1812. TheTurkish Marchis in the pseudo-Turkish melodic style popular in Vienna in the early 19th century, and it employs percussion instruments such as the triangle which the Viennese then associated with Turkish music. The march, with its quixotic little melody, begins softly, almost like march music heard from a distance. It grows in sonority until a stirring climax is achieved. Then it dies out gradually and ebbs away in the distance. Leopold Auer made a famous transcription for violin and piano, whileBeethoven himself transcribed it for piano, with six variations, op. 76 (1809).
Vincenzo Bellini was born in Catania, Sicily, on November 3, 1801. Born to a musical family, he received music instruction in childhood, and while still very young started composing. He then attended the San Sebastiano Conservatory in Naples; during his stay there he completed a symphony, two masses, and a cantata among other works. He made his bow as opera composer withAdelson e Salvini, introduced at the Conservatory in 1825. He continued writing operas after that, and having them produced in major Italian opera houses with varying degrees of success.I Capuleti e i Montecchi, given in Venice in 1830, was a triumph. Then came the two operas by which Bellini is today most often represented in the repertory:La SonnambulaandNorma, both produced in 1831. In 1833 he came to Paris where he completed his last opera,I Puritani, given in Paris in 1835. He was at the height of his fame and creative powers when he died in Puteaux, near Paris, on September 23, 1835, at the age of thirty-four, a victim of intestinal fever.
Bellini was the genius of opera song. His fresh, pure lyricism—perfect in design and elegant in style—elevates his greatest operas to a place of significance. His masterwork isNorma, introduced at La Scala in Milan on December 26, 1831, where it was at first a failure. The libretto by Felice Romani was based on a tragedy by L. A. Soumet. In Gaul, during the Roman occupation, in or about 50 B.C., Norma, high priestess of the Druids, violates her vows by secretly marrying the Roman proconsul, Pollione, and bearing him two sons. Pollione then falls in love with Adalgisa, virgin of the Temple of Esus. Unaware that Pollione is married, Adalgisa confides to Norma she is in love with him.With Pollione’s infidelity now apparent, he is brought before Norma for judgment. She offers him the choice of death or the renunciation of Adalgisa. When Pollione accepts death, Norma confesses to her people that, having desecrated her vows, she, too, must die. Moved by this confession, Pollione volunteers to die at her side in the funeral pyre.
The overture is famous. Loud dramatic chords in full orchestra are succeeded by a softlentopassage. A strong melody is then presented by flutes and violins against an incisive rhythm. There follows a graceful, sprightly and strongly accented tune in the strings. Both melodies are then amplified, dramatized, and repeated; particular emphasis is placed on the delicate, accented tune. The overture then proceeds to an energetic conclusion.
One vocal episode fromNormais also extremely popular and is often heard in orchestral transcriptions. It is Norma’s aria, “Casta diva,” surely one of the noblest soprano arias in all Italian operatic literature. It comes in the first act and represents Norma’s prayer for peace, and her grief that the hatred of her people for the Roman invaders must also result in their hatred for her husband, Pollione, the Roman proconsul.
Ralph Benatzky was born in Moravské-Budejovice, Bohemia, on June 5, 1884. He acquired his musical training in Prague and with Felix Mottl in Munich, after which he devoted himself to light music by composing operettas. While residing at different periods in Vienna, Berlin, and Switzerland, he wrote the scores for over ninety operettas and 250 motion pictures, besides producing about five thousand songs. His most successful operettas wereThe Laughing Triple Alliance,My Sister and I,Love in the Snow,Axel at the Gates of Heaven, andThe White Horse Inn. He came to live in the UnitedStates in 1940, but after World War II returned to Europe. He died in Zurich on October 17, 1957.
The White Horse Inn(Im weissen Roess’l) is not only Benatzky’s most celebrated operetta, but also one of the most successful produced in Europe between the two world wars, and possibly the last of the great European operettas. It was first performed in Berlin in 1930, after which it enjoyed over a thousand performances in Europe. Its première in America in 1936 (the book was adapted by David Freedman, lyrics were by Irving Caesar, William Gaxton and Kitty Carlisle starred) was only a moderate success. The operetta book of the original—freely adapted by Erik Charell and Hans Mueller, from a play by Blumenthal and Kadelburg—is set in the delightful resort of St. Wolfgang on Wolfgangsee in Austria, in the era just before World War I. Leopold, headwaiter ofThe White Horse Inn, is in love with its owner, Frau Josepha, who favors the lawyer, Siedler. In a fit of temper she fires Leopold, but upon learning that Emperor Franz Josef is about to pay the inn a visit, she prevails upon him to stay on. Leopold makes a welcoming speech to the Emperor, during which his bitter resentment against Frau Josepha gets the upper hand. Later on, when Frau Josepha confides to the Emperor that she is in love with Siedler, he urges her to consider Leopold for a husband. Leopold then comes to Josepha with a letter of resignation, which she accepts, but only because she is now ready to give him a new position, as her husband.
Selections from this tuneful operetta include the main love song, “Es muss ein wunderbares sein,” the ditty “Zuschau’n kann ich nicht,” and the lively waltz, “Im weissen Roess’l am Wolfgangsee.”
It is mainly the worldwide popularity of this operetta (even more than the natural beauty of Wolfgangsee) that brings tourists each year to the White Horse Inn at St. Wolfgang, for a sight of the operetta’s setting, and to partake of refreshments on the attractive veranda overlooking Wolfgangsee. The inn is now generously decorated with pictures in which the two main songs of the operetta are quoted, supplemented by a portrait of Benatzky. Souvenir ashtrays also carry musical quotations from the operetta.
Arthur Benjamin was born in Sydney, Australia, on September 18, 1893. His music study took place at the Royal College of Music in London. After serving in World War I, he became professor at the Sydney Conservatory, and in 1926 he assumed a similar post with the Royal College of Music in London. Meanwhile in 1924 he received the Carnegie Award for hisPastoral Fantasia, and in 1932 his first opera,The Devil Take Her, was produced in London. For five years, beginning with 1941, he was the conductor of the Vancouver Symphony. He has written notable concertos, a symphony, and other orchestral music, together with chamber works and several operas includingA Tale of Two Citieswhich won the Festival of Britain Prize following its première in 1953. He also wrote a harmonica concerto for Larry Adler. Though many of his compositions are in an advanced style and technique, Benjamin was perhaps best known for his lighter pieces, particularly those in a popular South American idiom. He died in London on April 10, 1960.
TheCotillon(1939) is a suite of English dances derived from a medley entitledThe Dancing School, published in London in 1719. Presented by Benjamin in contemporary harmonic and instrumental dress, these tunes—popular in England in the early 18th century—still retain their appeal. A short introduction, built from a basic motive from the first dance, leads to the following episodes with descriptive titles: “Lord Hereford’s Delight” for full orchestra; “Daphne’s Delight” for woodwind and strings; “Marlborough’s Victory,” for full orchestra; “Love’s Triumph” for strings; “Jig It A Foot” for full orchestra; “The Charmer” for small orchestra; “Nymph Divine” for small orchestra and harp solo; “The Tattler” for full orchestra; and “Argyll” for full orchestra. A figure from the final tune is given extended treatment in the coda.
Benjamin’s best known piece of music is theJamaican Rumba(1942). This is the second number ofTwo Jamaican Piecesfor orchestra. A light staccato accompaniment in rumba rhythm courses nimbly throughthe piece as the woodwinds present a saucy melody, and the strings a countersubject. Consecutive fifths in the harmony, a xylophone in the orchestration, and the changing meters created by novel arrangement of notes in each measure, provide particular interest. TheJamaican Rumbahas been transcribed for various solo instruments and piano as well as for piano trio.
TheNorth American Square Dances, for two pianos and orchestra (1955), is a delightful treatment of American folk idioms. The work comprises eight fiddle tunes played at old-time square dances. The native flavor is enhanced in the music by suggestions and simulations of feet-stamping, voice calling, and the plunking of a banjo. In the Introduction there appear fragments of the first dance; these same fragments return in the coda. There are eight sections: Introduction and “Heller’s Reel”; “The Old Plunk”; “The Bundle Straw”; “He Piped So Sweet”; “Fill the Bowl”; “Pigeon on the Pier”; “Calder Fair”; and “Salamanca” and “Coda.” The fourth and seventh dances are in slow tempo, while all others are fast.
Robert Russell Bennett was born in Kansas City, Missouri, on June 15, 1894. He began his music study in Kansas City: piano with his mother; violin and several other instruments with his father; and harmony with Carl Busch. While still a boy he wrote and had published several compositions. He came to New York in 1916, worked for a while as copyist at G. Schirmer, then during World War I served for a year in the United States Army. After the war he spent several years in Paris studying composition with Nadia Boulanger; during this period he was twice the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 1926-1927 he received honorable mention for his first symphony, in a contest sponsored byMusical America; in 1930 he received two awardsfrom RCA Victor, one forSights and Sounds, an orchestral tone poem, the other for his first successful and widely performed work, the symphonyAbraham Lincoln. Since then Bennett has worked fruitfully in three distinct areas. As a composer of serious works he has produced several operas (includingMaria Malibran), symphonies and other significant orchestral compositions. As an orchestrator for the Broadway theater, he has been involved with some of the foremost stage productions of our times including musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Lerner and Loewe, and many others. He has also written compositions of a more popular nature, compositions which, while fully exploiting the resources of serious music, are nevertheless filled with popular or jazz materials. Among the last are his effective symphonic adaptations of music from George Gershwin’sPorgy and Bess;Oklahoma!andSouth Pacificof Rodgers and Hammerstein; andKiss Me Kateof Cole Porter. In each instance, the main melodies are brilliantly orchestrated and skilfully combined into an integrated synthesis so that each becomes a coherent musical composition.
TheMarch, for two pianos and orchestra, (1930) makes delightful use of jazz melodies and rhythms. There are here four connected movements, each in march time. The first movement, in a vigorous style, leaps from one brief motive to another without any attempt at development. In the second, a sustained melody, first for solo oboe and later for the piano with full orchestra, is placed against a shifting rhythm. The third is a serious recitative culminating in an episode in which the classic funeral march is given sophisticated treatment. The fourth movement begins with amarche mignonneand concludes with a forceful, at times overpowering, statement of the funeral-march theme of the third movement.
While theSymphony in D(1941) is scored for symphony orchestra and has been played by many leading American orchestras, it is music with its tongue in the cheek, and is consistently light and humorous. This symphony was written to honor the Brooklyn Dodger baseball team (that is, when they were still in Brooklyn)—ironically enough an ode to a colorful team by a composer who has been a lifelong rooter of its most bitter rival, the New York Giants (once again, when they were still at the Polo Grounds). There are four brief movements. The first, subtitled “Brooklyn Wins,” “means to picture the ecstatic joy of the town after the home team wins a game,” as the composer has explained. This is followed by a slow (Andante lamentoso) movement, appropriatelydesignated as “Brooklyn Loses”—music filled with “gloom and tears, and even fury.” The third movement, a scherzo, is a portrait of the club’s then (1941) president, Larry MacPhail, and his pursuit of a star pitcher. “We hear the horns’ bay call—then we hear him in Cleveland, Ohio, trying to trade for the great pitcher, Bob Feller. He offers Prospect Park and the Brooklyn Bridge as an even trade, but the Cleveland management says ‘No’ in the form of a big E-flat minor chord. After repeated attempts we hear the hunting horns again, as he resumes the hunt in other fields.” The finale is a choral movement, and like that of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, an ode to joy. “It is purely fictitious, this text, but it speaks for itself. The subtitle of this finale is ‘The Giants Come to Town.’”
Bennett has written two delightful orchestral compositions derived from the songs of Jerome Kern. One isSymphonic Study, a synthesis of some of Kern’s best-loved melodies, andVariations on a Theme by Jerome Kern. Both of these compositions are discussed in the section on Kern. Bennett’s symphonic treatment of George Gershwin’sPorgy and Bess, entitledSymphonic Picture, is commented upon in the Gershwin section, specifically withPorgy and Bess; Bennett’s symphonic treatment of the music of Cole Porter’sKiss Me Kate, and ofOklahoma!andSouth Pacificis spoken of in the sections devoted to Cole Porter and Richard Rodgers, respectively. Bennett has also orchestrated, and adapted into a symphonic suite, the music from Richard Rodgers’Victory at Sea, described in the Richard Rodgers section.
Hector Berlioz was born in Côte-Saint-André, France on December 11, 1803. As a young man he was sent to Paris to study medicine, but music occupied his interests and he soon abandoned his medical studies to enter the Paris Conservatory. Impatient with the academicrestrictions imposed upon him there, he left the Conservatory to begin his career as a composer. From the very beginning he set out to open new horizons for musical expression and to extend the periphery of musical structure. His first masterwork was theSymphonie fantastique, inspired by his love for the Shakespearean actress, Harriet Smithson. It was introduced in Paris in 1830, a year in which Berlioz also won the Prix de Rome. In his later works, Berlioz became one of music’s earliest Romantics. He was a bold innovator in breaking down classical restraint; he helped extend the dramatic expressiveness of music; he was a pioneer in the writing of program music and in enriching the language of harmony, rhythm, and orchestration. Among his major works are theRequiem,Harold in Italyfor viola solo and orchestra, theRoman Carnival Overture, the dramatic symphonyRomeo and Juliet, andThe Damnation of Faust. Berlioz married Harriet Smithson in 1833. It proved to be a tempestuous affair from the outset, finally ending by mutual consent in permanent separation. From 1852 until his death Berlioz was a librarian of the Paris Conservatory. He was active throughout Europe as a conductor and was a trenchant writer on musical subjects; among his books is a volume ofMemoirs. He died in Paris on March 8, 1869.
The compositions by which Berlioz is most often heard on semi-classical programs are three excerpts fromThe Damnation of Faust: “The Dance of the Sylphs” (“Danse des sylphes”); “The Minuet of the Will-o’-the-Wisps” (“Menuet des feux-follets”), and “Rakóczy March” (“Marche hongroise”).
The Damnation of Faust, op. 24, described by the composer as a “dramatic legend,” took many years for realization. It was based on a French translation of Goethe’sFaust, published in 1827. A year later, Berlioz completed a musical setting of eight scenes as part of an ambitious project to prepare a huge cantata based on the Faust legend. He did not complete this project until eighteen years after that. Upon returning to it, he revised his earlier material, and wrote a considerable amount of new music. This work was first performed in oratorio style in Paris on December 6, 1846 and was a fiasco. It was given a stage presentation in Monte Carlo in 1903. Since then it has been performed both in concert version and as an opera.
“The Dance of the Sylphs” is graceful waltz music, its main melody assigned to the violins. It appears in the second part of the “legend.” Faust is lulled to sleep by sylphs who appear in his dream in a delicate dance which brings up for him the image of his beloved Marguerite.“Minuet of the Will-o’-the-Wisps” comes in the third part of the legend. Mephisto summons the spirits and the will-of-the-wisps to encircle Marguerite’s house. The dance tune is heard in woodwind and brass. After the trio section, the minuet melody is repeated twice, the second time interrupted by chords after each phrase. The “Rakóczy March” is based on an 18th-century Hungarian melody. It is logically interpolated into the Faust legend by the expedience of having Faust wander about in Hungary. A fanfare for the brass leads to the first and main melody, a brisk march subject begun quietly in the woodwind. It gains in force until it is exultantly proclaimed by full orchestra. A countersubject is then heard in strings. After the march melody returns, it again gains in volume until it is built up into an overpowering climax.
Leonard Bernstein was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, on August 25, 1918. Early music study took place with private piano teachers, and subsequently with Helen Coates and Heinrich Gebhard. He was graduated from Harvard in 1939 after which he attended the Curtis Institute of Music (a pupil of Fritz Reiner in conducting) and three summer sessions of the Berkshire Music Center as a student and protégé of Serge Koussevitzky. He made a sensational debut as conductor with the New York Philharmonic in 1943, appearing as a last-minute substitute for Bruno Walter who had fallen ill. Since that time he has risen to the front rank of contemporary symphony conductors, having led most of the world’s leading organizations, and being appointed music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1958. As a serious composer he first attracted attention with theJeremiah Symphonyin 1944, which was performed by most of America’s leading orchestras, was recorded, and received the New York City Music Critics Award. He subsequently wrote other major works for orchestra as well as the scores to successful ballets, an opera, and several Broadway musicalcomedies that were box-office triumphs; the last of these includedOn the Town(1944),Wonderful Town(1953) andWest Side Story(1957). Bernstein has also distinguished himself as a musical commentator and analyst over television, concert pianist, and author.
Whether writing in a serious or popular vein Bernstein consistently reveals himself to be a master of his technical resources, endowed with a fine creative imagination, a strong lyric and rhythmic gift, and a restless intelligence that is ever on the search for new and fresh approaches in his writing. High on the list of favorites in the semi-classical repertory are the orchestral suites he adapted from his two popular and successful ballets.
Facsimile, choreography by Jerome Robbins, was introduced in New York in 1946. The ballet scenario revolves around three lonely people—a woman and two men—who find only frustration and disenchantment after trying to find satisfactory personal relationships. The orchestral suite from this vivacious score, vitalized with the use of popular melodies and dance rhythms, is made up of four parts. I. “Solo.” The principal musical material here is found in a solo flute. This is a description of a woman standing alone in an open place. II. “Pas de Deux.” Woman meets man, and a flirtation ensues to the tune of a waltz. The scene achieves a passionate climax, and is followed by a sentimental episode, romanticized in the music by a subject for muted strings and two solo violins and solo viola. The love interest dies; the pair become bored, then hostile. III. “Pas de trois.” The second man enters. This episode is a scherzo with extended piano solo passages. A triangle ensues between the two men and one woman, there is some sophisticated interplay among them, and finally there ensue bitter words and misunderstandings. IV. “Coda.” The two men take their departure, not without considerable embarrassment.
Fancy Freewas Bernstein’s first ballet, and it is still his most popular one; he completed his score in 1944 and it was introduced by the Ballet Theater (which had commissioned it) on April 18 of that year. It was a success of major proportions, received numerous performances, then became a staple in the American dance repertory. It is, wrote George Amberg, “the first substantial ballet entirely created in the contemporary American idiom, a striking and beautifully convincing example of genuine American style.” The scenario, by Jerome Robbins, concerned the quest of girl companionship on the part of three sailors on temporary shore leave. Bernstein’s music, though sophisticated in its harmonic and instrumental vocabulary, is filled with racy jazz rhythmsand idioms and with melodies cast in a popular mold. The orchestral suite is made up of five parts: “Dance of the Three Sailors”; “Scene at the Bar”; “Pas de deux”; “Pantomime”; “Three Variations” (Galop, Waltz, Danzon) and Finale.
When this Suite was first performed, in Pittsburgh in 1945, with Bernstein conducting, the composer provided the following description of what takes place in the music. “From the moment the action begins, with the sound of a juke box wailing behind the curtain, the ballet is strictly Young America of 1944. The curtain rises on a street corner with a lamppost, side street bar, and New York skyscrapers tricked out with a crazy pattern of lights, making a dizzying background. Three sailors explode onto the stage; they are on shore leave in the city and on the prowl for girls. The tale of how they meet first one girl, then a second, and how they fight over them, lose them, and in the end take off after still a third, is the story of the ballet.”
Fancy Freewas expanded into a musical-comedy by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, for which Bernstein wrote his Broadway score. CalledOn the Townit started a one-year Broadway run on December 28, 1944, and subsequently was twice revived in off-Broadway productions, and was made into an outstanding screen musical.
Georges Bizet was born in Paris on October 25, 1838. Revealing a pronounced gift for music in early childhood he was entered into the Paris Conservatory when he was only nine. There—as a pupil of Marmontel, Halévy, and Benoist—he won numerous prizes, including the Prix de Rome in 1857. In that year he also had his first stage work produced, a one-act opera,Le Docteur miracle. After his return from Rome to Paris he started to write operas.Les Pêcheurs de perles(Pearl Fishers) andLa jolie fille de Perthwere produced in Paris in 1863 and 1867 respectively. Success came in 1872 with his first Suite from the incidental music to Daudet’sL’Arlésienne. After that came hismasterwork, the opera by which he has earned immortality:Carmen, introduced in Paris two months before his death. Bizet died in Bougival, France, on June 3, 1875.
His gift for rich, well-sounding melodies, and his feeling for inviting harmonies and tasteful orchestration make many of his compositions ideal for programs of light music, even salient portions ofCarmen.
Agnus Deiis a vocal adaptation (to a liturgical Latin text) of the intermezzo from Bizet’s incidental music toL’Arlésienne. It is also found as the second movement of theL’Arlésienne Suite No. 2. A dramatic dialogue between forceful strings and serene woodwinds leads into a spiritual religious song.
TheArlésienne Suite No. 1is made up of parts from the incidental music, which Bizet wrote for the Provençal drama of Alphonse Daudet,The Woman of Arles(L’Arlésienne). The play, with Bizet’s music consisting of twenty-seven pieces, was given at the Théâtre du Vaudeville in Paris in 1872. Out of this score the composer selected four excerpts and assembled them into an orchestral suite, which has become his most celebrated instrumental composition, and his first success as a composer. A knowledge of the plot and characters of the Daudet play is by no means essential to a full appreciation of Bizet’s tuneful suite.
The first movement, “Prelude,” begins with a march melody based on an old French Christmas song. This is subjected to a series of variations. After the march tune has been repeated vigorously by the full orchestra there appears a pastoral interlude, scored originally for saxophones, but now usually heard in clarinets. This, in turn, is succeeded by a passionate song for strings, with brass and woodwind accompaniment. The second movement is a “Minuet,” whose principal theme is a brisk and strongly accented subject. In the trio section, the clarinet appears with a flowing lyrical episode. As the violins take this material over they become rapturous; the harp and woodwind provide intriguing accompanying figures. A brief “Adagietto” comes as the third movement. This is a sensitive romance for muted strings. In the finale, “Carillon,” we get a picture of a peasant celebration of the Feast of St. Eloi. The horns simulate a three-note chime of bells which accompanies a lively dance tune, first in strings, then in other sections of the orchestra. A soft interlude is interposed by the woodwind. Then the lively dance reappears, once again to be accompanied by vigorous tolling bells simulated by the horns.
There exists a second suite made up of four more numbers from the incidental music toL’Arlésienne. This was prepared after Bizet’s deathby his friend, Ernest Guiraud. This second suite is rarely played, but its second movement, “Intermezzo,” is celebrated in its liturgical version as “Agnus Dei” (which seeabove). The other movements are Pastorale, Minuet and Farandole.
If the name of Bizet has survived in musical history and will continue to do so for a long time to come, it is surely because of a single masterwork—his operaCarmen. This stirring music drama—based on the famous novel of Prosper Mérimée, adapted for Bizet by Meilhac and Halévy—never fails in its emotional and dramatic impact. Carmen is the seductive gypsy girl who enmeshes two lovers: the bull fighter Escamillo, and the sergeant, Don José. Both she and Don José meet a tragic end on the day of Escamillo’s triumph in the bull ring. The background to this fatal story of love and death is provided by the Spanish city of Seville—its streets, bull ring, taverns, and nearby mountain retreat of smugglers.
Carmenwas introduced at the Opéra-Comique on March 3, 1875. Legend would have us believe it was a fiasco, and further that heartbreak over this failure brought about Bizet’s premature death two months after the opera was first heard. As a matter of historic truth, while there were some critics at that first performance who considered the text too stark and realistic for their tastes,Carmendid very well, indeed. By June 18th it enjoyed thirty-seven performances. At the start of the new season of the Opéra-Comique it returned to the repertory to receive its fiftieth presentation by February 15, 1876. It was hailed in Vienna in 1875, Brussels in 1876, and London and New York in 1878. Many critics everywhere were as enthusiastic as the general public, and with good reason. For all the vivid color of Spanish life and backgrounds, and all the flaming passions aroused by the sensual Carmen, were caught in Bizet’s luminous, dramatic score.
The Prelude toCarmenrepresents a kind of resumé of what takes place in the opera, and with some of its musical material. It opens with lively music for full orchestra describing the festive preparations in Seville just before a bull fight. After a sudden change of key, and several chords, the popular second-act song of Escamillo, the bullfighter, is first given quietly in strings, then repeated more loudly. Then there is heard an ominous passage against quivering strings which, in the opera, suggests the fatal fascination exerted by Carmen on men. This is repeated in a higher register and somewhat amplified until a dramatic chord for full orchestra brings this episode, and the overture itself, to a conclusion.