Day 206
25 July 2017: Casella – Symphony No. 2 (1909)
Today happens to be the 134th anniversary of Alfredo Casella’s birth, so
it is apposite that I should give his second symphony an airing. Actually, it's
questionable whether Casella considered this his second symphony. He wrote it
in the same year as he conducted the premiere of his first, and as you might
recall when I featured that a few months ago (see Day 102), Casella pretty much
disavowed it immediately, to the extent that he used a re-scored version of the
slow movement in this piece. The implication seems quite clear that he did not
intend the earlier work to be heard again.
While the first symphony is by no means a bad composition, it is clearly
substantially inferior to this. The dark tone is set right from the off with a
funereal theme set against a tolling bell, and while the scherzo provides
relative light relief, the overall mood of the work for the most part is sombre. The beautiful slow movement that Casella thought so much
of that he played it again, Sam, is of course just as beautiful second time
around, but benefits from this more opulent scoring. Oddly, the march-like
finale is not actually the final movement, being superseded by six-minute Epilogo. It is this that elevates Symphony No. 2 to greatness. Starting
quietly, its soaring string line builds through a long crescendo to a
magnificent climax featuring full orchestra, organ and bells. As for its
undoubted neglect, well, as mentioned when discussing his first symphony,
Casella was persona non grata for a while in his homeland for his support of
Mussolini during the last war. Even so, it beggars belief that this symphony
was first recorded just eight years ago, exactly 100 years after it was
written. Casella's rehabilitation is under way, but has quite a way to go
still.
Day 207
26 July 2017: Tchaikovsky – Symphony No. 4 (1878)
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's six numbered symphonies can, more or less, be
split down the middle. The first three are comparatively lightweight, and
less-frequently performed, while numbers four to six are giants of the
symphonic repertoire and can be heard regularly in concert halls all over the
world. While unquestionably great works, there was a time when I rather tired
of them. In my student days, my now wife and I were regulars at the
subscription concert series at Victoria Hall, Hanley, and it felt like every
second programme featured Tchaikovsky 4 or 5. Listening today felt like
reacquainting myself with an old friend, albeit one I'd been giving a wide
berth to for the last twenty years.
The symphony is bookended by the famous 'Fate' fanfare, and as symphonic
openings go, it really is right out of the top drawer. Parallels are often
drawn with the similarly arresting opening of Beethoven's fifth, and this was
something the composer was complicit in having written of his incorporation of the
Beethoven in this symphony's programme. The delicate Andantino features one of
Tchaikovsky's most plaintive melodies, while the extraordinary third movement
Scherzo features the strings playing pizzicato
throughout, no doubt chafing the finger skins of many a fiddle player down the
years. The finale rattles along at a furious pace until just past its halfway
point when, in a genuine masterstroke, the opening 'Fate' fanfare crashes back
in. From the barren aftermath it leaves, the music recovers its impetus with
the return of the movement's first theme and ploughs headlong towards its
crowd-pleasing conclusion. Vintage Tchaikovsky.
Day 208
27 July 2017: Sullivan – Symphony in E, 'Irish' (1866)
Confession time: I cannot stand Gilbert & Sullivan. I don't use
those words lightly, because to tell the truth there's not much music I do
genuinely dislike. Maybe the really whiniest forms of Country music, and pretty
much all hip hop, but apart from that I've got a high tolerance level. G&S
though ... urgh. Don't ask me to explain why, it's clearly just a personal
thing given how enduringly popular they are with amateur operatic societies to
this day. To use what I promise will be the only Morrissey quote I'll deploy
this year, it says nothing to me about my life.
Thankfully, this bears no relation to any of his ghastly operettas. That
may be because there was no input from his partner-in-crime, WS Gilbert, whom
he had yet to meet, but in reality this was written before he had developed a
style of his own. Sullivan was only 21 when he started work on this, and being
a youthful work, the influences (Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schumann) are still
pretty easily detected. As for the 'Irish' nickname, it indicates nothing more than that the first movement was conceived while Sullivan was holidaying in Ireland. Whatever its merits and demerits, the fact is that this
is symphony written by an Englishman in the 1860s, and there aren't many of
those around. It pre-dates Stanford's first symphony by ten years and Parry's
by sixteen. And while it's never likely to be much more than a curiosity in the
grand scheme of English music history, there is plenty to like about this work
... not least that there isn't a patter song in sight.
Day 209
28 July 2017: Khachaturian – Symphony No. 2, "The Bell" (1944)
At around about the time that Shostakovich was writing his own
devastating depiction of war-torn Russia, the Symphony No. 8 (see Day 158),
Aram Khachaturian composed this 'requiem of wrath' in response to the same
events. Like Shostakovich, however, they were not events he was experiencing
first-hand as they spent most of the war safely hidden away in a composers'
retreat 150 miles east of Moscow. Nevertheless, the incalculable losses
suffered by the Soviet Union during World War II were deeply felt across the
whole country and inevitably permeated the music of the time.
As a rule, Khachaturian doesn't really do subtlety and this work batters
its point home in no uncertain terms. At around 50 minutes in length, it can be
quite an arduous listen, but given the time and place it was written, it was
hardly going to be a musical tea party. The symphony takes its title from the
bell motif that opens the work in almost murderous fashion, and straight from the off it's
clear this is going to be a bumpy ride. It's not all blood and guts though, as
there are many moments of often sparsely scored music of a desolate nature. The
third movement is the core of the piece – an austere funeral march based on an
Armenian folk tune Vorskan akhper,
and one in which Khachaturian expressly set out to portray the 'superhuman
suffering' of his compatriots. Harsh brass prefaces the final movement, which
picks up the aural assault where it had left off. There is a brief moment of
calm towards the end but it soon builds again to a terrifying denouement. If nothing else, this
work can be held up to prove that there is a lot more to Khachaturian
than his popular ballet scores.
Day 210
29 July 2017: Sammartini – Sinfonia in A major, J-C 63 (c. 1760)
While Haydn is often referred to as 'The Father of the Symphony', it is
probably fairer to say that he popularised a form that was developed elsewhere.
Of the many composers who might lay claim to creating the genre, Giovanni
Battista Sammartini is indisputably one of the founding fathers of the symphony
as we know it. Sammartini wrote about 80 Sinfonias, and the "J-C"
cataloguing system bears no relation to the order in which they were composed.
Consequently, the c.1760 date I've given this particular one is very 'circa' as
it could have been written any time between 1759 and 1775. This is one of his
later symphonies, with some of the earlier ones dating back to the 1730s, the
decade in which Haydn was born.
I could have chosen any one of those 80-or-so symphonies, but this is a
perfectly representative choice. It differs from the later style typical of
Haydn, Mozart et al in that it has three movements. They follow the
fast-slow-fast pattern typical of the Italian opera overture, from which the
Sinfonia spawned. The influence Sammartini had on the Classical period
composers is clearly discernible here, with its ostensibly rhythmic themes
based around the notes of the triad. The light elegance one associates with
Haydn's slow movements again has its roots in this music, although the triple time
final movement is closer in style to the third movement minuets of the
Classical period. This does lead to a slight feeling of incompleteness, as if
there should be a presto finale to finish. That said, this is delightful music
of great historical importance.
Day 211
30 July 2017: Magnard – Symphony No. 2 (1896)
Albéric Magnard, is a composer probably more famous – if he is known at
all – for the heroic nature of his death than for his music. His demise at the
age of 49, single-handedly defending his property from invading German forces
in the early years of World War I, turned him into a national hero. Sadly, it
hasn't secured his musical legacy as he is little-known in his native France,
and largely unheard of in this country. I feel duty bound to do my bit to help
promote him.
This symphony was originally composed in 1892, After it was
first performed in full four years later, however, the original second movement
(entitled Fugues) was dispensed with
and replaced with the Danses movement
that now occupies that slot. This resulted, by all accounts, in the overall
work becoming ten minutes shorter when it was presented in its new configuration in
1899. Although nominally in E major, the symphony's unsettling opening doesn't
really establish any key with any degree of certainty for quite some time.
There is a feeling throughout of a free spirit at work, seemingly going where
his fancy takes him. This really comes to the fore in the sublime third
movement; a theme and variations marked Très
nuancé, which, at times, is close to what I imagine we might have got had
Ravel ever written a symphony. There are also echoes of Strauss, and the
conclusion of the symphony features a grand theme that might have been lifted
from Elgar. All of these similarities would have been entirely accidental
though, as Magnard is a composer of great originality. I'm a big fan of his
work and wish he could be gifted with some form of revival.
Day 212
31 July 2017: Panufnik – Metasinfonia (1978)
Andrzej Panufnik went through a period of refining his musical language
in the mid-Seventies, and the practical offshoot of this was a cluster of four
symphonies produced in almost as many years. Metasinfonia is the fourth of those and his seventh overall. It was
written for the unusual combination of organ, timpani and strings, and in it
Panufnik made a conscious effort to redress the balance between ‘feeling and
intellect’, that had, to be honest, made its two predecessors rather cold,
academic exercises. Having written at great length about the schematic approach
he took to Nos. 5 and 6, even to the extent of providing diagrams in the score,
Panufnik’s programme notes for Metasinfonia
were far more concise, accepting that the technicalities of his compositional
methods might be of little interest to the listener.
Metasinfonia feels more like an organ concerto than a
symphony, something the composer himself acknowledged. The changing dynamic
between orchestra and soloist does, however, provide this work with an extra
dimension that informed all the subsequent works Panufnik was to write. It
feels like a less rigid composition generally, and the simple fact is that this
particular combination of instruments sounds fantastic to my ears. With Metasinfonia, Panufnik felt he had found
his feet again as a composer, and while it is by no means his most well-known
work – almost certainly the least-performed – I think it is a very strong piece
that deserves greater familiarity.