2014 blossom music festival august 16

saturday August 16YO-YO MAThe Cleveland OrchestraJahja Ling, conductorYo-Yo Ma, cello

2O14BLOSSOMMUSIC FESTIVALS U M M E R H O M E O F

THE CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

2 2014 Blossom FestivalConductor

Jahja LingTh e upcoming 2014-15 season marks Jahja Ling’s eleventh year as music direc-tor of the San Diego Symphony. He also maintains a career as an internationally renowned guest conductor. In addition, he holds a long, collaborative relationship with Th e Cleveland Orchestra, where he was a member of the conducting staff from 1984 to 2005. Mr. Ling was resident conductor of the Orchestra (1985-2002) and served as Blossom Festival Director for six seasons (2000-05). He has returned each

year as a guest conductor; this summer’s concerts mark the 30th anniversary of his fi rst conducting Th e Cleveland Orch-estra. Mr. Ling has conducted all of the major symphony or-chestras of North America and many prominent ensembles across Europe and Asia. Acclaimed for his interpretation of works in the standard repertoire, he is also recognized for the breadth of contemporary music included in his pro-grams. Recent and upcoming appearances include perfor-mances with the San Diego Symphony at Carnegie Hall and on tour in China, plus guest conducting engagements with orchestras in Asia, North America, and Europe. Jahja Ling’s commitment to working with and devel-oping young musicians is evidenced by his involvement as

founding music director of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra (1986-93) and the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra (1981-84). Mr. Ling’s recordings include a range of works on the Telarc, Azica Records, and Continuum labels, featuring performances with the San Diego Symphony, Florida Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Scottish Chamber Or-chestra, one of which was nominated for a Grammy Award. His performance of the world premiere of Ellen Taaff e Zwilich’s Th ird Symphony with the New York Philharmonic is included in that ensemble’s American Celebrations collection. Born in Jakarta, Indonesia, of Chinese descent, Jahja Ling began to play the piano at age 4 and studied at the Jakarta School of Music. At age 17, he won the Jakarta Piano Competition and was awarded a Rockefeller grant to attend the Juil-liard School. He continued his education at Yale, studying orchestra conducting under Otto-Werner Mueller and earning both a master’s degree and doctorate. He also served as a conducting fellow at the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute. In addition to his years with Th e Cleveland Orchestra, and as a member of the con-ducting staff of the San Francisco Symphony, Mr. Ling served as music director of the Florida Orchestra (1988-2003) and was artistic director of the National Sym-phony Orchestra of Taipei (1998-2001). As a pianist, he won a bronze medal at the 1977 Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition. Mr. Ling makes his home in San Diego with his wife, Jessie, and their young daughters, Priscilla and Stephanie.

3Blossom Music Festival

Saturday evening, August 16, 2014, at 8:00 p.m.

2O14BLOSSOMMUSIC FESTIVAL

Program: August 16

T H E C L E V E L A N D O R C H E S T R A JAHJA LING , conductor

BEDRICH SMETANA Overture to The Bartered Bride(1824-1884)

EDWARD ELGAR Cello Concerto in E minor, Opus 85(1857-1934) 1. Adagio — Moderato 2. Lento — Allegro molto 3. Adagio 4. Allegro — Moderato — Allegro, ma non troppo — Poco più lento — Adagio

YO-YO MA, cello

I N T E R M I S S I O N

ANTONÍN DVORÁK Symphony No. 6 in D major, Opus 60(1841-1904)

1. Allegro non tanto 2. Adagio 3. Scherzo (Furiant): Presto — Trio 4. Finale: Allegro con spirito

This concert is dedicated to Mrs. Alfred M. Rankin, Sr.and to William P. Blair III in recognition of their extraordinary generosity in supportof The Cleveland Orchestra’s 2013-14 Annual Fund.

Media Partners: WCLV Classical 104.9 FM ideastream® and The Plain Dealer

4 The Cleveland Orchestra

B E DŘ I C H S M E TA N A is today honored as the founding father of Czech music. His determined eff orts on behalf of a national sound and repertory, however, were only partially understood and accepted in his own lifetime. Th e musical creativity he de-ployed was as oft en dismissed as celebrated. His good inten-tions were frequently misjudged by others or only incompletely accomplished by his own understanding of music’s rights and wrongs. Yet his fame endures — just as the country he so ar-dently believed in has at last become post-modern reality. Like his contemporaries Verdi and Wagner, Smetana de-voted a majority of his creative energies to writing opera. Like them, too, he was pioneering the art form both as music and as an expression of his country’s nationhood. As a musician, Smetana was partially self-taught. His father was an amateur violinist and encouraged musical lei-sure in all his children (Bedřich was the thirteenth of 20 chil-dren born to three successive wives; typical of the era, only 9 children survived infancy). Young Bedřich showed a remark-able ear for music and quickly learned to play both violin and piano. He performed in public at age six and might well have been another Mozart-like child star had his father been more willing to promote his son’s gift s for profi t. Bedřich’s musical learning, however, was neither systematic nor rigorous. His fast ear gave him early facility, but provided very little foundation for theory and formal understanding. His sometimes incurious interest in academics also limited his horizons, and he was constantly distracted by everyday life. Like many creative geniuses required by necessity to fi nd their voice by trial and error in full view (hearing) of the pub-lic, Smetana was accused of writing music that sounded like almost every other northern European 19th-century com-poser you can name, from Wagner to Berlioz, from Weber to Schumann to Liszt, Rossini and Donizetti. And some of his music is remarkably reminiscent of those, and others. Even though it fi nally has been recognized to sound like himself. Smetana was, at least at fi rst, a pragmatic nationalist, prob-ably more interested in good music and good theatrics than in politics itself. He is today revered as a rallying symbol of Czech nationalism. But his style came slowly, bit by occasionally pain-

Overture to The Bartered Bridefrom the opera composed 1863-66

by BedřichSMETANAborn March 2, 1824Litomyšl, Bohemia

diedMay 12, 1884Prague

About the Music

5Blossom Music Festival About the Music

ful bit. And at times quite unsuccessfully. Luckily for him, he forged together a characteristic Czech sound at precisely the time that the country itself was forming politically. Bohemia, aft er centuries of German subjugation, was caught up in the patriotic fever that swept much of Europe in the 19th century. Over the centuries, the region had been “adopted” and traded among the grand Germanic nationstates of central Europe. And although the two cultures had intertwined themselves quite thoroughly in most aspects of day-to-day life, many of the region’s citizens nevertheless identifi ed strongly with a Czech “homeland.” Aft er a number of years, abroad in Sweden and then ad-vocating a new tradition of Czech music from the outside as newspaper critic and conductor-performer, he was at last made chief administrator of the city’s Provincial Th eater (Prozatímní in Czech, literally meaning “Provisional,” and representing an expedient test case by the Germanic government to allow and promote, in a limited way, Czech opera performance). It was at fi rst a second-class operation compared to the German productions (and orchestra) across town, but it was exactly the platform Smetana needed. Th roughout his years as principal conductor of the Pro-vincial Czech Th eater (1866-74), Smetana’s eff orts to foster a uniquely Czech musical language were largely devoted to the creation and production of operas — his own as well as some attempts by others or suitable repertory favorites outfi tted with new Czech translation. At the time, there were very few prec-edents for what Czech symphonic or “classical” music should be. Smetana’s fi rst great success came with his second opera, Th e Bartered Bride, which opportunely premiered in 1866 near the crest of a wave of nationalistic fervor across Bohemia. Th e overture is a mood-setting piece of great excitement and fun. Like many notable overtures of an earlier era, it contains only a few whifs of melodic ideas that actually appear in the opera, although some of its impulse comes from the closing section of Act Two. —Eric Sellen © 2014

At a Glance

Smetana wrote his opera Prodaná nevěstra [“The Bartered Bride”] to a German libretto by Karel Sabina (for which the composer helped to fashion a Czech version) between 1863 and 1866.The fi rst performance took place in Prague on May 30, 1866, with the composer conducting. Smetana made some revisions and additions to the score over the next three years. This overture runs just over 5 minutes in perfor-mance. Smetana scored the opera for 2 fl utes and piccolo, 2 oboes, 2 clari-nets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, timpani, percussion (triangle, cymbals, bass drum, tenor drum) and strings.

The Blossom Board of Overseers is proud to welcome state legislators to this evening’s concert in appreciation for their support and advocacy.

6 The Cleveland OrchestraAbout the Music

O N LY F O R T W E N T Y of his seventy-six years did Elgar enjoy the simultaneous benefi ts of fame and creative abundance. For the fi rst forty-two years, he was unknown in the wider world, and for the last fourteen his muse was in retirement, if not quite still. Th e work that closed this twenty-year period of high creativity was the Cello Concerto, completed in the summer of 1919. A year later, with the death of his beloved wife, Alice, Elgar withdrew more and more from public life and wrote no more masterpieces. His slow progress toward national recognition was no doubt due to the fact that he grew up far from London and did not study with someone who could have helped him on his way. He was largely self-taught, and did not at all match English people’s notion of a typical composer — expected in those days to be someone who clearly recognized and understood the beauty of art, and could talk about it, in the manner of Oscar Wilde, or at least a foreigner. A friend who had played under Elgar’s di-rection described him as “a very distinguished-looking English country gentleman, tall, with a large and somewhat aggressive moustache, a prominent but shapely nose and rather deep-set but piercing eyes. It was his eyes perhaps that gave the clue to his real personality: they sparkled with humour, or became grave or gay, bright or misty as each mood in the music revealed itself. He looked upstanding, and had an almost military bearing. He was practical to a degree, he wasted no time. Th e orchestra, it is almost needless to say, adored him.” Until the success of his Enigma Variations in London in 1899, Elgar was regarded as a provincial composer, which indeed he was, composing mostly for the regional festivals that fl our-ished across the countrysides in late Victorian England. Th en the great works appeared in steady succession — the Dream of Gerontius, Sea Pictures, the Pomp and Circumstance marches, In the South, the Introduction and Allegro for strings, the First Symphony, the Violin Concerto, the Second Symphony, Fal-staff , and a group of three chamber works composed toward the end of the war: the Violin Sonata, the String Quartet, and the Piano Quintet. Th ese last three works were composed at Brinkwells, the house in Sussex where the Elgars moved in 1917. It was odd that

Cello Concerto in E minor, Opus 85composed 1918-19

by EdwardELGARborn June 2, 1857Broadheath, England

died February 23, 1934Worcester, England


The work that

closed Elgar’s

great twenty-

year period of

high creativity

was the Cello

Concerto,

completed in

the summer of

1919. A year

later, with the

death of his

beloved wife

Alice, the com-

poser with -

drew more

and more from

public life and

wrote no more

masterpieces.

Elgar should live anywhere but in his beloved West Country, but this house brought him respite from the constant anxie-ties of World War I, and is readily associated with the leaner, more refl ective musical style that the Cello Concerto perfectly illustrates. A letter written at this time describes his routine: “I rise about seven work till 8-15 — then dress, breakfast — pipe (I smoke again all day!) work till 12-30 lunch (pipe) — rest an hour — work till tea (pipe) — then work till 7-30 — change, din-ner at 8. Bed at 10 — every day practically goes thus . . . We go for lovely walks . . . the woods are full of fl owers, wonderful . . .” On September 26, 1918, with the war still on, Elgar’s wife’s diary recorded “wonderful new music, real wood sounds & other lament wh. shd. be in a war symphony.” But this was to be a concerto, not a symphony, and as it neared completion the following summer, Elgar described it as “a real large work & I think good & alive.” Th e Cello Concerto was completed in July 1919 and fi rst performed in the Queen’s Hall, London, on October 26 of that year with Felix Salmond as the soloist and Elgar himself conducting. (In the cello section of the orchestra — the London Symphony Orchestra — was a future conductor, John Barbirolli, then aged nineteen, who was later to conduct a historic recording of the work with Jacqueline du Pré.) For that fi rst night, Elgar had been given too little rehearsal time, and the main impression was of orchestral incompetence. Er-nest Newman reported that the orchestra “made a lamentable public exhibition of itself.” Later the work came to be recog-nized as one of the handful of supreme concertos for cello. In 1928, Elgar conducted a recording of the work with Beatrice Harrison as the soloist. T H E M U S I C We may discern in the Cello Concerto a sentiment of resig-nation and even of despair generated from within by that strong vein of melancholy that had always been an inescapable element of Elgar’s music, and from without by the desolating impact of the Great War. But the Cello Concerto is not a threnody, nor even, so far as we can tell, a deliberately planned swansong. It is refl ective, playful, tearful, and energetic by turns, like all his best music, and we underestimate the work if we attach too much to its autumnal character — many of its pages might have been summoned into existence as part of Elgar’s Wand of Youth. Unlike the traditional concerto, this one has four move-

About the Music

8 Blossom Music Festival

ments, not three. Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto had expanded the form to four movements and taken on mighty symphonic proportions, but Elgar here has four movements not for length and weight but for diversity and contrast. Th e movements are all concise, especially when compared to the expansive land-scape of the three movements in Elgar’s Violin Concerto. As in his two symphonies, the two central movements, a scherzo and a slow movement, off er a complete contrast in momentum and temper. Th e declamatory opening of the work recurs trun-cated at the beginning of the scherzo and in full, this time with marvelously valedictory eff ect, at the end of the fi nale. Aft er a declamatory opening for the soloist, the fi rst movement’s gentle lilt is far removed from any pomp or cir-cumstance. Over the meandering fi rst theme Elgar wrote in his sketchbook: “very full, sweet and sonorous,” and although the whole orchestra tries to give it breadth, it ends as it began, bleak and bare. Th e scherzo second movement that follows is in 4/4 time with bustling sixteenths reminiscent of Elgar’s In-troduction and Allegro for strings of many years earlier. Th ere is a brief expressive phrase off ered here and there in contrast, but lightness prevails. For the work’s slow movement, Elgar indulges unasham-edly in the yearning phrases and sliding harmony that breathe nostalgia and tranquility. Th is is not a lament but a private world of sweetness so direct and complete that it requires no development or expansion. For all its heart-rending beauty, the movement is short, and its half-close leads directly into the fi nale fourth movement. Here, aft er another declamatory start, the music settles into a sturdy rhythm that proceeds in a business-like and oddly impersonal fashion right through to the closing pages. Th en, as if yielding to some fatal destiny, Elgar adds an epilogue in slow tempo as passionate as anything he had ever written, full of drooping phrases and desperate gestures, like a dying man reaching up for help. Th ere is asperity too, in the harmony, and the music slides inevitably into a brief memory of the slow movement followed by the work’s opening statement and a brief energetic (and surely ironic in intention) close.

—Hugh Macdonald © 2014

Hugh Macdonald lives in England and is the Avis H. Blewett Professor Emeritus of Music at Washington University in St. Louis.

He s a noted authority on French music. He has written books on Beethoven, Berlioz, and Scriabin.

Elgar wrote his Cello Con-certo between Sepetmber 1918 and June 1919. The fi rst performance took place in London on October 26, 1919, with the composer conduct-ing and Felix Salmond as the soloist. (Salmond later moved to the United States, and taught at Juilliard and then at Curtis; his pupils in-cluded Bernard Greenhouse and Leonard Rose.) This concerto runs about 30 minutes in performance. Elgar scored it for 2 fl utes and piccolo, 2 oboes, 2 clari-nets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, and strings. The Cleveland Orchestra fi rst presented Elgar’s Cello Concerto at a weekend of concerts in February 1967 under Louis Lane’s direction, with Jacqueline Du Pré as soloist. It was most recently performed as part of the 2004 Blossom Music Festival, conducted by David Zinman and with Claudio Bohórquez as the soloist.

At a Glance

About the Music


Yo-Yo MaC E L L I S T YO -YO M A’s multi-faceted career is testament to his continual search for new ways to communicate with audiences, and to his personal desire for artistic growth and renewal. Whether performing new or familiar works from the cello repertoire, coming together with colleagues for chamber music, or exploring cul-tures and musical forms outside the Western classical tradi-tion, Mr. Ma strives to fi nd connections that stimulate the imagination. Yo-Yo Ma made his Cleveland Orchestra debut in Janu-ary 1982, performing the Dvořák Cello Concerto in concert at Severance Hall. He returned frequently over the next de-cade, including concerto and recital performances at Sever-ance Hall, as well as concertos at Blossom. Most recently, he led a Blossom Festival performance of his Silk Road Ensem-ble in August 2010, and returned in November 2012 to per-form at Th e Cleveland Orchestra’s annual Gala Concert. Mr. Ma maintains a balance between his engagements as soloist with orchestras throughout the world, his recital and chamber music activities, and his work with the Silk Road Project, for which he serves as artistic director. He draws inspiration from a wide circle of collaborators, each fueled by the artists’ interactions. One of Mr. Ma’s goals is the exploration of music as a means of communica-tion and as a vehicle for the migrations of ideas across a range of cultures through-out the world. Expanding upon this interest, in 1998, Mr. Ma established the Silk Road Project, a nonprofi t arts and educational organization. Under his artistic direction, the Silk Road Project presents performances by the acclaimed Silk Road Ensemble, engages in cross-cultural exchanges and residencies, leads workshops for students, and partners with leading cultural institutions to create educational materials and programs. Th e Project’s ongoing affi liation with Harvard University has made it pos-sible to broaden and enhance educational programming. Th rough ongoing part-nerships with arts and educational organizations in New York City, it continues to expand Silk Road Connect, a multidisciplinary educational initiative for middle-school students in the city’s public schools. Developing new music is also a central undertaking of the Silk Road Project, which has been involved in commissioning and performing more than 60 new musical and multimedia works from compos-ers and arrangers around the world. Mr. Ma is widely recognized for his strong commitment to educational pro-grams that bring the world into the classroom and the classroom into the world. While touring, he takes time whenever possible to conduct masterclasses as well as more informal programs for students — musicians and non-musicians alike. He

Soloist


has also reached young audiences through appearances on Arthur, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and Sesame Street. Along these lines, Yo-Yo Ma is currently work-ing as an ongoing creative consultant with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the ensemble’s Institute for Learning, Access, and Training. Th is work focuses on the transformative power music can have in individuals’ lives, and on increasing the number and variety of opportunities audiences have to experience music in their communities. Mr. Ma and the Institute have created the Citizen Musician Initiative, a movement that calls on all musicians, music lovers, music teachers, and institutions to use the art form to bridge gulfs between people and to create and inspire a sense of community, detailed at www.citizenmusician.org. Mr. Ma is an exclusive Sony Classical artist, and his discography of over 90 albums (including more than 15 Grammy Award winners) refl ects his wide-ranging interests. He has made several successful recordings that defy easy categorization, among them Hush with Bobby McFerrin, Appalachia Waltz and Appalachian Journey with Mark O’Connor and Edgar Meyer, and three albums with the Silk Road Ensemble. Mr. Ma’s recent recordings include Mendelssohn Trios with Emanuel Ax and Itzhak Perlman. Across this full range of releases, Mr. Ma remains one of the best-selling recording artists in the classical fi eld. In autumn 2009, Sony Classical released a box set of over 90 albums to commemo-rate Mr. Ma’s 30 years as a Sony recording artist. Yo-Yo Ma was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris. He began to study the cello with his father at age four and soon came with his family to New York, where he spent most of his formative years. Later, his principal teacher was Leonard Rose at the Juilliard School. He pursued a traditional liberal arts education to add to his conservatory training, graduating from Harvard University in 1976. Mr. Ma has received many awards, including the Avery Fisher Prize (1978), Glenn Gould Prize (1999), National Medal of the Arts (2001), Dan David Prize (2006), Sonning Prize (2006), World Economic Forum’s Crystal Award (2008),

and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2010). Mr. Ma serves as a United Na-tions Messenger of Peace and as a mem-ber of the President’s Committee on the Arts & Humanities. He has performed for eight American presidents, most recently at the invitation of President Obama on the occasion of the 56th In-augural Ceremony. Yo-Yo Ma and his wife have two children. Mr. Ma plays two instruments, a 1733 Montagnana cello from Venice and the 1712 Davidoff Stradivarius.

Soloist


has also reached young audiences through appearances on Arthur, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and Sesame Street. Along these lines, Yo-Yo Ma is currently work-ing as an ongoing creative consultant with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the ensemble’s Institute for Learning, Access, and Training. Th is work focuses on the transformative power music can have in individuals’ lives, and on increasing the number and variety of opportunities audiences have to experience music in their communities. Mr. Ma and the Institute have created the Citizen Musician Initiative, a movement that calls on all musicians, music lovers, music teachers, and institutions to use the art form to bridge gulfs between people and to create and inspire a sense of community, detailed at www.citizenmusician.org. Mr. Ma is an exclusive Sony Classical artist, and his discography of over 90 albums (including more than 15 Grammy Award winners) refl ects his wide-ranging interests. He has made several successful recordings that defy easy categorization, among them Hush with Bobby McFerrin, Appalachia Waltz and Appalachian Journey with Mark O’Connor and Edgar Meyer, and three albums with the Silk Road Ensemble. Mr. Ma’s recent recordings include Mendelssohn Trios with Emanuel Ax and Itzhak Perlman. Across this full range of releases, Mr. Ma remains one of the best-selling recording artists in the classical fi eld. In autumn 2009, Sony Classical released a box set of over 90 albums to commemo-rate Mr. Ma’s 30 years as a Sony recording artist. Yo-Yo Ma was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris. He began to study the cello with his father at age four and soon came with his family to New York, where he spent most of his formative years. Later, his principal teacher was Leonard Rose at the Juilliard School. He pursued a traditional liberal arts education to add to his conservatory training, graduating from Harvard University in 1976. Mr. Ma has received many awards, including the Avery Fisher Prize (1978), Glenn Gould Prize (1999), National Medal of the Arts (2001), Dan David Prize (2006), Sonning Prize (2006), World Economic Forum’s Crystal Award (2008),

and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2010). Mr. Ma serves as a United Na-tions Messenger of Peace and as a mem-ber of the President’s Committee on the Arts & Humanities. He has performed for eight American presidents, most recently at the invitation of President Obama on the occasion of the 56th In-augural Ceremony. Yo-Yo Ma and his wife have two children. Mr. Ma plays two instruments, a 1733 Montagnana cello from Venice and the 1712 Davidoff Stradivarius.

Soloist 11Blossom Music Festival

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12 The Cleveland OrchestraAbout the Music

I F A N YO N E D O U B T S the value of persistence, let him or her consider the case of Antonín Dvořák, a violist in the orchestra of the Provisional Th eater in Prague, who doggedly produced symphonies, string quartets, songs, and much else with little recognition until 1875, when a juror named Johannes Brahms, working for the Austrian State Stipend, looked at a package of Dvořák’s compositions and declared the 34-year-old composer “a very talented man.” Th ings happened fast aft er that. Th e renowned critic Ed-uard Hanslick, a Brahms partisan, took up Dvořák’s cause as well. Brahms’s publisher Simrock brought out several Dvořák works, and commissioned a set of Slavonic Dances for piano duet modeled on Brahms’s popular Hungarian Dances. Th ese proved to be such runaway bestsellers that Dvořák’s name be-came a household word, seemingly on every piano rack in the Austrian empire — and beyond. Orchestras and conductors clamored for music by him. The composer himself could hardly believe his good fortune, aft er so much toil in obscurity. His letters from that time are full of wonder at new experiences. In September 1879, unable to be in all places at once, Dvořák missed the fi rst per-formance of his Slavonic Rhapsody No. 3 in Berlin, but he was able to hear the redoubtable Hans Richter conduct it in Vienna shortly thereaft er. Dvořák wrote that, following an “incompa-rably fi ne” performance, “I had to promise to come to the per-formance of the Serenade and had to assure the Philharmonic that I would send them a symphony for the next season. Th e day aft er the concert, Richter gave a banquet at his house, in my honor so to speak, to which he invited all the Czech members of the orchestra. It was a grand evening which I shall not easily forget as long as I live.” Dvořák began sketching the promised symphony the fol-lowing summer, and eventually wrote at the end of the sketch, “Th anks be to God! Ended at 8:30 in the evening of September 20, 1880.” Finishing the orchestration on October 15, he set four copyists to work making the fair copy to rush to Richter in Vienna. But the Philharmonic dragged its feet in schedul-ing a performance, and so the premiere eventually and instead went to the Prague Philharmonic, led by Adolf Čech, in March

Symphony No. 6 in D major, Opus 60composed 1880

by AntonínDVOŘÁKborn September 8, 1841Nelahozeves, Bohemia

diedMay 1, 1904Prague

13Blossom Festival 2014

1881. Th e piece was rapturously received, and the Czech-fl a-vored furiant scherzo had to be repeated. Dvořák decided to let stand the piece’s dedication to Richter, who fi nally conducted the work in London in 1882, by which time, because Dvořák’s music was such a hot property, the performance was not even a local premiere. Th is was the fi rst of Dvořák’s symphonies to see print, and the public’s ignorance of his fi ve previous eff orts in the genre remained so deep and persistent that there are still plenty of people walking around today who fi rst got to know this mu-sic as Dvořák’s “Symphony No. 1.” Listening to it makes clear that, at the time, Dvořák enjoyed not only Brahms’s patronage but his artistic infl uence as well.

T H E M U S I C Th e Czech composer was certainly not alone in Brahms guidance, but still, the opening bars of the symphony’s fi rst movement are so wonderfully characteristic of Dvořák’s rhyth-mic verve and appealing turn of phrase that it is startling to hear him take this blithe material and immediately begin wor-rying it à la Brahms. However, one can appreciate how good Dvořák is at “doing” Brahms while one waits for these lovely tunes to return in their original form. Dvořák, although a violist himself, nevertheless had a way with a cello tune, and two beauties emerge among the many attractive ideas in this movement. Th e development section of the movement is fi rst mysterious, then playful, but always colorful. Eventually, the themes return pretty much in order, and no less welcome for that, before the lively coda displays them in yet more new guises. A soft modulating passage, in the manner of the same point in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, slides us gently down from bright D major into the gentle world of B-fl at major for the second movement Adagio, a slice of music plainly inspired by the expressive breadth of the Bonn master’s great movements in that same tempo. But ultimately the movement is memo-rable more for its sensitive scoring and pure-hearted Dvořákian lyricism than for its Beethovenian forte interruptions. On the other hand, Dvořák is the sole master of all he surveys in the irresistible third movement scherzo, an elabo-ration of the Slavonic dance rhythms that made him famous — specifi cally, the furiant, with its distinctive rhythmic play of twos and threes. Th e movement’s Trio section ventures far

About the Music

This was

the fi rst

of Dvorv

ák’s

symphonies

to see print,

when it was

presented as

“Symphony

No. 1.”

Listening to

it makes clear

that, at the

time, Dvorv

ák

enjoyed not

only Brahms’s

patronage

but his artistic

infl uence

as well.


away from the big dance to a pastoral landscape with a lone, piping fl ute — a favorite Dvořák genre scene, sounding even more tender here because the fl ute is a piccolo. Th e pianissimo opening of the fi nale is so similar to the same place in Brahms’s Second Symphony—also in D, published just three years before Dvořák composed this piece—it is almost as if the composer is saying, as Brahms did when somebody pointed out a resemblance between his First Symphony and Beethoven’s Ninth, “Every jackass notices that!” And Dvořák might also go on to say, “Now, listen to how I do it”—because the Dvořák way isn’t the Brahms way. It’s more straight-ahead, tuneful, and funny. And when it’s time to throw the themes together contrapuntally in this sonata-form movement, there isn’t a hint of Brahmsian fretting; instead, the butcher’s son from Nelahozeves just grins and stirs the pot with his muscu-lar arms. Th e movement comes to a satisfying, full-circle close with the brass’s grand re-statement of the opening theme.

—David Wright © 2014

David Wright lives and writes in Wellesley, Massachusetts. He pre-viously served as program annotator for the New York Philharmonic.

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THE CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

About the Music

Dvořák wrote his Sixth Symphony in 1880. The fi rst performance took place in Prague on March 25, 1881, with Adolf Čech conducting. The United States premiere was given by Theodore Thomas and the New York Philharmonic Society on January 6, 1883. It was the fi rst of Dvořák’s symphonies to be published, in Berlin in 1882, and was thus issued as “Symphony No. 1.” The printed score was dedicated to conductor Hans Richter. (Dvořák’s symphonies were renumbered in the chrono-logical order of their compo-sition in the 1950s.) This symphony runs about 40 minutes in perfor-mance. Dvořák scored it for 2 fl utes and piccolo, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trom-bones, tuba, timpani, and strings.

At a Glance


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Girls Kindergarten-Grade 12 and Coed Pre-Primary Laurel is home to the Center for Research on Girls.

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IMAGINE, EXPLORE, CREATE andTINKER!JOIN US FOR LAUREL SCHOOL’S SECOND ANNUAL

STEAM InKNOWvation FESTIVALActivities, food and fun for kids Preschoolthrough Grade 6 and their families!Sunday, September 21, 1:00-4:00 pmOne Lyman Circle Shaker Heights, Ohio 44122

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All-School Open HouseSunday, November 2, 1:00-3:00 pmLaurelSchool.org 216.464.0946

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Carmina BuranaO FORTUNA! Experience one of the most popular masterpieces of the 20th century in Carl Orff ’s compelling tale for chorus, orch estra, and soloists. Infused with spir-ited rhythms, catchy melodies, and songs of love, lust, and drink — amidst the recur-ring change of seasons and the never-ending wheels of fortune and fate. With the Blossom Festival Chorus.

August 23 Saturday

EXPERIENCE MORE BLOSSOM!See a full listing of 2014 Blossom Music Festival concerts on pages 36-37 of the Festival Book.

August 30 Saturday

Family FunFestLABOR DAY WEEKEND fun for the whole family! Bring the kids and share the magical experience of Blossom and live symphonic music. A fun-fi lled concert featuring tunes from Th e Little Mermaid, Th e Wizard of Oz, Frozen, and more. Featuring great family-friendly activities and a post-concert fi re-works show!

A Beatles TributeCELEBRATING THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY of their

arrival in the United States — it seems like just “yesterday” when the Fab Four fi rst came to

America. From the early hits through the solo years, relive the best of the Beatles with Classi-

cal Mystery Tour, the group that has been called “the most amazing Beatles tribute band ever.”

Don’t miss this one-night-only event!

August 24 Sunday

2014 blossom music festival august 16

Documents

th e cleveland orchestra

florida orchestra

san diego symphony

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royal philharmonic orchestra

music director

th e cleveland orchestra

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