Completing a Mozart Horn Concerto

Next Saturday, February 4th, will be our first Classics concert of the new year at the Cohan Center.  ”Suite Serenades“ will feature the incomparable French horn virtuoso Richard Todd and acclaimed tenor Christopher M. Cock. This dynamic duo will perform together with the orchestra in Britten’s musical setting of six British poems called Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings. Also on the program will be Mozart’s Symphony No. 4 and Stravinsky’s delightful Pulcinella Suite.

One of the highlights of the evening however, may be something you’ve never heard before. Maybe you’ve never even thought of it before. Can you imagine completing an unfinished Horn Concerto by the master himself, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart? Well, that’s exactly what Craig H. Russell has done in Allegro for Horn & Orchestra, which will receive its world premiere next Saturday night.

In case you’re wondering how on earth one goes about completing a Mozart Horn Concerto, we thought we’d share with you Dr. Craig Russell’s notes on the piece, just in time for Mozart’s 256th birthday. Enjoy! And we hope to see you next Saturday at the concert.

Allegro for Horn & Orchestra, KV494a (1786/2006, rev.2011)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791); Completed by Craig H. Russell (b.1951)

At Mozart’s death, he left behind manuscripts with snippets of themes, abandoned sketches, and unfinished works. Among these incomplete torsos is a Horn Concerto in E-Major (KV 494a). It begins magnificently but then ends in midstream. How frustrating. “Wouldn’t it be grand,” I thought to myself, “if we could hear the whole piece!” So, in 2006, I decided to try to finish what Mozart had started. It felt to me as if Mozart had left the ball on the 30-yard-line, and it was my task to see if I could push the whole piece forward and nudge it over the goal line. As much as possible, I wanted this piece to remain “Mozart’s” and not bear the trace of my own compositional traits or idiosyncrasies. To be successful, I hoped to make the “Russell” invisible and the “Mozart” highlighted. I’ll leave it to the audience to see how close I got to that goal.

Mozart’s manuscript pages for this horn concerto are presently housed at the Deutschen Staatsbibliothek Berlin under the call number “Mus. ms. autogr. W. A. Mozart Anh. 98a.” On the first page, Mozart scribbled out in red ink his title, Concerto a Corno principale (Concerto for a Featured French Horn). The beginning measures are complete and polished in every detail: Mozart has all of the lines written out, and he adds detailed dynamics, bowings, and articulations. But little by little, and rather early on, the information begins to diminish, until—when the solo horn enters—the accompaniment begins to evaporate altogether. Soon the horn abruptly stops in mid-phrase. At that point, I “pick up the ball” and move forward.

The scholarly research of Alan Tyson has shown that Mozart obtained the paper for this work in the spring or summer of 1785, shortly before he began composing The Marriage of Figaro. For whom did Mozart write this piece? No one really knows, but there are some believable theories. The scholar Franz Giegling suggests that this movement may have been destined for Jacob Eisen—the principal hornist for the National Theater in Vienna. Giegling cites as supporting evidence a letter from Constanze Mozart to Johann Anton André in which she states, “the widow of Jacob Eisen has in her possession a single [Mozart] score for solo horn.” In the 1960s, Richard Dunn proposed that Mozart might have begun this E-major concerto for Giovanni Punto, the horn soloist who premiered Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante, KV 297b. A third possible candidate for the potential dedicatee of this concerto would be Joseph Leutgeb for whom Mozart wrote most of those gorgeous horn concertos that we know and love. Giegling thinks Leutgeb is not a viable candidate and builds a plausible case for his view. Alfred Einstein thought this E-major concerto movement was probably a middle-movement sketch intended for Mozart’s Concerto in D-major (KV 412), a theory that seems nonsensical to me, since that would produce a pattern with two fast movements plus a rondo—and no slow movement at all. That structure simply does not match up with any other known Mozart work. Also, a typical classical concerto in D would never have a contrasting middle movement in the key of E-major.

So, we have several candidates for Mozart’s choice of horn soloist: Eisen? Punto? Leutgeb? In the end, no one really knows with certainty either the occasion or the person that Mozart had in mind. But I have my own flawed but enchanting theory—maybe Mozart was simply waiting for Rick Todd to come along and play this concerto! Certainly, nobody has ever played the horn any better.

Excerpted from program notes for the concert by Craig H. Russell

**Don’t miss Suite Serenades on February 4th at the Cohan Center. At 7 pm, Dr. Russell will  present an entertaining pre-concert lecture on the musical program (including his own world premiere) called “Symphonic Forays.” The concert begins at 8 pm.

Holidays, Hallelujahs, and Flash Mobs

By David Hennessee

The holiday season is upon us, and with that comes holiday music: from sacred music like Handel’s Messiah, to carols, both secular and sacred, to novelty songs (“Grandma got run over by a reindeer,” for example). A personal musical tradition of mine is tuning in to David Letterman every December 23rd to watch Darlene Love perform “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home).”

For many of us in the classical music community, performers as well as patrons, the holiday season means a concert by the Cuesta Master Chorale, often featuring something Christmas-y or sacred – a mass, requiem, magnificat, or what have you. This year’s concert is a little different: all well-known overtures, choruses and arias from best-loved operas. “Habanera” from Carmen, for example. Here’s a version with the legendary Maria Callas. Love the facial expressions! And the beehive!

Also we’re performing Dido’s Lament from Purcell’s opera “Dido and Aeneas.” I came across this version featuring the amazing Jessye Norman, and in addition to her passionate singing, she looks like a character from science fiction fantasy.

We’re also playing “Brindisi” from Verdi’s “La Traviata.” This is one you might not know by name, but once you hear it, you go, “oh yeah!” I found this great video of a Brindisi flash mob. In case you don’t know the term “flash mob,” it describes a recent phenomenon (dating from 2003) of groups of people assembling suddenly and unexpectedly in a public place, doing something unusual. For example, in 2006 at different stations in London’s Underground, about 4000 people wearing portable music devices danced in a flash mob “Silent Disco.” Flash mobs have become quite a trend in recent years; a quick YouTube search reveals all sorts of crazy, entertaining examples.

I think the flash mob is a fascinating phenomenon, perhaps showing our desire in modern society to break through the hum-drum, processed, commodified veneer of mass culture into random, unexpected, joyful moments of beauty and presence. Kind of a communal “random act of kindness” that erases distinctions between high culture and mass culture, the concert hall and the town square. My Marxist friends in the university often point out that in a capitalist society, art can become just another thing to buy sell, losing its edge and power of social criticism. Flash mobs, by contrast, exist in the realm of “art for art’s sake,” beautiful and effective for their very uselessness. Like Winnie the Pooh, they simply are.

The holiday season often sees performances of Handel’s Messiah. Of course, the Messiah is great and all, but I do have to say I’m rather pleased not to be playing it this year. The reason is summed up by this joke: “Did you hear about the viola player who dreamt he was playing Handel’s Messiah, woke up, and realized he was?” Still, it’s hard not to be moved by Handel’s music, especially the “Hallelujah Chorus.” What would it be like to be shopping at the mall, grabbing a bite at the food court, and all of a sudden hear this:

Did you know, you don’t even have to be able to sing or play an instrument to perform the Hallelujah chorus? Check it out.

Happy Holidays!

Nationalism

In our last installment of “Playing in the Orchestra from A to Z,” we delved into the mysteries of the mute. And what amazing (if understated) discoveries me made there! After writing that blog, next on my agenda was N for Nerves. Fittingly, this topic gave me cold feet. What if my blog was unable to fully explain and solve the age-old problem of performance anxiety? Well, never fear; in the near future I plan to stare down my perfectionism and write a blog on stage fright that will free us all of it paralyzing grasp forever!

Luckily, another N topic has presented itself as timely: Nationalism in classical music. This weekend we are playing Sibelius Symphony #5, an unusual piece in its structure and sound world. Sibelius’s best known piece is probably his symphonic poem “Finlandia,” which evokes the oppression of czarist Russia and a prayer for freedom. Sibelius’s symphonies by contrast are “absolute music” in the sense that they don’t tell a story or evoke specific images. Nevertheless, it’s not difficult when listening to parts of Symphony #5 to imagine the icy landscape of the composer’s Finland, insects buzzing over the tundra, or majestic mountains and coastlines.  (BTW the insect effect is achieved by repeated tremolo-like string parts. At times one could wish they’d had Orkin in early 20th-century Finland.)

Music that reflected nationalism really took off in the 19th century, for a few reasons. First, Romanticism as a general movement in art concerned itself with folk traditions of the “common people,” seeing them as natural, spontaneous, innocent, and even closer to the divine. Secondly, the French Revolution spread the values of freedom and national self-determination around a Europe that had been oppressed by absolute monarchs for centuries. The 1815 Congress of Vienna attempted to turn back the clock on this nationalistic spirit, but the genie was out of the bottle. Since that time, many composers have used their music to express the idioms of their homeland and pride in its values and culture.

A famous example is Bedrich’s Smetana’s “The Moldau.” This video features beautiful images of Prague.

There was a sort of rage for things Hungarian in the 19th century, and the German Brahms jumped on board with his Hungarian Dances.

In the 20th century Bela Bartok studied the folk music of his native Hungary and incorporated it into his compositions. The last movement of the Viola Concerto, for example, resembles a raucous peasant dance. When I was learning it, my teacher would hop around the room singing “Dance, gyspy!” BTW, the violist in this clip is amazing! If you watch any of these videos, watch this one… Viola Power!

As we know, the Czech composer Dvorak lived in the United States for three years, where he took inspiration from African-American and Native-American music. He wrote some of his best-known music there, including the Cello Concerto and the New World Symphony with it’s famous “Goin’ Home” slow movement. He also lived in a Czech-speaking community in Iowa for a while, where he wrote the American String quartet. In its last movement you can almost visualize cowboys riding across the prairie. One teacher I had directed my quartet to play the staccato chords like “Indian hatchet chops” (this was before political correctness).

America’s homegrown musical style is jazz, of course, and Gershwin is the one who introduced it to the concert hall with “Rhapsody in Blue.” His “Lullaby” also makes use of the syncopated rhythms of jazz and popular dance.

Zzzzzzzzzz…… well after that I think I may be relaxed enough to face writing about nerves. Till then, dear readers.

Spooky Symphonies

By David Hennessee

Halloween is fast approaching, with all its attendant ghouls, goblins, witches, demons, and other creatures of the night-bump. We all know about holiday music around Christmas-time (cheerful and somber carols, silly pop songs, ubiquitous Messiahs…), but what about Halloween holiday music?

I got to thinking about classical music that evokes the spirit of this gruesome season, and actually there is quite a bit going back a few hundred years. These days, I’d venture to say that most people regularly hear symphonic music in film scores. Just the other day, for a friend I was playing a recording of the finale from Sibelius Symphony #5 (which we’re playing in November), and he said “You know how I can tell this is 20th century? It sounds like movie music!” That’s probably a compliment to Sibelius, as it means his idiom still speaks to listeners deeply enough to inspire film composers to imitate it.

For horror movies, music is absolutely necessary for setting the mood and giving the audience all the chills they crave. Consider how in the following example, the wrong music transforms Hithcock’s chilling “The Birds” into farce.

Of course, most Hitchcock movies are scored to the eerie and intense music of Bernard Herrmann. Without the music, “Psycho” would just be a story of a boy and his mother.

Vertigo, while not exactly horror, is certainly moody, creepy, and suspenseful, due in no small part to the score.

Music that conveys fear really got going in the Romantic period, though you see earlier examples in opera; for example the finale of Don Giovanni, when the statue of the Commedatore comes to life to accuse Don Giovanni and cast him into hell. To me, the fact that in this production, the Commendatore looks a like a life-size Monopoly piece only makes the scene creepier. Go directly to hell! Do not pass GO or collect $200!

Romantic-era composers pioneered music that evoked specific scenes, such as Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony, as well as music that tells stories, which we call program music. One of the best examples of program music is Berlioz’s “Symphonie Fanatastique.” Here is a visualization of its “Witches’ Sabbath” movement.

The Russian nationalist composers were masters of vivid and colorful program music, as we see in Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain.”

Sacred music also uses some of these spooky techqniues. The Requiem Mass, for example, contains a Dies Irae (“Day of Wrath”) movement. Verdi’s Dies Irae is probably the scariest; you can almost hear the lost souls crying out in terror at God’s wrath. Playing it is a little scary too… it’s fast!

Whenever I think of Halloween, this little bon-bon comes to mind: Charles Ives’ piece for strings and piano entitled “Halloween.” In college, my string quartet was asked to perform for a Halloween program, and someone suggested this piece. We performed in costume… the first violinist was a police officer, the second was a cowboy, the cellist was a cat, and I was a ghost. It’s not easy to play the viola covered in a sheet with eyeholes cut out. I’m not sure I played all the correct notes, but as you will hear, it probably didn’t matter.

Happy Halloween!

Transformations

By David Hennessee

Hello all, I hope you had a great summer! The symphony is getting ready for Opening Night, when we will be performing Berlioz’s Overture to Beatrice and Benedict, Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite, and Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto with Robert Thies as soloist. It’s been a while since I last blogged; I had some ideas about the “brotherhood of man” and “Freude” around the time we played Beethoven 9 in May but was so busy learning all those notes, I didn’t find the time to get them down on (virtual) paper. By the way, check out the first minute or so of this video to hear us playing Beethoven (and get a close-up of violists Kim Wilkins and Karen Loewi-Jones rockin’ out!)

Some more recent concerts that many of us in the Symphony played kind of got me thinking. First there was the “Summer of Love” Pops concert with all those groovy feel-good popular songs from 1967-1970. The next week, some of us performed for the Symphony of the Vines September 11th memorial concerts. On the program were the Barber Adagio and Mozart Requiem. Quite a change from “Windy” and “Happy Together,” right?  Well, maybe… but from another perspective, I think it’s interesting that at the height of the Vietnam War, with all that violence and social unrest, some of the music our culture was so lighthearted. I guess that’s the great paradox of the 1960s… a time of joy, understanding, love and peace, but also struggle and unrest. And that’s a bit similar to the paradox of music like the Barber Adagio and Mozart Requiem… melancholy, evoking intense emotions of loss and pain, yet ultimately cathartic and healing.

The father of the Franciscan Order at Mission San Miguel gave a mini-sermon before the 9/11 memorial concert on the Franciscan idea that “if you don’t transform your pain, you will transmit it.” In essence that’s what a Requiem does; it takes the subject of death and makes something beautiful and healing out of it.

That phrase – “if you don’t transform your pain, you will transmit it” – really struck a chord with me, making me think about how great art has the power to do just that. Moreover, in their personal lives artists often face struggles that they work through and heal in the artistic process. Then as performers, viewers, or readers, we are privileged to experience that transformation of pain, witnessing its power, and possibly letting it heal some of our own.

This theme of transforming pain actually ties together all the works we are performing on Opening Night. Before writing the opera Beatrice and Benedict, Berlioz, for example, developed an intestinal illness that troubled him for the rest of his life, and he began writing an opera that he was unable to finish because of that illness. Despite these difficulties, he finished his next opera, Beatrice and Benedict. Interestingly, he recounted that at the premiere, his conducting was strengthened because the physical pain let him be “emotionally detached” and “less excitable.” The story of Beatrice and Benedict fits the theme of transformation as well. Based on Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, this comedy describes how the main characters despise one another when they first meet, but in the end realize their mutual love and respect.

The story of Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto is well known and also involves transformation. Rachmaninoff’s first symphony was not well-received by contemporary critics, and on top of that, the composer faced a number of personal problems that sent him into a depression that lasted for several years. Unable to compose, Rachmaninoff began therapy in which he repeated to himself “You will begin to write your concerto…You will work with great facility…The concerto will be of an excellent quality…” The therapy worked, and the Concerto has been one of the most popular works in the repertoire ever since. In the lush, melancholy melodies that run through this concerto, I think you can hear some of Rachmaninoff’s sadness and its transformation into beauty.

Also on the program is a suite from Stravinsky’s Firebird ballet, a work that describes a world of trickery, fantasy, and magic. In the animated film Fantasia 2000, Disney used the music to evoke a volcanic eruption, its aftermath, and rebirth.

See you on Opening Night!

Live Web Broadcast: Anne Akiko Meyers Japan Benefit Concert on April 29th

SPECIAL Live WEB BROADCASTAnne Akiko Meyers Japan Benefit Concert At 7:55PM US Pasific Time, Friday, April 29
Play for Japan USA presents a benefit concert featuring virtuoso Anne Akiko Meyers, one of the world’s premiere concert violinists. For those who cannot attend the event in Woodside, CA, a special Live Web Broadcast of the performance is available for a $7 donation. All proceeds will go to Japan disaster relief efforts. Let’s support Japan through the power of music! From the comfort of your living room, you can have a front row seat to watch Ms. Meyers perform Japanese and Western classical pieces with pianist Wendy Chen.Live Broadcast will be available for viewing up to 48 hours after the conclusion of the concert. This concert is fiscally sponsored by the Kurosawa Piano Music Foundation, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization.
broadcasting will start at 7:55pm pst Concert will be held @ Woodside HS Performing Arts Center [map it] April 29(FRI)	Get More Info Here BUY LIVE BROADCAST TICKETS NOW! ($7 donation)
CORPORATE SPONSORS: Anova Solutions, Artspromo, enConcert, eOne Music,eTix, eTix Japan, Frecklebox,  Progressive Solutions, Sony Computer Entertaiment America LLC, SRI International, Yamaha Peninsula Music Center PARTNERS: American Red Cross, Asian American Cancer Support Network, Asian American for Community Involvement, atelier b, Bloomingdale’s Stanford, Capriccio Music, Friends of “Play for Japan USA”, Japanese Art & Cultural Center, Japan Center for International Exchange, Japan Society of Northern California, Japanese Working Mothers Association SF, KEIZAI Society, San Francisco Symphony, Vintage Wine Marchant, Wells Fargo

OFFICIAL ENDORSEMENT BY: The Consulate-General of Japan in San Francisco

Into the 70′s: The Turning Point

As our 50th Anniversary Season draws closer to the grand finale day by day (Beethoven’s 9th – May 7 & 8!) we suddenly realized that we left you, our loyal blog fans, hanging out in the late 60′s. Not a bad place to hang out in many ways, but still, we figured you might like to know the rest of the story. So without any further ado, we present to you the next installment of this history of the San Luis Obispo Symphony by Edward Lowman.

The Symphony prospered during the sixties. Incorporation had worked out well and the newly -forged relationship with Cuesta College was turning out even better. The orchestra had grown in both size and quality and the Symphony Guild had been established. As the decade came to a close, however, the Symphony hit a bump. A big bump. Maestro Earle Blakeslee announced that he would be leaving for Europe after the 1969-70 season.

To help fill the gap, Hendrik de Boer was asked to step in as President one last time. Daniel Kepl, meanwhile, a young conductor from Santa Barbara, was engaged to lead the orchestra. It was understood that de Boer’s assignment was to be crisis intervention rather than long-term leadership, but Kepl’s role was hoped to grow into something more. In any event, they both were on board for barely a year.

It was at this point that another player came onstage who would have some impact. In the Autumn of 1970 Alice Nelson persuaded Edward Lowman to become the organization’s first permanent, salaried Business Manager (at a whopping $1.00/hour!). He immediately set about putting things in order in the areas of player personnel, orchestra morale, union relations, concert production, house management, publicity and public relations, program design and printing, internal communications, the music library and coordination with the Monday Club Competition. He even had to have the conductor’s podium rebuilt.

These things were all remedial fixes of operational matters, however; the big issues still lay ahead. By the Spring of 1971, Alice Nelson and one or two other experienced hands like June Eisenbise recognized that Lowman could also be their lightning rod for really significant changes. Very private meetings were held, including several in cars and a now legendary one late in the evening on the steps of Great Western Bank under umbrellas in a pouring rain. Plans were made, roles were defined, names were named. Lowman thought to himself that it seemed just too much like a grade B spy movie.

And then, just like in the movies, it all came together. A fresh new leadership team swept in consisting of: banker Arthur Allen, radio station owner Homer Odom, and title insurance executive Murray Taylor. Fresh new attitudes brought fresh new procedures, from business practices to fiscal controls to the fact that the Board would no longer take the summer off.

Clifton Swanson

At the meeting of July 1971, President Allen announced that he would like the Board to meet their new Conductor/Music Director. He then opened the door and in walked Clifton Swanson, Conductor of the Cal Poly Chamber Orchestra and Music Director of the newly founded Mozart Festival. Allen also unveiled the new budget: $12,500. It seems like nothing today, but thirty years ago it was an unheard-of sum for an arts organization on the Central Coast. It wasn’t just theoretical, either: There was a detailed plan for raising it, with Vice-President Odom in charge and with a written assignment for every member of the Board.

By the August meeting it was already clear that the coup was a complete success. Instead of responding to events the Symphony was now shaping them. All its components were up and running and the new maestro had even announced the 1971-72 Season’s concert dates and the name of the first guest artist, pianist Steven Gordon. This was the beginning of the modern era of the San Luis Obispo Symphony, and all through that pivotal July meeting the umbrella people never looked at each other even once. They didn’t dare.

Now began a period of sustained and mostly steady development. In September of 1971, new President Arthur Allen attended the first rehearsal under new Conductor/Music Director Clifton Swanson. They were doing Handel’s Water Music. Afterwards, Allen intoned in his deep stentorian voice, “When I heard those horns I knew that all would be well.”

It wasn’t just the horn section, either (led, of course, by new Principal Jane Swanson and composed of her students plus the one lonely player from the previous year). Stability, satisfaction and growth throughout the ranks of the orchestra would be a hallmark of Swanson’s tenure. The orchestra’s thinner ranks in those days enabled Swanson to do something else of which he remains very proud: encouraging top students from local high schools, Cuesta College, and Cal Poly to join the Symphony. A remarkable number of these students passed through on their way to musical careers, and several are still associated with the Symphony today.

The Symphony Guild also prospered. Many people contributed but three stood out: Dorothy Burkhardt, Virginia Polin, and of course, Peggy Peterson. Then, in 1981, Patty Patten and Ruth Kraker co-founded the North County Symphony Guild. The Guilds not only raised money for the Symphony but also raised Symphony awareness in the community.

One of Maestro Swanson’s greatest contributions was his impressive network of soloists. He believed that top soloists not only pleased the audience but also inspired the orchestra. The first of these was pianist Steven Gordon, who later coached the 88 pianists in the Olympics Opening Ceremonies at Los Angeles. Others included pianist James Bonn, violinists David Abel and Kathleen Lenski, and soprano Lucy Shelton.

Before that, however, in mid-1979 the most fruitful connection of them all had begun when the Symphony offered an aspiring young pianist his very first professional engagement. He was Jeffrey Kahane, and on January 18, 1980, he soloed in Beethoven’s Fourth Piano Concerto.

Edward Lowman and Jeffrey Kahane

For Kahane and the Central Coast it was love, and in 1983 they shared one of the most special moments of their lives. Swanson had booked Kahane to play Rachmaninoff’s Third Concerto in May. Early in the year, however, Kahane called up and said he was thinking of entering the prestigious Rubinstein Competition. He wasnt sure, though: He’d have to cancel with us because the competition was just a week before the concert here and the Third Concerto wasn’t on the competition list, the Paganini Rhapsody was. Swanson told Kahane to go ahead and enter. “We won’t practice the Third, we’ll practice the Rhapsody. Then when you get here we’ll tell everyone that we’ve just now decided to change the program because of your appearance at the Rubinstein.” Then Clifton added the kicker. “Of course, this means you have to win the Rubinstein!”

Now pinch yourselves, folks, because that’s just how it worked out. The whole orchestra kept their little secret perfectly (the printed program even carried notes for the Third Concerto), Kahane did win the Rubinstein, and on May 7, 1983, the Symphony community enjoyed an evening they will never, ever forget.

Copyright © 2001 by Edward Lowman