Concerts & Tickets

Programme note

Johann David Heinichen (1683-1729)
Sonata in F major for two horns and strings, Sei. 255 (c. 1715)

Allegro assai
Larghetto
Allegro

Heinichen’s name may not be familiar to us today, but this is largely thanks to his historical misfortune: his most direct contemporary was Johann Sebastian Bach. In his day, Heinichen was well-respected as both a composer and a theorist, with an extensive catalogue of music ranging from songs and masses to concertos and symphonies, but posterity has overlooked him in favour of his more famous counterpart. Until recently, much of Heinichen’s music was all but forgotten and the effects of the Second World War mean that, sadly, much of it is lost forever. But following the efforts of scholar/conductor Reinhard Goebel in the 1990s, his music is now enjoying a much-deserved resurgence.

Heinichen studied music at the Thomasschule in Leipzig – whose long list of distinguished former students includes JS Bach, his sons and, later, Richard Wagner – but upon finishing he went on to study law at the University of Leipzig. Just a few years into a successful career as an advocate, Heinichen found himself drawn back to the world of composition and he was soon being asked to write music for the Weissenfels court, before returning to Leipzig at the request of the manager of the opera house. Although Heinichen enjoyed a successful career in Leipzig, in 1710 he left to spend time in Venice, where he hoped to immerse himself in Italian opera and learn at first hand from composers such as Antonio Vivaldi. This formative musical sabbatical lasted some seven years, and he did not return to Germany until 1717 when he was appointed Kapellmeister to the court at Dresden, a post which he held until his premature death from tuberculosis at the age of 46.

The results of Heinichen’s stay in Italy colour his works in every sphere. Less overtly contrapuntal than much music of the North German Baroque style, his music borrows from the drama and virtuosity of the Italian concerto style, exploring new textural combinations and sonorities, while revelling in the grand instrumental forces that were available to him within the Dresden orchestra. Among his many works for orchestra and small ensemble, the Sonata in F major for two ‘Corno da Caccia’ and strings is a wonderful example of the exuberance and vigour that characterises Heinichen’s works. The ‘Corno da caccia’ (or ‘hunting horn’) is simply the name by which the orchestral horn was known in 18th-century Italy, but its use outside a full orchestral palette, as it is heard here, is altogether unusual. The result approaches a chamber concerto for two horns, and Heinichen mimics this with ritornello-like alternation between the horns and strings. At the work’s centre is a cantabile slow movement in C minor, in which the horns take centre stage with a lyrical duet. This melancholic movement, with sighing appoggiaturas in the horns and hushed string accompaniment, is soon swept away by the exuberant finale – whose virtuosic passagework and running semiquavers pays homage to the likes of Albinoni and Vivaldi.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Harpsichord Concerto in D minor, BWV1052 (c.1739)

Allegro
Adagio
Allegro

Though traditionally hailed as the fountainhead of all keyboard concertos, Bach’s dark-toned masterpiece in D minor was originally written, or so it is believed, for violin. It’s not a fact we should feel specially surprised to learn, any more than that the original was somehow lost. Bach, at ease with both instruments, knew all about transcription. Moreover, among great baroque composers, he was famously resourceful, possessing a sleight of hand that enabled him to transform one work into its opposite - a secular cantata into a sacred one, a shimmering violin toccata into a resonant organ one - with not only total conviction but apparently the minimum of effort. It was simply one aspect of a lavish inspiration which, if he had used it in a superficial way, would have made him seem a superficial composer, but which, since he used it with all the genius at his command, was just one more manifestation of his greatness.

Yet what music could sound spikier, or more harpsichord-like, than the bare, keen-edged main theme of the first movement of this D minor concerto, its angular outline recurrent enough to make the entire movement seem constructed out of this and little else? Or, for that matter, what music could now be said to sound more piano-like? The theme, in all its progressions and diversions, seems a vivid manifestation of the timbres of either of these instruments. But on the other hand, what could be more violin-like than the same movement’s fast-moving repetitions of a single note on what sounds like a violin’s open string? Stravinsky’s gloss on the same sort of sonority can be heard in his Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments.

When a harpsichord plays these repeated notes you may find yourself thinking of them simply as harpsichord music, or perhaps as violin music in disguise, or else as potential piano music, with a pianist as subtle as Edwin Fischer or, nowadays, Angela Hewitt as its performer. The music, for all its edginess, is multi-faceted, as Bach was bound to be aware when he wrote it and revised it and recognised how malleable it actually was.

Edinburgh’s distinguished essayist, Donald Francis Tovey, chose quite specifically to identify this harpsichord concerto as the greatest and most difficult violin concerto before the time of Beethoven. Was Bach therefore confounding future listeners by making the harpsichord his chosen instrument - and further confusing the issue by employing some of the same material in two of his church cantatas, Nos 146 and 188? The transformation of the sombrely trudging music of the concerto’s central adagio in G minor into the opening chorus of Cantata 146, entitled We Must Pass Through Much Tribulation to Enter the Kingdom of God, is certainly striking. But even if (as seems probable) the cantata was written first, the concerto version - where the theme is played, for thirteen bars, by the orchestra in unison, before the soloist breaks in with an eloquent, wide-spanning instrumental aria - is no less inspired.

Thereafter, with brilliant scales and arpeggios, the finale reinforces the vitality of the concerto’s opening movement.

© Conrad Wilson

Programme note

Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741)
Concerto in G minor ‘di Dresda’ RV 577 (c. 1716)

Although Vivaldi composed over 500 concertos over the course of his lifetime, and remains one of the most prolific composers of his generation, it was not until long after his death that he became a well-known musical figure. He published just a fraction of his works during his lifetime, most of which went largely unnoticed by musicians outside his own circle. Amazingly, it was not until the beginning of the twentieth century, almost 200 years after his death, that the public interest in Vivaldi was revived – largely thanks to the work of a French scholar, Marc Pincherle, who instigated the rediscovery of Vivaldi's original manuscripts.

Despite the wealth of concertos within Vivaldi's ouevre, and their superficial similarities, in fact his music is extremely innovative, often breaking with traditional forms and repeatedly looking for harmonic contrasts, new melodic ideas and inventive formal digressions. The diversity and inventiveness of his works is due in no small part to the musicians for whom Vivaldi was writing. Vivaldi was fortunate to have a talented group of musicians at his disposal in the form of the Ospedale della Pietô in Venice, where he worked as master of the violin from 1703-1740. The Ospedale acted as an orphanage to provide abandoned or unwanted children with shelter and education, giving the boys a trade to leave with at 15 and providing musical training for the girls, the most talented of whom stayed on to become part of the orphanage’s renowned choir and orchestra. This promising group of young players allowed Vivaldi to write challenging works tailored to their specific abilities, and they proved to be the inspiration behind many of his well-known concertos. 

Having been fortunate to explore and perfect his concerto writing at the Ospedale, Vivaldi soon attracted the attention of orchestras beyond the local area. In the spring of 1716, the lead violinist and later concertmaster of the Dresden court orchestra, Johann Georg Pisendel, arrived in Venice and spent some time meeting with Vivaldi and exchanging musical ideas – it is thought Pisendel even received violin lessons from the master. Pisendel was so impressed with Vivaldi’s music that he returned to the court with at least forty of Vivaldi’s manuscripts, and with plans to commission and perform a number of new works. From the manuscripts that survive, it appears that Vivaldi delivered some ninety instrumental concertos to Dresden – almost all of which are for one or more solo violins, suggesting that they were written specifically with Pisendel in mind. And since the Dresden court orchestra comprised the very best virtuoso musicians in Europe at that time, who were particularly receptive to challenging, modern repertoire, so too are the ‘Dresden concertos’ among some of Vivaldi’s most daring. The Concerto in G minor, RV 577 is one of around twenty concertos Vivaldi wrote for ‘molti Istrumenti’ (works with more than one principle solo instrument), and employs two recorders and two oboes as well as the violin as its soloists. But the virtuosic writing is not limited to the solo instruments – apparently conscious of the uncommon ability of his orchestra, Vivaldi also included soloistic writing for other instruments, including the bassoon, whose intricate melodies would not be out of place in a chamber concerto of its own.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Programme note to follow

Programme note

Paul Hindemith (1895-1963)
Kammermusik No 2 for Piano and Orchestra Op 36 No 1 (1924)

Sehr lebhafte Achtel
Sehr langsame Achtel
Kleines Potpourri: Sehr lebhafte Viertel
Finale: Schnelle Viertel

Few composers of the early twentieth century were able to distance themselves entirely from the political events around them, such was the turbulent atmosphere in which they found themselves writing. Paul Hindemith was no exception: his relationship with the Nazi regime remains a contentious issue, with accounts of his life varying dramatically regarding his allegiance. While Joseph Goebbels denounced Hindemith as an “atonal noisemaker”, other members of the party saw in his music the potential to celebrate a ‘new’ and ‘modern’ Germany. In truth, he fell in and out of favour with the Nazis during their time in power, and despite accepting a number of commissions under their direction, he was eventually rejected by their more radical factions and effectively pushed out of Germany in 1937.

During the three years in Switzerland that followed, Hindemith set about writing his own tonal theory to rival that of his contemporary, Arnold Schoenberg. Unlike Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique, Hindemith’s system was essentially tonal (centring around a tonic note), but its rather more free use of the twelve chromatic tones was intended to preserve the ‘natural’ or ‘acoustic’ basis of harmony, as he saw it. Melodically, Hindemith tried to avoid outlining major or minor triads, resulting in the angularity – and slight awkwardness – of the melodic lines. Although this theory appeared to open a new chapter in Hindemith’s compositional life, in fact Hindemith had already been exploring different kinds of musical ‘systems’ in his earlier works and shared many common interests with his ‘rival’ Schoenberg, such as the revisiting of antiquated forms and the possibilities of musical symmetry.

Many of Hindemith’s works from the 1920s demonstrate an interest with a systematic way of writing; in particular, his Kammermusik (Chamber Music) of 1924-7, exploits melodies which feature all the notes of the chromatic scale. Although the instrumentation suggests that these works are

not strictly ‘chamber music’ in the traditional sense, their outlook is distinctly small-scale, focussing on intensive motive development, clarity of line (with sharply differentiated instrumental sounds) and propelling rhythms – a rejection of the inflated emotionalism of post-Romanticism that preceded this period. Instead, this collection of eight compositions for varying instrumental ensembles pays homage to Hindemith’s longstanding love of Bachian counterpoint, clarity of form and technical precision. The Kammermusik No 2 for piano and orchestra is the first of the eight works to receive the subtitle ‘Concerto’, and features solo piano alongside a small ensemble of twelve ‘Solo-Instrumente’. Like Stravinsky’s own ‘neo-classical’ revival of baroque and classical procedures, Hindemith’s exploration of antiquated techniques appears to splice effortlessly with contemporary practice. The sharp, syncopated rhythms and alternating time signatures of the first movement produce the effect of a baroque moto perpetuo, while a ritornello-style alternation between soloist and orchestra breaks the otherwise unbroken melodic flow and illuminates Hindemith’s dense motivic craft. Beneath the complex harmonic system, the work as a whole also conforms to baroque expectations: with a broad, ornamented slow movement, a witty ‘Potpourri’ taking the role of the scherzo and a triumphant march to finish.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
Movements for Piano and Orchestra (1959)

Tempo = 110
Tempo = 52
Tempo = 72
Tempo = 80
Tempo = 104

A chameleonic composer to say the least, Stravinsky’s musical style underwent more radical transformations during the course of his career than perhaps any other composer to date. His styles are difficult to classify succinctly, but they are widely thought to fall into three identifiable periods: an early ‘Russian’ period, characterised by the use of Russian folk ideas, hard-edged sounds and rhythmic complexity; his subsequent ‘neoclassical’ phase (although he abhorred the term) which saw him look back to Classical and Baroque models and rejuvenate them with modern techniques; and lastly his ‘Serial’ period, in which he finally embraced the twelve-tone techniques that Arnold Schoenberg and his school had explored some years earlier. 

While the division of style into distinct periods is, as with every composer, an over-simplification of their musical development, in Stravinsky’s case the changes are readily identifiable. Yet one strand of his musical outlook remained constant through his career: his distaste for over-indulgence and personal expression. In his autobiography of 1936 he wrote: ‘I consider that music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all, whether a feeling, an attitude of mind, a psychological mood, a phenomenon of nature, etc... Expression has never been an inherent property of music. That is by no means the purpose of its existence. If, as is nearly always the case, music appears to express something, this is only an illusion and not a reality. It is simply an additional attribute which, by tacit and inveterate agreement, we have lent it, thrust upon it, as a label, a convention.’

Later criticised for this polemic, which was essentially a reaction to the indulgent sounds of Romanticism that preceded Stravinsky’s early works, Stravinsky maintained: ‘I stand by the remark, incidentally, though today I would put it the other way around: music expresses itself.’ Indeed, the idea that ‘music expresses itself’ goes a long way to explaining the disparate styles in Stravinsky’s oeuvre, each of which is connected by the fact that it is all ‘music about music’. This is nowhere more evident than in the serial works that make up his final period, where Stravinsky explored his own belief that: ‘Composers combine notes, that's all.’ Even the titles of these late works reflect this anti-expressive attitude: the ‘imaginatively’ titled Movements for Piano and Orchestra comprises five movements which are simply titled by their tempo indications. Having previously used serial techniques only sparingly, Movements is Stravinsky’s first completely serial work, employing the same rigorous twelve-note set – first heard in the piano at the opening – across the five movements. Despite this element of rigid regularity, the movements themselves are contrasted in texture, tempo and timbre, with interlinking interludes, which function as both coda to the previous movement and prelude to the next. At barely ten minutes long, it is a dense and extremely complex work, whose contrasts are as integral to its design as the repeated twelve-note set that anchors it. On its completion, Stravinsky declared: ‘I am becoming not less but more of a serial composer’.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741)
Concerto in D major RV 208 ‘Grosso Mogul’ (c. 1716)

Allegro
Grave
Allegro

Although Vivaldi’s 500 instrumental concertos include some 37 for bassoon, four for the mandolin and at least one for the ‘flautino’ or flageolet (a member of the flute family, similar to a recorder), nearly half of the total are for solo violin. The violin was Vivaldi’s own instrument but it was also the one taught to the largest number of girls at the Ospedale della Pietô in Venice, where he worked from 1703 to 1740. Most of these concertos were written expressly for his pupils, so the virtuosic nature of the music gives us some idea of the high standards these outstanding young musicians attained under his tuition. Writing after hearing one of the Ospedale’s concerts during a visit to Italy, French writer Charles de Brosses wrote: ‘The Ospedali have the best music here... Indeed they sing like angels, play the violin, flute, organ, oboe, cello, bassoon... The performances are entirely their own and each concert is composed of about forty girls... There is nothing so charming as to see a young and pretty nun in her white robe, with a sprig of pomegranate blossoms over her ear, leading the orchestra and bearing time with all the grace and precision imaginable.’

But de Brosses’ characterisation of these ‘charming’ performances may not be entirely accurate. It is more likely that Vivaldi’s performances were noisy affairs, with a house full of shouting, clapping and stamping listeners, who responded with applause to each virtuosic solo and every return of a well-known melody. It is for this reason that Vivaldi’s concertos are built upon tonal routines and repetitive forms: every build-up of harmonic tension brings with it a satisfying sense of release, and every divergence from the melodic patterning brings the possibility of startling the listener. In turn, each return of the principle theme reorients the listener and re-establishes a sense of comfort and stability. It is a formula, and one which works. Through his extensive development of the concerto form, Vivaldi was instrumental in establishing the three-movement plan (fast-slow-fast) as the recognised concerto model and making extensive use of the ritornello procedure (the return of a principle theme) during the outer movements. His emphasis upon close thematic unity and vibrant rhythms also came to be widely emulated.

The Concerto in D major RV 208 ‘Grosso Mogul’ was written during Vivaldi’s time at the Ospedale, but the origins of its title remain unclear and it is unlikely that Vivaldi gave it its name. It is a striking concerto in many respects, not least because Vivaldi composed his own cadenzas for the first and third movements, when it was far more common for performers to improvise these themselves. The concerto also includes a highly-unusual slow movement consisting of a series of recitative-like passages for the solo violin, which leaps and dances above sustained continuo chords. Here, Vivaldi commands his soloist to ‘speak’ instead of sing, in an innovative gesture that would have shocked and delighted his audiences as much as the dazzling outer movements.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683-1764)
Suite from Les Paladins (1760)

Though he lived to the ripe age of 81 and composed prolifically in his final years, Rameau’s operatic oeuvre is not is vast as it might have been – had he been brave enough to consider it earlier in his career. As he later admitted: ‘I have attended the theatre since I was 12, yet I first worked for the Opera only at 50, and even then I did not think myself capable.’ Rameau did not begin writing opera – the genre for which he is best-known today – until 1733, and spent most of his early career working as an organist and violinist, composing only occasionally and receiving relatively little recognition for his works. Little is known about this early period of his life, though it appears he held organist posts in Lyon, Clermont and Dijon. As a result, the few early works that survive are largely for church purposes – a handful of motets and cantatas, and a number of canons for mixed voices. A notable exception, his first book of works for harpsichord, Pièces de clavecin, was written as early as 1706 and marks Rameau out alongside François Couperin as one of the masters of harpsichord music in the early 18th century. 

After a rather unremarkable early career, punctuated only by the publication of his compositional treatise, Traité de l'harmonie, in 1722, the response when Rameau finally premiered his first opera, Hippolyte et Aricie, in October 1733, was dramatic. It was quickly hailed as the most important opera since the death of Rameau’s predecessor, Jean-Baptiste Lully, and was admired for its harmonic innovation and melodic originality. But its intensely dramatic style also alienated others, who found the music over-complex, unnatural and misshapen. This was the first of his operas to divide the public, in what would become a protracted battle between the ‘Lullistes’ (the traditionalists and Lully devotees) and the ‘Ramistes’ (Rameau’s supporters who favoured his contemporary style). Though the dispute gradually subsided during the 1740s and Rameau was eventually embraced as a court composer and given a royal pension, controversy was never far away and his works remained continually at risk of criticism for their relentless adventurousness.

To our ears today, these works appear firmly rooted in the French tradition, but for Rameau’s contemporaries they often broke with recognised musical customs. His comic opera, Les Paladins, though it includes elements of face and knockabout comedy, was criticised for mixing this with serious elements more befitting of a Tragédie. The libretto is based on a fable by La Fontaine and blends reality with the surreal as a young knight, Atis, struggles to free a young Italian girl, Argie, from captivity and win her hand. Several disguises later, and with the help of the fairy Manto, Atis is successful and manages to outwit her gaoler and claim his prize. Though Rameau was well into his seventies when he wrote it, Les Paladins contains some of his most adventurous orchestration and even incorporates new musical fashions, with a boldness of style and attention to detail more befitting of a composer in the throes of youth.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741)
Concerto in D major RV 208 ‘Grosso Mogul’ (c. 1716)

Allegro
Grave
Allegro

Although Vivaldi’s 500 instrumental concertos include some 37 for bassoon, four for the mandolin and at least one for the ‘flautino’ or flageolet (a member of the flute family, similar to a recorder), nearly half of the total are for solo violin. The violin was Vivaldi’s own instrument but it was also the one taught to the largest number of girls at the Ospedale della Pietô in Venice, where he worked from 1703 to 1740. Most of these concertos were written expressly for his pupils, so the virtuosic nature of the music gives us some idea of the high standards these outstanding young musicians attained under his tuition. Writing after hearing one of the Ospedale’s concerts during a visit to Italy, French writer Charles de Brosses wrote: ‘The Ospedali have the best music here... Indeed they sing like angels, play the violin, flute, organ, oboe, cello, bassoon... The performances are entirely their own and each concert is composed of about forty girls... There is nothing so charming as to see a young and pretty nun in her white robe, with a sprig of pomegranate blossoms over her ear, leading the orchestra and bearing time with all the grace and precision imaginable.’

But de Brosses’ characterisation of these ‘charming’ performances may not be entirely accurate. It is more likely that Vivaldi’s performances were noisy affairs, with a house full of shouting, clapping and stamping listeners, who responded with applause to each virtuosic solo and every return of a well-known melody. It is for this reason that Vivaldi’s concertos are built upon tonal routines and repetitive forms: every build-up of harmonic tension brings with it a satisfying sense of release, and every divergence from the melodic patterning brings the possibility of startling the listener. In turn, each return of the principle theme reorients the listener and re-establishes a sense of comfort and stability. It is a formula, and one which works. Through his extensive development of the concerto form, Vivaldi was instrumental in establishing the three-movement plan (fast-slow-fast) as the recognised concerto model and making extensive use of the ritornello procedure (the return of a principle theme) during the outer movements. His emphasis upon close thematic unity and vibrant rhythms also came to be widely emulated.

The Concerto in D major RV 208 ‘Grosso Mogul’ was written during Vivaldi’s time at the Ospedale, but the origins of its title remain unclear and it is unlikely that Vivaldi gave it its name. It is a striking concerto in many respects, not least because Vivaldi composed his own cadenzas for the first and third movements, when it was far more common for performers to improvise these themselves. The concerto also includes a highly-unusual slow movement consisting of a series of recitative-like passages for the solo violin, which leaps and dances above sustained continuo chords. Here, Vivaldi commands his soloist to ‘speak’ instead of sing, in an innovative gesture that would have shocked and delighted his audiences as much as the dazzling outer movements.

© Jo Kirkbride

Programme note

Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683-1764)
Suite from Les Paladins (1760)

Though he lived to the ripe age of 81 and composed prolifically in his final years, Rameau’s operatic oeuvre is not is vast as it might have been – had he been brave enough to consider it earlier in his career. As he later admitted: ‘I have attended the theatre since I was 12, yet I first worked for the Opera only at 50, and even then I did not think myself capable.’ Rameau did not begin writing opera – the genre for which he is best-known today – until 1733, and spent most of his early career working as an organist and violinist, composing only occasionally and receiving relatively little recognition for his works. Little is known about this early period of his life, though it appears he held organist posts in Lyon, Clermont and Dijon. As a result, the few early works that survive are largely for church purposes – a handful of motets and cantatas, and a number of canons for mixed voices. A notable exception, his first book of works for harpsichord, Pièces de clavecin, was written as early as 1706 and marks Rameau out alongside François Couperin as one of the masters of harpsichord music in the early 18th century. 

After a rather unremarkable early career, punctuated only by the publication of his compositional treatise, Traité de l'harmonie, in 1722, the response when Rameau finally premiered his first opera, Hippolyte et Aricie, in October 1733, was dramatic. It was quickly hailed as the most important opera since the death of Rameau’s predecessor, Jean-Baptiste Lully, and was admired for its harmonic innovation and melodic originality. But its intensely dramatic style also alienated others, who found the music over-complex, unnatural and misshapen. This was the first of his operas to divide the public, in what would become a protracted battle between the ‘Lullistes’ (the traditionalists and Lully devotees) and the ‘Ramistes’ (Rameau’s supporters who favoured his contemporary style). Though the dispute gradually subsided during the 1740s and Rameau was eventually embraced as a court composer and given a royal pension, controversy was never far away and his works remained continually at risk of criticism for their relentless adventurousness.

To our ears today, these works appear firmly rooted in the French tradition, but for Rameau’s contemporaries they often broke with recognised musical customs. His comic opera, Les Paladins, though it includes elements of face and knockabout comedy, was criticised for mixing this with serious elements more befitting of a Tragédie. The libretto is based on a fable by La Fontaine and blends reality with the surreal as a young knight, Atis, struggles to free a young Italian girl, Argie, from captivity and win her hand. Several disguises later, and with the help of the fairy Manto, Atis is successful and manages to outwit her gaoler and claim his prize. Though Rameau was well into his seventies when he wrote it, Les Paladins contains some of his most adventurous orchestration and even incorporates new musical fashions, with a boldness of style and attention to detail more befitting of a composer in the throes of youth.

© Jo Kirkbride