Three years after completing his First Piano Concerto, Tchaikovsky wrote his Violin Concerto in a single month while taking a rest cure in a Swiss resort on Lake Geneva. Here is the Wikipedia article which gives some interesting details about the initial reaction to the piece.
It was this piece that was my introduction to classical music. Before hearing this, at age 17 or 18, my exposure had been very limited. Where I grew up there were no concert halls, no orchestras, just the occasional traditional musician like my mother, who was an "old-time fiddler". There were no radio stations broadcasting classical music, either. So when a friend of mine put on an LP of this piece one day, it was a complete revelation.
Listening to it now I am struck by a number of things: first of all, it is a tremendous advance over the First Piano Concerto that I discussed last week. This piece is much more coherent in its structure. The whole first movement is based on one theme and some variants of it. It is very protean, however and the variations on the theme are extensive. Oddly enough, I am reminded of a Mozart piano concerto. Like Mozart, this whole movement seems spontaneous, flowing freely. The violin dominates throughout. Indeed, we don't get much of a tutti until measure 127! There really are only three major tuttis in the movement: that one, another that sets up the violin cadenza and the coda, shared with the violin. A tutti, by the way, is when the whole orchestra is let loose. Usually, in this concerto, it is only parts of the orchestra, accompanying the violin.
The movement starts with a brief orchestral introduction before the violin enters with a lyric mini-cadenza, followed by its statement of the theme:
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The second theme, which is really a variation of the first theme, is presented on the violin as follows:
Here is that first big orchestral tutti:
Here is a variation in G major for the solo violin:
And here is a variant using dotted rhythms:
One fascinating thing about this concerto as compared to the piano concerto, is how very lyrical it is, another way in which it reminds me of Mozart. Tchaikovsky is not the only one to display much more lyricism in the composition of a violin concerto as opposed to a piano concerto. We see something similar with Prokofiev, whose piano concertos are often very percussive, but whose violin concertos are very lyrical.
Let's listen to this superb performance with Itzak Perlman and Eugene Ormandy conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra:
The Piano Concerto No. 1 by Tchaikovsky was completed in 1875, though it underwent some revisions later on. A recent recording of it returns to the original version, but we usually hear the revised one. If you recall, the 18th century concerto always began with the orchestra stating the main theme with the entry of the soloist delayed until this was complete. Mozart broke with this on occasion, having the solo piano interrupt the orchestra, and Beethoven began a couple of concertos with the piano soloist. But it was Robert Schumann who laid out a new model for the Romantic concerto, giving the orchestra a single chord and having the solo piano present the opening theme. A number of composers we have looked at, including Grieg and Liszt, used this kind of opening while Brahms returned to the earlier format of delaying the entry of the soloist.
Tchaikovsky, in his first piano concerto, does something different. As the piano is now so powerful an instrument, both physically and culturally, it no longer has to assert itself so starkly. In an interesting turnabout, the orchestra is given the opening theme, but the piano accompanies them, all of them, with a huge chordal figure before taking over the theme itself. Here is how that looks:
After a brief four-measure introduction in the brass, the melody is given to the first violins and cellos--one of Tchaikovsky's great tunes. But this unusual effect, a single instrument accompanying a whole, large orchestra with huge arpeggiated chords (arpeggiated in large clumps, mind you) is a unique effect and makes for a powerful beginning. Then, as I said, the piano takes over the theme:
The Wikipedia article on the concerto says that "One of the most prominent differences between the original and final versions is that in the opening section, the octave chords played by the pianist, over which the orchestra plays the famous theme, were originally written as arpeggios." But didn't I just say that this version, the revised one, has huge arpeggiated chords at the beginning? Of course, there are lots of different kinds of arpeggios. The term is derived from the Italian word for harp, who typically has these kinds of textures:
This example is for piano, but harp arpeggios look just the same. However, to a theorist, prolonging a harmony by spreading it out in different octaves is also an arpeggiation and I was using the word in that sense. Playing the notes of a B-flat minor chord individually, as on a harp or guitar, or in solid groups of six or seven notes, and extending this harmony over one or more octaves for several measures is an arpeggiation to a theorist. Performers think of it differently, though and contrast what they call arpeggios with "solid chords", which is what the piano is playing here. This is because, to a performer, they present different problems of execution. Theorists aren't interested in execution, but they are interested in what the listener hears.
Even from the very first performance, in Boston in 1875 with Hans von Bülow as soloist, the work was a big success. At the premiere, the audience response was so enthusiastic that they had to repeat the finale! I witnessed a response like this myself on one occasion. In Toronto in the late 1970s, John Williams premiered a guitar concerto by Leo Brouwer with the composer conducting and the audience, composed largely of guitarists attending a festival, were ecstatic and delivered a five minute standing ovation. Finally, after having returned to the stage often enough to have shaken the hand of every single member of the orchestra, Williams and Brouwer decided to play the slow movement again. So yes, these things happen. Just not very often!
Without going into further analysis of the piece (for a non-technical one you might look here), let's listen to it. Here is a classic performance with a young Martha Argerich and Charles Dutoit conducting the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in 1975:
It's Tuesday so time to check out what Tom Service has for us today over at the Guardian's weekly symphony guide. I'm going to miss this series when it is done in the very near future.
Today's installment is on the Symphony No. 6 by Tchaikovsky, nicknamed the "Pathetique" and his last and most-perfect symphony. I just listened to this a few days ago and it is an impressive work. As is usual with him, Tom begins by exploding some of the typical characterizations of the piece and in this case, it is called for and well done. No, this is not a "suicide note" from the composer and it is probably the finest music Tchaikovsky wrote. Mind you, Tom then blots his copybook by dragging back in some programmatic comments that Tchaikovsky originally wrote about a previous symphony that he was sketching. So, six of one taken away only to add on half a dozen later on. Tom is quite right in describing the symphony in this way, however:
That slow, lamenting finale turns the entire symphonic paradigm on its head, and changes at a stroke the possibility of what a symphony could be: instead of ending in grand public joy, the Sixth Symphony closes with private, intimate, personal pain.
Yes, it is with this movement that Tchaikovsky creates (or perhaps recreates if we take Beethoven and Schubert into account) the notion of the symphony as existential struggle rather than public celebration. It certainly started as a communal act of celebration: nearly every symphony by Haydn and Mozart fulfills that purpose. But with Beethoven darker elements begin to appear and with this symphony by Tchaikovsky they take over the form. I have written about this here. Tom ends his essay with this comment, which I think is quite true:
He knew this piece marked a new high-watermark in his confidence as a composer, and that he had re-invented the symphony on his own terms, and for so many composers who came after him. Mahler, Shostakovich, Sibelius, and many others could not have composed the symphonies they did without the example of Tchaikovsky’s Sixth. It’s just a terrible fluke of fate that this was his last symphony, and not the beginning of what could have been his most exciting creative period as a composer.
Now let's have a listen to the Symphony No. 6 by Tchaikovsky. Here is Mravinsky and the Leningrad Symphony:
This is the second symphony by Tchaikovsky to appear in the series. Tom previously wrote about the First Symphony.
One of my posts on Sunday was, without me noticing, my 500th post. So I think I will take a moment and have a look at the progress of this blog.
The main thing I notice is that I learn a great deal from posting. The obvious way is that most posts have to be researched to some extent. But there is a more interesting and less obvious way. Doing the blog is an exploration of my own engagement with music over some forty-six years. I tell anecdotes from that whole period and it puts it in perspective for me. I start to get a more or less objective sense of my own life and career while telling it to the blogosphere. Of course, this is not what I am actually trying to do.
My real purpose with the blog is to talk to people about music. I have always had a kind of instinctive attraction to teaching. I think you only start to be sure of what you know when you try to tell it to others. In so doing you discover things you didn't know you knew, you discover gaps in what you thought you knew and sometimes you even discover new things and connections between them.
One thing I have discovered is that it is difficult to have objectivity about your career and abilities when you are in the middle of it. You really don't think about these things, you are too busy learning music, playing concerts and teaching. Now that I am away from all that I realize some odd things. I was trying as hard as I could to be a guitar virtuoso and came pretty close.
At my peak I was playing the Rodrigo Concierto de Aranjuez for guitar and orchestra and doing a pretty good job--something that relatively few guitarists can do. I actually think that I may have been the first Canadian guitarist to perform the piece with orchestra. One performance was recorded for nation-wide broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. They also recorded my performance of the Villa-Lobos Concerto with the CBC Vancouver Orchestra. Another CBC broadcast was of a solo and chamber recital in which I played the Manuel Ponce 20 Variations and Fugue on Folias de Espana. That is one of the longest and hardest pieces in the repertoire.
So, a strong performer at least. But I had to work very, very hard to sustain that because I am not a natural virtuoso. I'm also not quite consistent enough--sometimes I made mistakes. The great virtuosi are like machines and rarely make mistakes. While I was struggling to become and remain a virtuoso, I was neglecting something much more interesting and important: I can compose music. I have always composed music, even before I was a musician. The first time I saw someone reading from a score I looked closely at it and then went off in a corner and scratched down an imitation of it on a piece of paper, then ran back and said "play this!" I was nine years old. I taught myself how to read music, something few people do. When it comes to understanding and creating music I have more natural talent than I do as a guitar virtuoso.
I have been composing music for at least as long as I have been a musician--forty-six years. But for all but the last five or so years, I didn't really take it seriously. It was something I did, but I barely noticed that almost no other performers of my acquaintance did the same. I was friends with composers, but didn't feel as if I was one of them. I did take some informal composition lessons at one point and wrote a piece for two guitars and harpsichord that was very well received by the audience. This was in 1977 and I much later realized that it was the first 'process' piece for guitar, preceding Steve Reich's own piece for multiple guitars by at least a decade.
So if I had been a lot more self-aware and open-minded, I would have switched from performance to composition back in the 70s. But many of we humans are not so self-aware! For some reason I became fixated on being a guitarist: that was my identity. Even though I could compose and was interested in it, I couldn't imagine myself being a composer. This might have been partly because the only models I had of being a musician up until I was twenty years old, were performers. I had never met a composer and probably thought that they only existed in books or the distant past. This may be why most musicians tend to come from families of musicians. They get exposed to different models from an early age and this gives them a wide field of possibilities. If I had met a composer when I was nine years old, that might have been an inspiration.
But enough of this. I'm not a narcissist and don't usually indulge in a lot of autobiography in this blog. Sure, I tell anecdotes from my experience, but they are meant to illustrate a point. Let's end with the first piece of classical music that really made a big impact on me and started my 'conversion'. The Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto:
Richard Taruskin's five-volume history of music, the Oxford History of Western Music, keeps giving me ideas for posts. In discussing Schubert's Unfinished Symphony he mentions the very few other symphonies in this key. Let's have a look at them.
You would think that there would be scads of symphonies in this key, only two sharps away from A minor, but no. The only previous one by a major composer is one of a group of six written by C. P. E. Bach in 1773 for Baron van Swieten. It is in three movements, Allegretto, Larghetto and Presto. It is not a lengthy work and is for strings alone.
The decade of the 1770s was noted for its "storm and stress" mood in music. The symphony had traditionally been rather a cheerful, convivial kind of music. But composers soon started to use the resources of the orchestra to paint some darker moods. Still, until the 19th century, symphonies in minor keys are relatively rare. Mozart's 40th Symphony in G minor stands out for that reason. In 1772 Joseph Haydn wrote a symphony in B major and cast the second movement in B minor. The work is scored for two oboes, bassoon, two horns and strings. Here is the whole symphony. The second movement, Poco Adagio starts around the 5:30 mark. It is in the style of a siciliana.
Given that fairly modest background to the idea of a symphony in B minor, Schubert's Unfinished stands out even more strongly. Every composer, at least in those days, probably had a few unfinished symphonies in his drawer. When you start to compose quite often the music just doesn't unfold as it should, or you get side-tracked into some dull ideas or just lose your way. So there they sit, sketches of potential works. Schubert had a few unfinished symphonies of his own. But TheUnfinished is a bit different. There is a manuscript full score of the first two movements, two pages of a Scherzo, a piano sketch of the rest of the Scherzo and that's it. The nickname "Unfinished" may be just that, a nickname for a piece that Schubert decided was complete after just two movements. It was written in 1822, before the "Great C Major" that I discussed in these twoposts. Like a number of Schubert's larger works it was never performed during his life. The Unfinished wasn't even published until 1866!
The symphony begins with a mysterious "preface theme" in the low strings. In the score it is phrased in two-measure groups, but it is just as easily heard as 2 + 3 + 3 as I have bracketed it in the example below. Here is the opening group of themes from the first movement:
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Despite the fact that the nearest model for Schubert in the symphony genre was Beethoven, and despite the fact that Beethoven did use "preface themes" (usually to replace a slow introduction), this sounds nothing like Beethoven. That opening theme in the bass is very mysterious. You could say, "yes, but Beethoven had a very mysterious beginning to his 9th Symphony in D minor, did he not?" Yep, but the 9th Symphony of Beethoven was written in 1824, two years after this one! This symphony, apart from being in a very unusual key, has also very unusual themes. The texture here, with the strings accompanying the winds in the third theme above, owes little to Mozart and Beethoven, but we find it in Rossini, in the overture to the Barber of Seville, for example. Now let's listen to the music. Here is the whole Unfinished with the score:
There is just a touch of the operatic in the first movement, especially in the forzando chords in the full orchestra that from time to time punctuate the texture, followed by suspenseful pizzicati. Twice we return to that bass "preface theme" and each time it seems more ominous. What Schubert is doing here is inventing how to create romantic subjectivity in music. This was first done in the smaller forms, the songs and impromptus heard in the salons where Schubert achieved his success. Now he is moving it to the larger concert hall. He had no immediate influence because no-one heard this music until the second half of the century, but when they did, it made a huge impact on the romantic symphonists like Brahms and even Mahler.
There was one other symphonist who felt the impact of the Unfinished and that was Tchaikovsky whose 6th symphony is not only in B minor, but also ends with a slow movement! Here it is:
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