How did I come to pick this piece?
When I posted Camille Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No. 3 in C Minor, the “Organ Symphony,” on my list of Top 100 Classical Music Favorites (see #37, HERE), I also posted a list of “organ symphonies” and “symphonies for organ and orchestra,” HERE. I was surprised how many there were. I suspect I’ve heard only one of them in my life – the one by Saint-Saëns – so I thought I’d pick one at random to listen to this week. I chose Copland’s work because (a) I tend to like Copland’s music and (b) I had no idea he had written a symphony for organ and orchestra. This piece is, indeed, a symphony “for organ and orchestra” and not an “organ symphony” because the organ is not presented as a solo instrument with the orchestra accompanying it during a featured work. Instead, the organ is just another instrument in the orchestra for this symphony. How did I like it? Well…it was okay. While Copland is credited with capturing American landscapes in his music, that is not necessarily the case with this Symphony for Organ and Orchestra. While the sound is recognizably Copland-esque, the piece does not evoke a particular abstract of Americana. Instead, it is more about movement and perpetual motion than it is about evocative phrases and melodies. Written in 1924, this symphony is important in that it is Copland’s first fully realized orchestral work. The symphony has three movements: a quiet, contemplative prelude; a faster, steady scherzo (with a hint of the Blues), and a finale that really has two sections: a slower, mournful lento section to start, followed by a bolder, more persistent allegro part at the end. As I stated above, though, the entire piece has more of a focus on movement than melody. There is rarely a beat missed when some instrument isn’t playing a note to move the work forward. It’s unrelenting, like a clock tick-tick-ticking (or at times even like a faucet drip-drip-dripping). Whether a section of the work is more tranquil and contemplative or more fervent and bold, the forward motion is always present. True, there is an occasional swell in dynamics or perhaps even a brief pause, but soon the perpetual motion persists. In the final movement there is a repeated motif with different instrumentation with a grace note and a slide into the main note that penetrates the forward motion of the piece with a jolt here and there, almost as if the forward flow has become unsure or unsteady. However, with the help of a beating timpani and some bold brass, though, the motion regains its confidence. Exultant chords on the organ take the final steps of the symphony’s advance. Overall the piece is not one of Copland’s more memorable works; however, it is interesting to hear the foundation for what was to become the Copland sound.
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For this week’s selection, I ran a Google-search of “underrated classical music pieces,” and one site I found -- HERE – listed “Herrmann: Symphony No. 1.” Herrmann? As in Bernard Herrmann? As in the Bernard Herrmann who wrote the movie soundtracks for so many Hitchcock thrillers? Yep. The “Herrmann” referred to on the list of “38 Classical Hidden Gems You Should Listen to Right Now” was, indeed Bernard Herrmann. I was excited to give this symphony a try because I love Herrmann’s scores for “Vertigo,” “North By Northwest,” “Psycho” (rated #4 on the AFI list of top movie scores – HERE), and many other movie soundtracks (a list of his soundtracks is HERE). However, I had never heard any nonprogrammatic music by Herrmann before, so I wondered just how this would go. Below left: Scene d'Amour from "Vertigo" Below center: The overture from North by Northwest" Below right: The full soundtrack from "Psycho"
Herrmann was thirty-years old when he composed this piece, and he said, “For the first time I was not confined to the outline of a story. It was not necessary to depict waves, portray the anguish of a lost soul, or look for a love theme....Consequently, working on the Symphony I had a Roman holiday." The symphony lasts about 35 minutes, and it’s composed in a traditional format of four movements: 1. Maestoso: Allegro pesante 2. Scherzo 3. Andante sostenuto 4. Rondo: Epilogue à la processional The piece opens with a dramatic horn solo followed by an equally dramatic tangle of string, brass and woodwind phrases – and dramatic timpani rolls – all of which suggest tension. As a matter of fact, I couldn’t help but think of a chase and struggle on top of Mount Rushmore a la "North by Northwest." A little after two-minutes in, though, things quiet down a bit as the woodwinds lay a foundation for a more pensive mood with the strings. About six minutes in, a crescendo of lush strings punctuated by forceful chords in the brass suggest that the piece is about to take off – but things remain quiet though tense. An echo of the opening call of the horn is heard, and at close to nine minutes, the entwined phrases throughout the orchestra build to pounding timpani – but again, the drama fades. This dramatic ebb and flow continues until the end of the movement, when dissonant chords in the brass and one last timpani roll herald more drama to come. The second movement is a vigorous scherzo with a bit a macabre mood. Even the quieter sections hint at something a bit chilling. The third movement opens with a mournful tune from the woodwinds and strings. Hints of the score’s past drama are peppered throughout with brief outbursts of brass and timpani; however, the somber mood endures. Then, at about 27 minutes in, the melancholy and the (feel of the) earlier drama peak together in dramatic climax – followed by a short, quiet lament of a clarinet to end the movement. The fourth movement opens with a trumpet fanfare, and then the mood of the entire symphony shifts. This movement sounds more jubilant, more celebratory. There’s a bit of an introspective section in the middle with woodwinds and pizzicato strings, but it is not at all as somber as anything that came before. Soon, though, the boastful feel of the movement returns and continues until the symphony’s very triumphant end. Although the symphony has a bit of a fragmented feel – especially with how we got from “A” (the first three movements) to “B” (the final movement) – I did like it very much. Having listened to so many of Herrmann’s masterful scores, I couldn’t help but wonder what narrative Herrmann might have had in mind as he composed this work. ' At BernardHerrmann.org, an essay written by Bill Wrobel notes that Herrmann “tended to excel in music written not so much in a co-called abstract construct (concert works, say, or symphony) but in response to an external stimulus or medium such as the Big Screen (feature film), the Small Screen (television), radio plays, and the opera (Wuthering Heights). His dramatic instincts really shined in these Show Business mediums." In this case, with his Symphony No. 1, Herrmann did, in fact, excel.
For this week’s selection, I ran a Google-search of the most underrated composers. I found this list – HERE – and voila, there was Fanny Mendelssohn. Coincidentally, I had mentioned Fanny on this site – sort of -- when I posted #26 on my “Top 100 Classical Music Favorites. Concerning Felix Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 4, I wrote, “when Mendelssohn was in the process of writing it, he wrote to his sister, ‘The Italian symphony is making great progress. It will be the jolliest piece I have ever done, especially the last movement.’” I didn’t even mention her name. Furthermore, at the time, I didn't even know that she was a composer.
Who knows what type of success Fanny could have achieved if she were to have garnered the same praise and support as Felix.
To select a piece by Fanny Mendelssohn, I ran a search on YouTube of her name, and voila once again, I found the “Overture in C,” her only purely orchestral work. Evidently, this work remained unpublished during her lifetime, and as a matter of fact, it was not published until 1994. As far as I know, there is no story related with this overture, although there are various passages and melodies that made me wonder what story she might have had in mind were this overture to open an opera. The piece begins with a soft chord from the horns followed by a delicate, lilting melody played gently between the strings and woodwinds. Then, after a sparkling run of strings and a somewhat subdued fanfare, the piece takes off with energetic strains until the end. There are a few surprises, a key modulation here and there, and an occasional variation in dynamics, but overall, the piece is reasonably conventional – though entirely effervescent.
At first, it just seemed as though the piece needed – something? However, on subsequent assessments, I’ve backed off from that evaluation. The overture grew on me. The Overture in C Major is a very pleasant piece, and it is delightful just the way it is. It is a fun piece, a jaunty piece, and one I enjoyed very much.
I’ve always heard of Arnold Schoenberg, but I really don’t know much about him. I Google-searched his “greatest works,” and Verklärte Nacht, an early work of his written in 1899, came up first. One article I found described it as “his earliest important work,” so I thought I’d give it a try. “Verklärte Nacht” translates to “Transfigured Night,” and it was inspired by a poem of the same name HERE by German poet Richard Dehmel which describes a man and woman walking through a forest on a moonlit night. The woman shares a dark secret with her new lover -- that she bears the child of another man -- and the man reacts to her confession: Do not let the child you have conceived be a burden on your soul. Look, how brightly the universe shines! Another translation of the poem on Wikipedia is found HERE. Schoenberg’s work is written for a string sextet, and to be honest, it reminds me very much of a musical soundtrack one might hear to accompany a classic old movie, certainly a romance or perhaps some vintage film noir. In this case, it underscores a poem. Picture a scene where the leading man is clutching the ingenue or femme fatale as he is gazing into her tear-filled eyes -- like Bogart and Bergman at the end of “Casablanca.” Or maybe something like Detective Mark McPherson in “Laura” as he stares at and falls in love with the painted image of the murdered woman. Or perhaps a scene like Jimmy Stewart in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” as John “Scottie” Ferguson, pleading with Judy Barton, played by Kim Novack, to change her style, her clothes and her hair so that she can resemble the mysterious – and murdered – Madeleine Elster.
By the way, when Hedy Lamar was asked why she had turned down the title role in the film “Laura,” she said, “They sent me the script, not the score.” Schoenberg’s work isn’t flawed or deficient. It is a gentle and pleasant work, and perhaps at times a bit gripping. It includes no real pyrotechnics – not that any are needed. However, it tends to border on the melodramatic, and there just isn’t anything particularly memorable about the melody lines. Schoenberg’s work does do an admirable job conveying the quiet, moonlight night as “Two people walk through a bare, cold wood,” the poems opening line, and I can imagine that listeners in 1899 felt as though Schoenberg might be pushing the world of classical music to a threshold of "a new kind of sound and a new way of listening" as described by Michael Clive for the Utah Symphony (HERE). I’m sure it was harmonically innovative in its day, though today it doesn’t quite have a modernistic push strong enough to test the boundaries of composition. Also, although the emotional story-telling is adequate, it doesn’t seem to reach the intensity of passion of the movie themes I described above. I’m going to be honest I could listen to the lush strings and intense emotion of Bernard Herrmann’s “Scene d’Amour” every day. Schoenberg’s “Verklärte Nacht”? I’ve heard it once, and -- as time goes by -- I think that may just be enough. |
A New Hope:As the header above says, each week I will listen to a piece of classical music that I've never heard before, and then I will report out what I thought about it. Archives
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