Classic Ross Amico

Category: Daily Dispatch

Schoenberg: Beyond the Twelve-Tone Legend

Okay, pointy heads! It’s back to school – the Second Viennese School – for the birthday of Arnold Schoenberg.

The dour high priest of twelve-tone music was full of surprises. I venture to guess that many would be nonplussed to learn that the greatest prophet of dodecaphonic music claimed artistic kinship with Johannes Brahms. But then, some conductors (notably Karajan and Solti) have tried to interpret him that way. Even so, he remains one of the most hated composers among concertgoers who prefer programs of unsullied Beethoven and Dvořák.

Schoenberg may have preached the death of tonality, but he composed at least three Romantic masterpieces, “Verklärte Nacht” (“Transfigured Night”), “Pelleas und Melisande,” and the opulent oratorio “Gurrelieder,” before venturing into Expressionism with works like his Chamber Symphony No. 1. In the meantime, he also orchestrated his share of Viennese operettas and arranged Strauss waltzes for performance by his friends.

By the time he came to America, Schoenberg was probably the least “popular” composer in the world (if one of the most influential), but at his new home in Los Angeles his tennis partner was none other than George Gershwin. The two also shared a love of painting.

Adding to this “beautiful mountain” of contradictions, Schoenberg, like that other titan of 20th century music, Igor Stravinsky, made a game attempt to break into films. He was courted to write music for the 1937 big screen adaptation of Pearl Buck’s “The Good Earth,” but his proposed fee of $50,000 put an end to that.

Schoenberg did once prophesy that one day “grocer’s boys would whistle serial music on their rounds.” Maybe he actually meant cereal music. While to my knowledge that has yet to pass, I did once catch myself walking down the street humming the Golden Calf music from “Moses und Aron.”

Happy birthday, Arnold Schoenberg!

Schoenberg remembers his friend, George Gershwin

Gershwin films Schoenberg

Schoenberg home movies (Gershwin appears at the 30-second mark)

Schoenberg in private

Schoenberg on Alban Berg

“Gurrelieder,” Part I (1900-03, 1910)

Chamber Symphony No. 1 (1909)

“Pierrot Lunaire” (1912)

“Variations for Orchestra” (1926-8), conducted by Bruno Maderna

“Moses und Aron” (1930-32), The Golden Calf

A kinder, gentler Schoenberg – the Suite for String Orchestra (1935)

TWELVE IMAGES FOR TWELVE TONES: As this gallery demonstrates, Schoenberg wasn’t always the grim, humorless figure his portraits would suggest (images identified when you click through)

September 13, 2022
Jorja Fleezanis Minnesota Orchestra Concertmaster Dies

The violinist Jorja Fleezanis has died. Fleezanis served as concertmaster of the Minnesota Orchestra for twenty years (1989-2009). At the time of her appointment, she was only the second woman to be named concertmaster of a major U.S. orchestra.

Prior to her run in Minnesota, she was associate concertmaster in San Francisco for eight years. And before that, she was with the Chicago Symphony from the age of 23.

Fleezanis gave the world premiere of John Adams’ Violin Concerto, a work commissioned for her by the Minnesota Orchestra, in 1994.

With acclaimed pianist Garrick Ohlsson and principal cellist of the San Francisco Symphony Michael Grebanier, she formed the FOG Trio.

Public radio listeners with long memories will also remember her from her frequent appearances on “St. Paul Sunday” with Bill McGlaughlin.

Fleezanis was 70 years-old.

Plenty examples of her artistry on YouTube, both with the FOG Trio and her colleagues from the San Francisco Symphony.

Haydn & Brahms

Beethoven

Schumann

Arensky, Chausson & Saint-Saëns

Elgar

Dvořák piano trios

Dvořák quartet with members of the San Francisco Symphony

San Francisco Ravel

San Francisco Hindemith

San Francisco Shostakovich

Fleezanis interview

https://interlude.hk/in-touch-with-jorja-fleezanisconcertmaster-and-prophet/

September 12, 2022
Royal Music for the House of Windsor

Naturally, the death Queen Elizabeth II this week had me reflecting on all the music that was written for her. The coronation music alone could fill many hours, to say nothing of all the ceremonial and occasional pieces churned out over the course of her 70-year reign. It’s crazy to think that Sir Edward Elgar, so much an historical figure in our minds, wrote his “Nursery Suite” for then-Princess Elizabeth and her sister, Margaret.

Eric Coates. Sir Arnold Bax. Sir William Walton. Ralph Vaughan Williams. Herbert Howells. Sir Arthur Bliss. Sir William Walton. Benjamin Britten. Malcolm Williamson. Judith Weir. Many, many others, all wrote music for the Queen.

Be that as it may, this Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” we’ll broaden our scope even further to listen to music written for the Royal Family.

We’ll hear the “Suite for the Birthday of Prince Charles” by Sir Michael Tippett, the “Naxos” Quartet No. 8, composed for the Queen’s 80th birthday by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, and “The Thistle and the Rose,” commissioned by Charles for the 90th birthday of the Queen Mother, by Patrick Doyle – a composer best known for his film scores, especially those for Kenneth Branagh.

This is a rebroadcast from 2009, so don’t be scandalized if you hear King Charles III referred to as “Prince Charles” or Maxwell Davies alluded to as the “current Master of the Queen’s Music.” (Max died in 2016.)

I hope you’ll join me for a diadem of music for the House of Windsor. That’s “Sounds Imperial,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

September 11, 2022
9/11 Reflection Music Solace & Memory

9/11: A morning for reflection. The horror and surreality of that September morning, now 21 years ago, will never be forgotten. When my telephone (a land line!) rang around 9:00, I was already at work on my home computer (a Macintosh!), oblivious to the news. I picked up. A friend was on the line. She said a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. I imagined the Empire State Building and the B-25 accident, back in the 1940s. I was thinking maybe a piper. Bad enough in itself, certainly, but accidents do happen. Then she said one of the towers “fell over.” That was what sent me to the TV.

I had parents in the air that morning, on the way to China. The first leg of their journey took them west across Pennsylvania. Thankfully, they were not on United States Airlines Flight 93, that crashed near Shanksville, southeast of Pittsburgh, at 10:03.

The phone lines were jammed. Nobody owned a cell phone. It was a long day until I learned that their flight had been grounded in Pittsburgh.

My heart goes out to those who died senselessly, and for their survivors, for whom the day remains most vivid and painful, I’m sure.

It was a dark turning point for America at the start of a new century, and a new millennium. I wonder if we ever fully appreciated how good we had it here in the halcyon days of the late 20th century?

Not surprisingly, there has been a lot of music written in response to the horrific events of that morning, and the pain, heroism, and sacrifice. I’ve heard a lot of it, and for me, none of it as successful as Robert Moran’s “Trinity Requiem,” a masterpiece of solace and consolation.

The work was composed in 2011 for Trinity Wall Street, the so-called “Ground Zero Church” in Lower Manhattan, to mark the tenth anniversary of the attacks.

Here’s an interview I recorded with Bob shortly after the release of the CD (which I tweaked for rebroadcast last year), followed by a complete performance of the piece, a great balm for troubled times. If you’re not in the mood for the chit-chat, jump to the 16-minute mark for some truly lovely, reflective music.

https://www.wwfm.org/webcasts/2021-09-02/the-lost-chord-september-5-the-persistence-of-memory

September 11, 2022
Queen Elizabeth II & Benjamin Britten’s Friendship

Thank you so much to Colin Curless, who directed me to this touching article (linked below) about Queen Elizabeth II and her exceptional kindness to Benjamin Britten toward the end of his life. Britten enjoyed a special relationship with the Royal Family. The Queen Mother was a patron of the Aldeburgh Festival, founded by Britten in 1948, and the Queen, by all appearances, was a good friend over at least the course of his last decade.

Britten wrote an opera, “Gloriana,” as part of the celebrations surrounding Elizabeth’s coronation in 1953. It was given its premiere at Covent Garden with members of the Royal Family, including the Queen, in attendance. The opera, which portrayed Elizabeth I in what many considered an uncomfortably human light, was downbeat and “modern” and rather coolly received. If Elizabeth II didn’t care for it, she didn’t hold it against him. In fact, the composer was left with the impression that she was “delighted and flattered.”

The Queen opened the Snape Maltings Concert Hall at Aldeburgh in 1967, for the festival’s 20th anniversary. After the hall was damaged by fire in 1969, again she was in attendance at its reopening in 1970.

Britten never spoke publicly about his sexuality and was very careful about public displays of affection with his muse and life partner, the tenor Peter Pears. Nevertheless, the couple came under scrutiny of the police and at one point Britten wondered if Pears would have to be set up in a sham marriage.

It was only in 1967 that same-sex relationships were decriminalized in England. (In Scotland, it was not until 1981, and in Ireland 1993.) Although homosexuality was illegal in the UK for the first 54 years of Britten’s life, the Queen tacitly acknowledged his and Pears’ relationship, and after the composer’s death, she sent Pears a personal message of condolence. In all, Britten and Pears were creative and personal partners for almost 40 years.

When Britten died in 1977, his memorial service at Westminster Abbey was headed by the Queen Mother. It’s believed that Britten had declined a knighthood some years earlier (oddly, there doesn’t seem to be a record of it), but toward the end of his life, he accepted a life peerage.

This article is the first time I ever heard that he was offered the post of Master of the Queen’s Music – unusually, by Elizabeth herself, rather than an assistant, in advance of a public announcement – which Britten felt he had to turn down in light of his failing health.

You can read more about the Queen and Britten here:

https://www.classical-music.com/composers/how-the-queen-inspired-britten-to-start-composing-again-after-he-almost-died/?fbclid=IwAR1kWFYFBfe7QeT-g0oiUAsyGQHbz9NA_yBhslfScvp3reL-fgPdgmqaVgI

No one seems to have posted online the definitive recording of Britten’s “A Birthday Hansel,” with Pears and harpist Osian Ellis, the work composed for the Queen Mother referenced in the article. (There are other performances available if you search on YouTube.) However, I did come across this interesting 10-minute documentary, full of fascinating footage and commentary. The Queen makes an appearance around the 7-minute mark.

PHOTO: Britten and the Queen at Aldeburgh. In the background, left to right, Peter Pears, Imogen Holst (daughter of Gustav, a composer herself who served as Britten’s assistant), and Prince Philip

September 11, 2022

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