Ralph Vaughn Williams (1872-1958), Overture to The Wasps
During Ralph Vaughn Williams long life the composer witnessed the complete upheaval of the musical world, with the introduction of serialism and Arnold Schoenberg’s 12-tone system; rhythmic innovation and the eventual appearance of neo-classicism by Igor Stravinsky and his followers; and finally in the 1950’s an avant-garde movement that was philosophically based and questioned what exactly comprised music, led by American composer John Cage. Despite this musical turmoil (and two World Wars) and unlike his great Finnish contemporary, Jean Sibelius (1865-1957), who late in life retreated into compositional inactivity, Vaughn Williams continued to compose throughout his long lifetime. And while his individual compositional style did evolve over time, his distinctive voice did remain largely intact- there is no mistaking the Vaughn Williams “sound,” a combination of a traditional, tonal harmonic language with modal inflections; a clear folk song element; and lush orchestration.
The work we are hearing on today’s concert, Overture to The Wasps, was composed in 1909 in response to a request to write incidental music for a Cambridge University performance of the Greek playwright Aristophanes stage work of the same name. Vaughn Williams had in the previous year spent three months in France studying orchestration with another composer we are going to be hearing on today’s performance, Maurice Ravel. Ravel noted that Vaughn Williams was “…the only one of my pupils who does not write my music,” a statement that says as much about the strength of Ravel’s musical personality as it does the strength of Vaughn Williams own musical individuality and character. In any case, the Overture to The Wasps may not sound Gallic, but there is nothing in the work remotely reminiscent of the spirit of ancient Greece either- it breathes the distinctive Vaughn Williams “sound” mentioned above.
The incidental music as originally composed runs in total for almost two hours and uses, besides the orchestra, a chorus of tenors and baritones as well as solo baritone voices. Vaughn Williams later extracted five pieces into an orchestral suite, of which the overture is often performed independently. Full of light-hearted good spirit and catchy folk-like “tunes,” the Overture to The Wasps is quintessentially Vaughn Williams and the perfect opener to the ACO’s 2010 concert season.
Maurice Ravel (1875-1937), Le Tombeau de Couperin
With the outbreak of World War I Europe changed irrevocably- and the change was arguably felt no more acutely than in France and particularly in the capitol of French culture, Paris. It sometimes is forgotten that the frontline of this great conflict was for much of the period from 1914 to 1918 within close proximity to Paris, and the changes wrought by this war upon the entire psyche of the French people and nation was enormous. Marcel Proust, in the penultimate volume of In Search of Lost Time, writes movingly of wartime Paris and the changes in society changed by a modern war.
Like Proust, Maurice Ravel was profoundly affected by the war. Also like Proust, Ravel was initially found unsuitable for military service. Ravel, however, persisted and after a stint as a nurse’s aide eventually ended up in March 1915 as a truck driver for the 13th Artillery Regiment. Music was put aside as Ravel carried out his dangerous military duties shuttling back and forth from the rear to the frontline. His health deteriorated and by September 1916 Ravel was hospitalized with dysentery, leading eventually to his discharge from the Army in 1917.
As early as October 1914 Ravel had planned a new piano composition, a French Suite. Ravel wrote, “No it isn’t what you think: La Marseillaise will not be in it, but it will have a forlane and a gigue; no tango, however.” But after his combat experiences what had begun as a light-hearted homage to the great French baroque composer François Couperin and a golden era in French music turned into a memorial for those lost in the great war. The title, literally translated, is “Couperin’s Tomb.” However, that title is deceptive- French tradition designates a tombeau as being a composition or a collection of compositions that pay tribute to a departed colleague. Those being honored ended up being not only Couperin, but those friends of Ravel who died in combat defending their country- each movement is dedicated to a personal friend of the composer lost in the war.
Unlike other great memorials to those lost in war, Le Tombeau de Couperin is a gentle work, not full of the profound sadness of Richard Strauss’s Metamorphosen or the outright anger of Dmitri Shostakovich’s wartime symphonies. It evokes the memory of those it honors, not the tragedy and horror surrounding their deaths. From the original piano suite, Ravel eliminated two and rearranged the order of the remaining movements in the orchestral version of Le Tombeau de Couperin. The resulting work is a masterpiece of orchestration, using individual instruments in a masterful way and resulting in a delicate texture full of subtlety and transparency. That the orchestral version transcends the original piano version is generally acknowledged, and Ravel’s mastery of orchestration often takes “center stage” in performances or discussion of Le Tombeau. What should never be forgotten, however, are the profound losses that occasioned the composition of this most beautiful and delicate work and those whom memory it honors.
Gustav Mahler (1860-1911), Symphony #4 in G major
Although many commentators consider Mahler’s Fourth Symphony his most accessible work, that accessibility is truly deceptive. As is often the case, what outwardly appears to be simplistic and childlike often contains the deepest profundities. The very essence of the Fourth Symphony, like much of Mahler’s work, touches on themes of life and death that inform every measure of the composition.
One of the finest conductors of his or any generation, Mahler reserved his summers for compositional efforts. The Fourth Symphony was written during the summers of 1899 and 1900, although the kernel from which the Symphony springs dates from 1892. Mahler was profoundly influenced by Arnim and Brentano’s collection of folk poetry Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Youth’s Magic Horn), and his song Das Himmlische Leben (The Heavenly Life) was written in that year with a text from the poem of the same name from the Wunderhorn collection. Describing a child’s view of heaven, Mahler initially planned to use this song as the fifth movement of his Third Symphony before deciding to use it as the basis for the finale of the Fourth.
That the naïve, innocent spirit of the folk poetry found in this collection expressed a kindred spirit to that of Mahler’s own is evident by the sheer number of texts that Mahler set to music. Mahler’s entire existence was animated by a profound search for meaning in this earthly life, and he had a real affinity for the simple religious spirit expressed in Des Knaben Wunderhorn. The profound simplicity and innocence of the highest spiritual attainments finds voice in Mahler’s Fourth Symphony- it is the simplicity of ultimate, religious truth and wisdom, a simplicity that transcends earthly knowledge and understanding- only by abandoning our worldly cares and attachments can we find peace in knowledge of God.
That this religious “simplicity” is underpinned with musical complexity is not surprising nor is it contradictory- seeming paradox is inherent in profound religious experience. The four movements of the symphony contain numerous complex thematic links, all which find their source in the final movement. Mahler himself wrote to the conductor Georg Göhler in 1911 criticizing the program notes he had prepared for the Leipzig premiere of the Fourth Symphony: “Did you overlook the thematic relationships that are of such importance for the conception of the work? Or did you only feel that you must spare the public any technical explanations? In any case, I beg you to discover them in my work. Each of the first three movements has the most profound and significant thematic links with the last.” Not only are there many thematic links between the movements, but the writing is incredible dense, with the themes within the individual movements undergoing constant development, change and rearrangement. That the themes, musical and otherwise, upon which the symphony is built are stated in the final movement is, of course, the complete opposite of what is normally encountered. However, the religious “truths” that Mahler expresses in the Fourth Symphony ultimately require this unorthodox structure- it effectively expresses the need for man to abandon the world and its seeming complexities for the profound peace and love of God. The Fourth Symphony, then, is a constant regression from the world to a knowledge of the ultimate wisdom in God expressed through the eyes of an innocent, lamb-like child.
After a short introduction featuring tinkling sleigh bells, the first movement is in sonata form, the norm structurally for the first movement of a classical symphony, featuring two contrasting musical themes that are stated, developed and then recapitulated at the end. As was stated above, the straightforward structure of this movement features constantly developing and interacting musical motives within the sonata form. While the movement sounds very simple and clear in a formal sense, it belies the enormous complexities constantly at work within the musical tapestry.
The second movement originally bore the subtitle, “Death strikes up the dance for us; he strokes the fiddle most strangely and plays us up to heaven.” Utilizing a solo violin tuned up a whole tone to imitate the crude sound of a fiddle, the movement is a Scherzo with a beautiful Ländler (a peasant dance) trio section which appears twice. The contrast between the Scherzo, described by Mahler as “…mysterious, confused, uncanny… it will make your hair stand on end…” and the folk-like, lilting Ländler is striking. The image of death fiddling the dying to the otherworld is a common one in European folklore, and the programmatic implications in the symphony are obvious and confirmed in the movement which follows.
Mahler composed, in the third movement, the ascent to heaven. Concluding the quote above, Mahler wrote “…but in the Adagio which follows everything will be unraveled, and you will understand that no harm was meant after all.” This is the first symphonic movement in Mahler’s oeuvre that utilizes variations. Based on a theme first introduced at the opening of the movement, it is characterized by the composer as being “divinely gay and deeply sad” and it permeates the entire movement from beginning to end in varying permutations. Again, the seeming paradox of profound religious understanding is mirrored in a theme that somehow embraces both extremes of human emotion. Mahler further gave to this melody the features of the one of the saints to come in the finale: “St. Ursula herself, the most serious of all the saints, laughs, so gay is this higher sphere: that is to say, she smiles, and her smile resembles those on faces of the prone statues of old knights or prelates one sees lying in churches… with the peaceful, gentle expressions of men who have gained access to a higher bliss; solemn, blessed peace; serious, gentle gaiety, such is the character of this movement, which also has deeply sad moments, comparable, if you wish, to reminiscences of earthly life, and other moments when the gaiety becomes very lively.” The movement, and entire symphony, comes to a climax towards the end of the movement- a radiant orchestral tutti announces the opening of the gates of heaven.
For the final movement, Mahler offered no programmatic clues other than the text itself- “When man, now full of wonder, asks what all this means, the child answers him with the fourth movement: ‘This is the Heavenly Life.’” When revising Das Himmlische Leben for inclusion in the Fourth Symphony, Mahler remarked with delight on the “deep mysticism” of the poem. It is this deep mysticism, colored with the innocence of youth, which permeates the entire symphony and gives it its uniquely religious meaning.
We enjoy the heavenly delights,
therefore do we shun the earthly.
No worldly tumult is heard in heaven!
All live in balmiest peace!
We lead an angelic life!
But we are quite merry at the same time!
We dance and skip, we frisk and sing!
Saint Peter in heaven looks on!
John lets out the little lamb,
the butcher Herod lies in wait for it!
We lead a patient, innocent, patient,
darling little lamb to its death.
St. Luke slaughters the ox
without any hesitation or concern,
the wine costs not a penny in the heavenly cellar,
the angels bake the bread.
Good vegetables of every kind
grow in the heavenly garden.
Good asparagus, beans and whatever we may desire!
Whole tureens-full are prepared for us!
Good apples, good pears and good grapes!
The gardeners make room for everything!
If you want deer or hare, they come running to you
along the open road! Should a fast day perchance arrive,
all the fish swim by at once gladly!
There runs Saint Peter already with net and with bait
into the heavenly fishpond.
Saint Martha must be the cook!
There is truly no music on earth
with which ours can be compared.
Eleven thousand maidens venture to dance!
Saint Ursula herself laughs to see it!
There is truly no music on earth
