Program

Thursday, December 6, 2012, at 8:00Friday, December 7, 2012, at 8:00Saturday, December 8, 2012, at 8:00Sunday, December 9, 2012, at 3:00

Vasily Petrenko Conductorrobert Chen Violin

ElgarCockaigne Overture, Op. 40 (In London Town)

BarberViolin Concerto, Op. 14AllegroAndantePresto in moto perpetuo

RObeRT Chen

IntErmIssIon

shostakovichSymphony no. 10 in e Minor, Op. 93ModeratoAllegroAllegrettoAndante—Allegro

One hunDReD TwenTy-SeCOnD SeASOn

Chicago symphony orchestrariccardo muti Music DirectorPierre Boulez helen Regenstein Conductor emeritusYo-Yo ma Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant Global Sponsor of the CSO

This program is partially supported by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Comments by PhilliP huscher

2

Cockaigne overture, op. 40 (In London Town)

Edward ElgarBorn June 2, 1857, Broadheath, near Worcester, England.Died February 23, 1934, Worcester, England.

Elgar had already composed two of his greatest masterpieces,

the Enigma Variations and The Dream of Gerontius, when, late in 1900, the London Philharmonic Society wrote offering to perform a new orchestral work. Despondent after the disastrous premiere in October that year of The Dream of Gerontius, Elgar complained to his steadfast friend August Jaeger (the Nimrod of his Enigma Variations) that the Philharmonic Society had not offered a fee, and, after enu-merating the expenses involved in performing such a work, plaintively asked: “Now what’s the good of it?”

Jaeger, as usual, bucked Elgar up with encouragement. By November, Elgar was able to write: “Don’t say anything about the prospective overture yet—I call it ‘Cockayne’ &

it’s cheerful and Londony—stout and steaky’.”

While the connection between Elgar’s eventual title, Cockaigne, and London, the “land of Cockneys,” is fairly obvious—and was reinforced by the subtitle “In London Town” which Elgar added at the recommendation of a lead-ing London music critic, Edward Algernon Baughan—it is clear from personal annotations Elgar made on its literary definitions that there were other associations in his mind: “Cockaigne . . . ‘the land of all delights’ . . . An imaginary country of idleness & luxury  . . . Usually associated with Cockney—but the connection, if real, is remote.” Certainly, Elgar told the conduc-tor Hans Richter that “Cockaigne is the old, humorous (classical)

ComPosEd1900–1901

FIrst PErFormanCEJune 20, 1901, London, england. The com-poser conducting

FIrst Cso PErFormanCEnovember 29, 1901, Auditorium Theatre. Theodore Thomas conducting

most rECEnt Cso PErFormanCEsOctober 5, 1945, Orchestra hall. Désiré Defauw conducting

July 11, 1997, Ravinia Festival. Donald Runnicles conducting

InstrumEntatIontwo flutes and piccolo, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons and contrabas-soon, four horns, two trumpets and two cornets, three trombones and tuba, timpani, percussion, organ, strings

aPProxImatE PErFormanCE tImE15 minutes

CommEnts by DAnieL JAFFé PhiLLiP huSCheR

3

name for London & from it we get the term Cockney”—effectively reinforcing the idea that the over-ture was a celebration of London’s ordinary citizens rather than its grandees; but one should beware of assuming the overture is a faithful portrait of London in Elgar’s time. At the time of its composition, Elgar and his wife Alice had only spent one unhappy spell in the city some ten years earlier, when they had left their native Worcester for West Kensington in Elgar’s first unsuccessful bid to gain a professional foothold in the capital. Cockaigne is, rather, Elgar’s evoca-tion of an idealized community, a place of goodwill and high spirits where everybody, whether high- or low-born (something Elgar as the son of a tradesman was highly sensitive to), plays a vital role in its culture and sense of identity.

Dedicated to the composer’s “many friends, the members

of British orchestras,” the over-ture was first heard on June 20, 1901, at a Royal Philharmonic Concert conducted by Elgar in London’s Queen’s Hall. It was an instant success. To many of his contemporaries, including the astute critic George Bernard Shaw, the overture’s boisterous and celebratory character instantly recalled the overture to Wagner’s Die Meistersinger. Indeed, there is much in common between the two works (despite Elgar’s disingenuous protestations that he had learned more from Delibes’s ballet Sylvia): both celebrate a city’s mythical past, interwoven with the individual

concerns of young lovers who, as it were, represent the hope for that city and its culture; that is not to mention the resonant similarities between certain of Wagner’s and Elgar’s themes and their presenta-tion, nor indeed the C major tonal-ity shared by both overtures. Yet there is greater humanity in Elgar’s conception—boisterous and less “correct” in its deportment, and with an amused acceptance of human fail-ings such as the Salvation Army band which constantly fails to start in tune halfway

through Cockaigne.Elgar’s overture starts not with a

grand statement as does Wagner’s, but with a perky yet distinctive theme played sotto voce, almost as if it were overheard. Indeed, the slight hold on a high note seems to graphically suggest the intrigued listener, perhaps Elgar himself, to whom the theme has occurred, has paused to listen out for its further development. The theme then continues, building into a boister-ous, brass-capped full statement by the orchestra. Then follows a more wistful theme on the strings, full of blissfully sighing chromaticisms,

Edward and Caroline Alice Elgar just after their marriage

4

which might have been identified as that of the young lovers (similar as it is in character to Wagner’s love theme in Meistersinger); except this is the theme Elgar himself identi-fied as being inspired “one dark day in the Guildhall: looking at the memorials of the city’s great past & knowing well the history of its unending charity, I seemed to hear far away in the dim roof a theme, and echo of some noble melody.” After a vigorous near-peroration by the brass, the orchestra quietens for a more wistful, reflective theme, presented first by the strings, then by the woodwinds. This now is the theme which Elgar described as the lovers’ theme—not yearning like Wagner’s, but more assured, calm and tenderly loving.

Rather than needing a blow-by-blow commentary, the music unfolds its own eloquent narra-tive from these principal themes. But do listen for the solo clarinet, which twice initiates a crescendo: the first time with a perky theme which is in fact a cheekily speeded up version of the Guildhall theme, described by the critic Ernest Newman as a whistling tune of “the perky, self-confident, unabash-able London street boy . . . just as Wagner obtained the theme of his Nuremberg apprentices out of the Master-singers.” The second occasion, the clarinet plays another perky theme, this time genuinely

new, which is built up—with per-haps a hint of a tolling bell by the muted brass—into a grand march by the full orchestra (after which, in a calm interlude, we hear the incompetent Salvation Army band). In this way, Elgar seems to sug-gest that the greatness and spirit of Cockaigne is not only nourished by such institutions as the Guildhall, but also from the grassroots upwards. Indeed, Elgar explicitly said that vulgarity “often goes with inventiveness,” and such inventive-ness “in the course of time may be refined”—implicitly, one may assume, in his own music! Indeed, every major theme has its spotlight in the overture’s kaleidoscopic procession, whether in intimate scoring, or in a grand tutti state-ment. There is no hierarchy as such among those themes: the Salvation Army band apart, nothing is “inci-dental,” but every musical theme or character is essential in Elgar’s vision of “the land of all delights.”

—Daniel Jaffé

Daniel Jaffé is a regular contributor to BBC Music Magazine and a special-ist in English and Russian music. He is the author of a biography of Sergey Prokofiev (Phaidon) and the Historical Dictionary of Russian Music (Scarecrow Press).

5

Violin Concerto, op. 14

This is not the first violin concerto to have been declared

unplayable by the person for whom it was written. Tchaikovsky’s now-popular concerto also was rejected at first—although Leopold Auer, Tchaikovsky’s chosen soloist and a violinist of considerable accomplishment, eventually had the decency to admit his error (and later taught the work to his pupil Jascha Heifetz, who regularly played it). Barber was not so lucky, although time has proved the value of his work.

In 1939, Barber accepted a commission from Samuel Fels, a Philadelphia businessman (and the manufacturer of Fels Naphtha soap) who wanted a violin concerto for his adopted son, Iso Briselli, a child prodigy. (Briselli was born in Odessa, the birthplace of so many violinists including David and Igor

Oistrakh and Nathan Milstein.) Fels offered Barber $1,000—$500 up front, $500 on completion of the score. For a composer at the begin-ning of his career, it was without doubt a good deal. Or so it seemed at the time.

Barber wrote the first two move-ments that summer in Switzerland, but when Briselli saw them he complained that the music was “too simple and not brilliant enough for a concerto.” There are conflicting accounts of what happened next. According to the “official” story, dutifully repeated in program notes for years, Barber wrote a dazzling perpetuum mobile finale, which Briselli declared too difficult; Fels then asked for his money back, and Barber set up a performance to demonstrate that the movement was indeed playable—and that he needn’t repay the $500, which

samuel BarberBorn March 9, 1910, West Chester, Pennsylvania.Died January 23, 1981, New York City.

ComPosEd1939–40

FIrst PErFormanCEFebruary 7, 1941, Philadelphia

FIrst Cso PErFormanCEsJuly 30, 1960, Ravinia Festival. Jaime Laredo, violin; walter Susskind conducting

April 9, 1981, Orchestra hall. Jaime Laredo, violin; Leonard Slatkin conducting

most rECEnt Cso PErFormanCEsJune 3, 2000, Orchestra hall. itzhak Perlman, violin; Charles Dutoit conducting

July 25, 2012, Ravinia Festival. Joshua bell, violin; James Conlon conducting

InstrumEntatIonsolo violin, two flutes and piccolo, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, timpani, snare drum, piano, strings

aPProxImatE PErFormanCE tImE25 minutes

6

was already long spent. But in 1982, Briselli, who had, no doubt sensibly, given up the violin to run the Fels business, told his version of the story to Barbara Heyman, then at work on her definitive Barber biography. Briselli claimed that he had merely informed Barber that he feared the finale was “too lightweight” compared to the first two movements.

Nonetheless, a demonstration was set up to convince Fels that his money had been well spent. This took place at the Curtis Institute (where, not incidentally, Fels served on the board of trustees) in the fall

of 1939, before Barber had even put the finishing touches on the concerto. Herbert Baumel, a gifted Curtis student, learned the finale from Barber’s

manuscript in just two hours and played it in the studio of Josef Hofmann, the distinguished Curtis director, before a “ jury” that included Mary Louise Curtis Bok, the founder of the Curtis Institute, along with Hofmann, Barber, and Barber’s close friend Gian Carlo Menotti. According to Heyman, all parties immediately

agreed “that Barber was to be paid the full commission and Briselli had to relinquish his right to the first performance.” (Briselli was not present.)

Now Barber was free to find a new soloist for Fels’s commis-sion. (Barber took to calling it his concerto da sapone, or soap concerto, although it was becoming more of a soap opera.) And so the honor of introducing this now-beloved concerto fell to Albert Spalding, a little-known violinist whose name has a secure place in the history of American music as a result. (Eugene Ormandy conducted the premiere, with the Philadelphia Orchestra, in 1941.)

What regularly gets lost in the story of this concerto’s dif-

ficult genesis is the music itself, as direct and persuasive as anything Barber wrote. The concerto opens with one of Barber’s most inspired ideas, a warm and expansive theme stated at once by the solo violin. The entire Allegro is like a grand, reflective aria (even in much of his instrumental music, Barber is often a “vocal” composer) with intermit-tent dramatic episodes, but one in which unabashedly romantic, tonal melody reigns. The Andante, in the elegiac vein of the Adagio for Strings, opens with a poignant oboe solo, which the violin ulti-mately cannot resist. (In 1948, Barber changed the tempo marking of the first movement from Allegro molto moderato to a less relaxed Allegro, so that the concerto would not appear to open with two slow movements.) The controversial

Violinist Albert Spalding

7

finale is neither lightweight nor unplayable, although its brilliance is not of the more predictably heroic, fireworks variety.

A few footnotes. Herbert Baumel, the young Curtis student whose

playing “testified” on Barber’s behalf, substituted for Spalding at the first rehearsal for the premiere and so impressed Ormandy that he was offered a permanent position in the Philadelphia Orchestra.

When Mary Louise Curtis Bok commissioned Barber to write a work for the dedication of the new organ at the Philadelphia Academy of Music in 1960, he refused to accept the fee (reportedly $2,000), because of his longtime gratitude to her, and his admiration for her motto: “for quality of the work rather than quick, showy results.”

And finally, Barber eventually did get the remaining $500 Fels owed him.

The use of still or video cameras and recording devices is prohibited in Orchestra Hall.

Latecomers will be seated during designated program pauses. PLease nOTe: some programs do not allow for latecomers to be seated in the hall.

Please use perfume, cologne, and all other scented products sparingly, as many patrons are sensitive to fragrance.

Please turn off or silence all personal electronic devices (pagers, watches, telephones, digital assistants).

Please note that symphony Center is a smoke-free environment.

Your cooperation is greatly appreciated.

Note: Fire exits are located on all levels and are for emergency use only. The lighted exit sign nearest your seat is the shortest route outdoors. Please walk—do not run—to your exit and do not use elevators for emergency exit.Volunteer ushers provided by The Saints—Volunteers for the Performing Arts (www.saintschicago.org)

Symphony Center Information

8

symphony no. 10 in E minor, op. 93

We’re told that a recording of Mozart’s Piano Concerto

no. 23 was still on the record player when Joseph Stalin died on March 5, 1953. It was the last music he listened to, and it is hard to know what this merciless leader heard in some of the most sublime and civilized music ever written. Perhaps there’s a clue in Shostakovich’s own words, as recorded in Testimony:

Music illuminates a person through and through, and it is also his last hope and final refuge. And even half-mad Stalin, a beast and a butcher, instinctively sensed that about music. That’s why he feared and hated it.

Shostakovich, the composer Stalin hated most, had learned, through personal grief and public humiliation, of this fear. Twice since Stalin had assumed power in the twenties, Shostakovich felt the brutal power of Stalin’s attacks, and twice his artistic impulses had been devastated in ways scarcely equaled in any other time or place. Stalin’s first attack, prompted by an impromptu visit to the Bolshoi Theater performance of the opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, plunged Shostakovich into a crisis of con-science, changed his career forever, and, at the same time, altered the course of Soviet music.

The popularity of his written response to Stalin’s criticism—the Fifth Symphony—and his

dmitri shostakovichBorn September 25, 1906, Saint Petersburg, Russia.Died August 9, 1975, Moscow, Russia.

ComPosEd1953

FIrst PErFormanCEDecember 17, 1953, Leningrad, Russia

FIrst Cso PErFormanCEApril 5, 1962, Orchestra hall. erich Leinsdorf conducting

most rECEnt Cso PErFormanCEOctober 7, 2006, Orchestra hall. Paavo Järvi conducting

InstrumEntatIontwo flutes, alto flute and piccolo, three oboes and english horn, three clarinets and e-flat clarinet, three bassoons and contrabas-soon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones and tuba, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, military drum, snare drum, tam-tam, triangle, xylophone, strings

aPProxImatE PErFormanCE tImE57 minutes

Cso rECordIngs1990. Sir Georg Solti conducting. London

A 1966 recording with Leopold Stokowski conduct-ing was released on The First 100 Years.

9

increasing fame around the world only made Shostakovich the inevi-table prime target of the intensi-fied attack of February 10, 1948. This time, the official language of reprimand was stronger still, the accusations very specific, and the pressure to conform impossible to ignore. In response, Shostakovich not only withheld his First Violin Concerto, but he decided to write no more symphonies during Stalin’s lifetime. (One of the major proj-ects he did undertake was a set of twenty-four preludes and fugues for piano, inspired by a composer with no suspect political leanings and a spotless reputation—Johann Sebastian Bach.)

In March 1953, Shostakovich awoke to the news that Stalin was dead. His first professional act was to release the works he had withheld from performance; that summer he cleared his desk and began a new symphony, which he wrote at lightning speed. (Tatyana Nikolayevna, who gave the pre-miere of the preludes and fugues, claims that the symphony was actually begun in 1951, while he was writing the piano cycle; even so, it seems clear that he worked

extensively and urgently on the symphony only after Stalin’s death.) This is music of a new begin-ning, at once summing up all that Shostakovich had to say in the form of a symphony, releasing everything that the years of Stalin’s oppression had buried, and anticipating a fresh and enlightened era ahead. The Tenth Symphony was performed in Leningrad in December 1953, to a mixed response. In March 1954, the Moscow branch of the Union of Soviet Composers even called a special three-day conference to debate this important symphony, already recognized as a pivotal work in the history of Soviet music. Many didn’t know how to place it within the context of Social Realism that had governed Soviet composers since 1932. Some were put off by its apparent pessimism. Finally, in the elaborately ambigu-ous language that often springs from political gatherings, a young composer, Andrei Volkonsky, pronounced the Tenth Symphony an “optimistic tragedy.”

Soviet musicians quickly noticed, in the beginning of the symphony, a strong resemblance to the open-ing of Liszt’s Faust Symphony.

shostakoVICh’s musICal monogram

in several compositions, beginning with the First

Violin Concerto of 1948, Shostakovich spells out

his initials in musical notation. This four- note motive is derived from the German

transliteration of the composer’s own name, D. SChostakowitsch. in German notation, e-flat is called “es” and b-natural is h. Thus, DSCh is D, e-flat, C, b. The tradition for this kind of musical signature dates back at least to the time of bach.

10

Shostakovich’s friend and biogra-pher Dmitri Rabinovich insisted the reference was intentional. (Early in his career Shostakovich loved Liszt’s music; he later cooled—“too many notes.”) From those first strands of sound, sunken and mysterious, the music rises step by step toward a massive climax (some two-thirds of the way into a twenty-five-minute movement) and then retreats. The massive arch form, unerringly paced, is one of his finest accomplishments, and it achieves the kind of epic stature that eludes so many symphonies written in the twentieth century.

At the conference held by the Union of Soviet Composers, Shostakovich admitted that this movement didn’t realize his dream of a “real symphonic allegro.” We don’t know what music Shostakovich measured his own against, but the sense of a drama unfolding, of music developing before our eyes and ears, recalls the landmarks of the classical period—the works that defined “symphonic allegro” forever.

The scherzo that follows is concentrated fury—brief and to the point. Like much of Shostakovich’s angriest music, it’s set against a relentless moto perpetuo, with screaming woodwinds, flaring brass, and abundant percussion. The ensuing Allegretto begins as a dialogue between two kinds of music—one introspective, the other more assertive and proudly bearing the composer’s musical monogram (see sidebar on page 43). Stalin’s

death freed Shostakovich to write music so personal it bears his very signature in the notes on the page. This dialogue is interrupted twelve times by the gentle calling of the horn, a mysterious five-note sum-mons waiting for a reply. Although it has a resemblance to the horn theme from Mahler’s Song of the Earth, we now know that it’s really another musical signature—that of Elmira Nazirova, an Azerbaijani pianist and composer who had studied with Shostakovich at the Moscow Conservatory, and with whom he corresponded frequently during the summer of 1953. (The notes E, A, E, D, A correspond to E, L[a], Mi, R[e], A.)

When there is no answer, the finale begins, cautiously at first and then picking up speed and courage. This movement has often puzzled listeners because it answers the severe and despair-ing tone of the early movements with unexpected cheerfulness. It’s this music that makes the Tenth Symphony an “optimistic tragedy.” But even the affirmative final pages, where the DSCH motto is finally pounded out by the timpani, can never entirely sweep aside all the questions and fears that have been raised before. Shostakovich’s personal triumph, however, is unequivocal, for this is the first of his symphonies that Stalin would never hear.

Phillip Huscher is the program annota-tor for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.©

201

2 C

hica

go S

ymph

ony

Orc

hest

ra