UMS Concert Program, September 12, 1967: New York Philharmonic -- Leonard Bernstein

Season: Eighty-ninth
Concert: Special
Complete Series: 3581
Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor, Michigan

1967 Eighty-ninth Season 1968
UNIVERSITY MUSICAL SOCIETY
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Charles A. Sink, President Gail W. Rector, Executive Director Lester McCoy, Conductor
Special Concert Eighty-ninth Annual Choral Union Series Complete Series 3S81
Thirty-seventh program in the Sesqmcentennial Year of The University of Michigan
New York Philharmonic
LEONARD BERNSTEIN, Music Director
Tuesday Evening, September 12, 1967, at 8:30 Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor, Michigan
PROGRAM
?Symphony No. 4 in G major, for Orchestra
and Soprano Solo.........Mahler
Heiter bed'achtig. Nicht eilen--Recht gemachlich In gemachlicher Bewegung. Ohne Hast Ruhevoll (poco adagio) Sehr behaglich
Jeannette Zarou, Soprano
INTERMISSION
Symphony No. 2............Ives
Andante moderato Allegro
Adagio cantabile Lento maestoso Allegro molto vivace
Recorded by the New York Philharmonic and Leonard Bernstein
The Steinway is the official piano of the New York Philharmonic The New York Philharmonic records exclusively for Columbia Records
ARS LONGA VITA BREVIS
PROGRAM NOTES
Symphony No. 4 in G major, for Orchestra and Soprano Solo Gustav Mahler
Although he was much given to gigantic forms and metaphysical thought, Mahler also was strongly attracted to the simplicity and naivete of folk art. This attraction is especially clear in his Second, Third, and Fourth Symphonies. All three symphonies of this group are inter-connected through their use of poems from the famous Romantic collection of folk poetry, Des Knaben Wunderhorn. The Fourth Symphony is thematically connected to the Third because the finale of the Fourth Symphony was originally conceived as a movement of the Third.
The Fourth is the shortest of Mahler's symphonies, the most unpretentious, ingratiating, and, in its first three movements, the most orthodox in form of any symphony he had written up to this point. The Fourth Symphony was evolved backwards from the finale. Thus, the first three movements are all thematically related to the finale.
I. Heiter, beddchlig. Nicht eilen--Recht gemachlich. The glittering color of four flutes and sleigh bells, with which the symphony opens, suggests, as Mahler's music so often does, an unadmitted descriptive inspiration. The bright chirping sound of these opening bars is taken from the fourth movement, where it is a recurrent refrain. Here it serves as introduction to the principal theme. Almost immediately the first violins take up the graceful, easy-going melody. After a few bars the chief secondary theme, a lilting melody in folk-song style is "sung broad?ly," according to the composer's directions, by the cellos. As the movement develops, other simple melodies are added before the opening themes are recalled in approximately their original form.
II. In gemdchlicher Bewegung. Ohne Hast. The movement is a strange sort of scherzo which Mahler characterized with the words, Freund Hein spielt auf ("Death leads the music"). The concertmaster is directed to alternate between two violins, one of which is tuned a whole tone higher than normal and played "like a fiddle" (a primitive sort of violin) very assertively.
III. Ruhevoll (Poco adagio). Bruno Walter once asked Mahler what lay behind the "pro?found quiet and clear beauty" of this movement. Mahler explained that the movement had been inspired by a vision of a church sepulchre, with the reclining stone figures of the dead, "their arms closed in eternal peace." Formally, it is an amalgam of variation and sonata form.
IV. Sehr behaglich. The finale originally had the title The Celestial Life. The mood is light and joyous, as befits a peasant vision of the green pastures of heaven. The vocal solo is set to verses from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, with intervening orchestral ritornellos featuring the cheery chirping sounds which open the first movement. Mahler directs that the vocal solo should be sung "with child-like, bright expression, and without the slightest suggestion of parody." --Edward Downes
Symphony No. 2.........Charles Edward Ives
Charles Edward Ives is a unique figure in the history of music. Recognized today as a forceful trail blazer, bold pioneer and artistic personality of great distinction, he is at the same time the only important American composer who was not a professional musician. He had a very successful career in the insurance field and demonstrated there not only a fine business acumen but also creative inventiveness.
The son of a musician, Ives had studied composition with Horatio Parker during his college years at Yale. Realizing that the music he wanted to create was anything but "practical" and would never enable him to earn a living, he decided upon a career in the insurance field. In spite of this absorbing business activity, Ives continued incessantly to create music. When After work, burning the midnight oil, on weekends and in the vacation period, which he limited to two or three weeks. The amount of music created under these pressing circumstances between 1896 and 1921 is astonishing, and our amazement grows if we take a close look at his working method by studying his sketches and manuscripts. The extant material is now reposing at Yale University, Ives' Alma Mater.
Ives was a great pioneer in harmony, a bold innovator in matters of rhythm, and an imaginative experimenter in the field of orchestral sound. He created bold harmonic combina?tions, wrote polytonal passages and conceived rhythmical complexities that anticipated by ten years similar passages in the works of Schonberg and Stravinsky and other avantguardists. Yet while these composers had a chance to hear their works and to test their creations by means of actual sound, Ives was in the main denied this opportunity, which is so vital to a creative musician. His works were rejected by America's leading musical organizations as im?possible to perform and some of his scores, for example, that of his Second Symphony, sub?mitted for consideration, were not even returned to him. Thus when the latter work was to be given its concert premiere by the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York in 1951, the score had to be copied again from the pencil autograph at great expense.
Text for Symphony No. 4.........Mahler
Wir geniessen die himmlischen Freuden D'rum tun teir das Irdische mciden. Kein weltlich' Gctiimmel Hort man nicht in Himmel Lebt allcs in san)tester Ruhl
Wir jiihren ein englisches LebenI
Sind dennoch ganz liistig danebenl
Wir tanzen und springen,
Wir hiipfcn und singen,
Satikt Peter in Himmel sieht zul
Johannes das La'mmlein auslasset Der Metzger Herodes drauj passet. Wir fiihren ein geduldig's, Vnschuldig's, geduldig's Ein liebliches La'mmlein zu Toil
Sankt Lukas den Ochsen tat schlachten
Ohn' einig's Bedenken und Achten.
Der Wein kosl' kein Heller
Im Himmlischen Keller.
Die Englein, die backen das Brot.
Gut Krduter von allerhand Arten
Die waclisen im himmlichen Garten!
Gut's Spargel, Fisolen,
Vnd was wir nur wollcn.
Ganze Schiisscln voll sind uns bereitl
Gut' Aepfel, gut' Birn' und gut' Traubenl Die Gartner, die Allcs erlauben Willst Rehbock, willst Haasen Auj offener Strassen Sie laujen herbeil
Sollt ein Festtag elwa kommen Alle Fische gleich mit Freuden
angeschwommen. Dort lauft schon Sankt Peter Mit Netz und mit Koder vum himmlischen Weiher hinein. Sankt Martha die Kochin muss sein.
Kein Musik ist ja nicht auj Erden,
Die uns'rer verglichen kann werden,
Elf tausend Jungjrauen
Zu tanzen sich trauenl
Sankt Ursula selbst dazu lachtl
Cacilia mit ihren Verwandten Sind treffliche Hofmusikantenl Die englischen Stimmen Ermunlern die Sinnen Dass alles jiir Freuden erwacht.
All heavenly joys are ours, Pleasures of earth we disdain. No worldly strife Mars our heavenly life. We live here in sweetest peace.
We lead an angelic life,
Yet are merry as can be.
We dance and spring,
We jump and sing
While St. Peter in Heaven looks on.
The lamb we have from St. John
Herod, the butcher will be.
We lead the meek
And innocent
Little lamb to the death.
St. Luke slaughters the oxen Without any worry or heed. The wine costs us naught From our heavenly draught And the angels bake us our bread.
The finest vegetables grow
In the garden of Heaven.
Good beans, asparagus,
Whatever we want,
Whole plates-full just wait to be eaten.
Good apples, good pears, good grapes! The gardeners give what we wish. And roebucks and hares Run into our arms Here in the open streets 1
And when there is a Fast Day The fish come swarming in.
St. Peter he runs
With his net and bait
To fish in the heavenly pond.
St. Martha must cook the catch.
On earth there is no music
To be compared with ours
The eleven thousand virgins
Make bold to dance.
And St. Ursula smiles on the scene.
Cecilia, her kith and her kin
Play like a royal band.
And choirs of angels
Lift up our spirit
To the highest of heavenly joys.
According to a short prefatory note in the published score (1951), the second symphony was composed between 1897 and 1901. This information, signed "C.E.I.", is somewhat at variance with the composer's entries in his autograph. There we read: "The second and fourth movements originally written as overture for the Hyperion Theatre Orchestra, New Haven, 1896-98 [his college years] but revised for Symphony 190001." The third movement orig?inated as an Organ Prelude in 1896 and was orchestrated in 1902. The score of the first move?ment also shows the entry: "See organ sonata." It may be noted parenthetically that the first movement as well as the finale of the Third Symphony also grew out of organ pieces (both composed in 1901).
The Second Symphony expresses in the words of the composer the "musical feelings of the Connecticut country around Redding and Danbury in the 1890's, the music of the country folk. It is full of tunes they sang and played then. . . ."
I. The first movement, Andante moderato in B minor, 34, is mainly for strings. The opening theme, which is manipulated in imitation and contrapuntal manner, is of structural importance and returns in the introduction to the Finale. A typical American note is struck in the middle of the Andante moderato when Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean is proclaimed by the horns. A recitative passage of the oboe effects the transition to the following movement.
II. Allegro, A-flat major, 44. The chief theme has a marchlike character which contrasts to the simple, folklike second theme in F major. The composer surprises the listener in the middle section with quotations from the first movement of Brahms' Third Symphony. Form?ally speaking Ives clings here as well as in the finale to the time-honored sonata scheme with exposition, development, recapitulation and coda. Note also that the tranquil second time is transformed into a marching tune in the coda to emphasize the basic quality of the piece.
III. The Adagio cantabile, 34, which follows, reverts to the serene F major tonality. Ives has described the movement as "a reflection of the organ and choir music of the Long Green Organ Book" to which he also referred in his sketches. This placid movement, which contains some thematic allusions to the opening Andante moderato, closes gently with a quotation from America the Beautiful.
IV. The Lento maestoso though numbered as fourth movement is actually an introduction to the finale. Reverting to both the key (B minor) and the main idea of the first movement, this introduction not only provides the structural link between the first and last movements but in addition it creates a spiritual coherence. The reappearance of Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean, which becomes an essential thematic element in the finale, underlines the organic and spiritual importance of the Lento maestoso. The movement closes with a transitional passage preparing the key of the finale.
V. Allegro molto vivace, F major, 44. This is a spirited and merry piece studded with American folk tunes. We hear first De Camptown Races (horns) and Turkey in the Straw, the minstrel song, enormously popular in the time of Andrew Jackson (violins). The second theme (in the sonata sense) is, as Ives informs us, "partly from an early piece called The American Woods (Brookfield). The part suggesting a Steve Foster tune, while over it the old farmers fiddled a barn dance with all its jigs, gallops and reels, was played in Danbury . . . in 1889."
Columbia reenters in the recapitulation which, of course, repeats the American Woods episode. The coda introduces still another folk tune, Down in the cornfield, but is dominated by Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean, proclaimed by the trombones and combined with the barn dance of the old fanners. The conclusion is surprising. Ives denies the listener the expected ending on the F major chord and bids farewell with a combination which includes Db, D, Df, E, F, Gb, G, G, A, Bb but excludes C and B, the first and last notes of the chromatic scale. The conclusion conforms to one of the nicknames given to Ives at Yale, namely Sam, the punster and joker addicted to paradoxes.
--Joseph Braunstetn
(Dr. Joseph Braunstein, former musicologist of the New York Public Library, was the special?ist charged with identifying and putting in order the manuscripts of Charles Ives to prepare them for photoduplication and deposit of the copies in the New York Public Library and the Library of Congress.)
NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC
The Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, Inc. Philharmonic Hall, Lincoln Center, New York, N.Y. 10023
Carlos Moseley, Managing Director William L. Weissel and Albert K. Webster, Assistant Managers
UNIVERSITY MUSICAL SOCIETY
INTERNATIONAL PRESENTATIONS--1967-1968
HILL AUDITORIUM EVENTS NOW ON SALE
CHORAL UNION SERIES
Chicago Symphony Orchestra .... (2:30) Sunday, October 1
Program: Chaconne..........Buxtehude-Chavez
Concerto for Trumpet in D major......Telemann
?Symphony No. 7.........Roger Sessions
Suite, Noblissima visione........Hdjdemjth
La Valse..............Ravel
World premiere--commissioned by the University of Michigan for the Sesquicentennial celebration.
French National Orchestra, with
Eugene Istomin, Pianist......Monday, October 9
Vienna Symphony.........Thursday, October 19
"Carmina Burana"--opera by Carl Orff . . (8:00) Sunday, October 29
Expo '67 Production with Les Ballets Canadiens
Christa Ludwig, Mezzo-soprano.....Tuesday, October 31
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of London . Wednesday, January 17
Nathan Milstein, Violinist.......Monday, January 29
Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra .... Saturday, February 24
Van Cliburn, Pianist.........Friday, March IS
Toronto Symphony Orchestra......Thursday, March 28
Season Tickets: $30.00 (out)--$25.00--$20.00--$15.00--$12.00 Single Concerts: $6.00--$5.50--$5.00--$4.00--$3.00--$2.00
EXTRA SERIES
"Land of Smiles"--operetta by Franz Lehar . . Monday, September 25 (Original Viennese production starring Giuseppe di Stefano)
Chicago Symphony Orchestra.....Saturday, September 30
Program: Overture to Leonore, No. 3, Op. 72......Beethoven
Symphony No. 5 ("Reformation").....Mendelssohn
"Le Sacre du printemps.........Stravinsky
Yomiuri Japanese Orchestra......Friday, November 10
National Ballet from Washington, D. C. . . Wednesday, January 24 Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra .... Friday, March 8
Season Tickets: $15.00--$12.50--$10.00--$7.50--$6.00 Single Concerts: $6.00--$5.50--$5.00--$4.00--$3.00--$2.00
DANCE FESTIVAL
Harkness Ballet.........Friday, October 13
Oleata Basque Festival (from Bilbao) . . (2:30) Sunday, October 22 Jose Molina Bailes Espanoles......Friday, October 27
Season Tickets: $8.00--$6.00--$5.00 Single Performances: $4.00--$3.00--$2.00
Note: All programs begin at 8:30 p.m. unless otherwise indicated.
Brochures with complete list of presentations for next season, are available at the box office
tonight, or at
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