UMS Concert Program, October 5, 1968: Chicago Symphony Orchestra --

Season: Ninetieth
Concert: First
Complete Series: 3623
Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor, Michigan

1968 Ninetieth Season 1969
UNIVERSITY MUSICAL SOCIETY
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Charles A. Sink, President Gail W. Rector, Executive Director Lester McCoy, Conductor
First Concert Ninetieth Annual Choral Union Series Complete Series 3623
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
ISTVAN KERTESZ, Conductor
Saturday Evening, October 5, 1968, at 8:30 Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor, Michigan
PROGRAM
Symphony No. 67 in F major...........Haydn
Presto
Adagio
Menuetto, Trio
Allegro di molto
?Suite from The Miraculous Mandarin, Op. 19.....Bartok
INTERMISSION
Symphony No. 6 in D major, Op. 60........Dvorak
Allegro non tanto Adagio
Scherzo: furiant
Finale: allegro con spirito
Recorded by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
The Steinway piano is the official piano of The University Musical Society
Historical Note--On October 5, 1880, the University Musical Society held its first annual meeting and began its first full season of concert presentations.
ARS LONGA VITA BREVIS
PROGRAM NOTES
Symphony No. 67 in F major.........Haydn
It is a special occasion when a "new" symphony by Joseph Haydn is programmed in Ann Arbor and appropriate to begin a new concert season. The twelve "London" symphonies tend to dominate the active repertoire of Haydn, but the Symphony No. 67 in F major belongs to the Slurm und Drang period, when subjective emotion found expression in music which extended the diatonic mold to employ colorful harmonic relationships, and which con?veyed a sense of greater depth in a variety of ways.
The first movement is a sonata (Presto, F major, 6-8 time). The first theme appears in the first violins accompanied by the pizzicato of the remaining members of the string section. Transitional material leads through a "Sturm" section and into the pause that prefaces the second theme, a folklike melody in which oboes double the violins. The development expands the harmonic range, giving the music a greater intensity.
The slow movement (Adagio, B-flat major, 2-4 time), is also a sonata. Muted strings introduce the principal melody, an expressive line that arches upward in a curve that coincides with the five-measure phrase. The second theme, with the broken chord pattern in the strings and with the simple line in the oboes supported by horns, is more of a contrasting area than a clearly defined thematic idea. Here, Haydn does not present the sharply etched shape which characterizes the first movement second theme, for example; it is evident that the "second theme area" had not been reduced to a formula, and that Haydn would continue to wrestle with the problem of handling this particular section of the sonata structure.
The development section is essentially an extension of the second theme section, although the harmonies present the intense shades of the Sturm und Drang, and not without a contra?puntal element to add to the musical significance. At the end, a very special, even theatrical, effect is obtained by the use of col legno dell'arco (playing on the wood of the bow).
Although this movement (Menuelto, F major, 3-4 time) follows the traditional three-part structure (minuet--trio--minuet), the trio, for violins only, provides unusual features. The first and second violins are muted; the second violin must tune the G string down to F for a drone bass which is played throughout the trio.
The finale (Allegro di molto, F major, 2-2 time) presents an unusual form for this portion of a symphony; it is a three-part structure. Both the first part allegro and the middle section adagio present two main thematic ideas.
The first theme of the allegro is march-like; the second theme suggests that Haydn looked into the field of folk music for a "catchy" tune, and he scored it first for the first violins, and then for the oboe and bassoons. The adagio explores sustained melodic line, contrapuntal treatment, and contrasting instrumental textures, strings and winds. The move?ment concludes with a return to the material of the allegro.
Suite from The Miraculous Mandarin, Op. 19 . . . . Bela Bartok
This work, with its great realism, "vivid and harsh in both plot and music," was not staged in Budapest until 1946, after the death of the composer. It was performed for the first time at Cologne, in 1925, but it was banned by the Municipal Council after one performance. The subject was considered objectionable.
The story is set in a poor room of a brothel. A girl is set at the window to entice men into the room so that her three male accomplices can rob them. In the German preface to the score the three accomplices are called "tramps" or "ruffians" (Strolche). At the first call of the girl, there appears a shabbily dressed cavalier, who has no money and is eventually thrown out by the ruffians. The second visitor is a young man who likewise has no money and is similarly ejected. The third man to appear at the door is the strange character of the Man?darin. The stage directions in the score describe the scene as follows: "The Mandarin enters and remains motionless in the doorway; the girl flees terrified to the other end of the room. The girl [urged on by the trampsl overcomes her repugnance and . . . begins a hesitant dance which gradually becomes livelier. . . . Throughout the whole dance the Mandarin looks
at the girl with a fixed, impassive stare in which his incipient passion is hardly perceptible. The girl sinks down to embrace him; he begins to tremble in feverish excitement. The girl shudders at his embrace; she tries to tear herself from him, which she finally succeeds in doing. She flees from him and he chases her. ... He catches the girl. They struggle. The tramps leap out, seize the Mandarin . . . and strip him of his jewelry and his money . . . They drag him to the bed and try unsuccessfully to smother him with pillows and blankets. They then stab him three times with a rusty sword. He totters, but still tries to catch the girl. The tramps drag him to the center of the room and hang him from the lamp hook; it falls, and in the darkness the body of the Mandarin begins to glow with a greenish light. At last, the girl realizes what will save them. She embraces the Mandarin; his longing is now stilled, his wounds begin to bleed, he becomes weaker and dies after a short struggle."
The music of the suite, beginning with the first portions of the pantomime, concludes with the chase of the Mandarin after the girl. This music is continuous and is played without interruption as it moves from scene to scene. The opening section, what might be considered the introduction to the pantomime itself, describes the sounds of a city street in a veritable vortex of orchestral sonority. There follows the command of the ruffians to the girl, musically carried out in a somewhat jagged figure in the violins over tremolo strings. The appearance of the clarinet solo marks the entrance of the cavalier. He is very shortly thrown out. The young man pleases the girl and the dance, beginning somewhat lightly and becoming more impassioned, is more extensive. The appearance of the Mandarin is marked by a strangely colorful orchestration. The dance for the Mandarin is a waltz, beginning slowly and gradually becoming faster. The music changes from the waltz tempo to vivace in 2-2 time for the beginning of the "chase," represented musically by a fast-paced fugal passage with a theme strongly marked by syncopation. It is with this material that the brilliant finale of the suite is reached.
Symphony No. 6 in D major, Op. 60.....Anton Dvorak
The published number on the title pages of Dvorak's symphonies is not at all the order in which they were composed. The work performed on this occasion, published as No. 1, is in reality the sixth of the series. His last symphony--"From the New World"--was published as No. S, but was its composer's ninth.
The D major symphony was composed at Vysoka, Dvorak's country place for which he had a great fondness. When the score was finished October IS, 1880, he hurried to Vienna to show it to Hans Richter--then the world's most famous conductor--and, at the same time, to offer him the dedication. In a letter written home in the course of the sojourn in the Austrian capital, Dvorak wrote: "Richter liked the symphony very much indeed, so that after each movement he embraced me. He will perform it December 26. Then it will go to London."
The work was not, however, first given to the world by Richter, whose programs, it seems, had already been made up for the season. The premiere took place at Prague, March 25, 1881, with the composer's friend, Adolf Cech as conductor. So great was the applause given to the Scherzo that Cech was constrained to repeat it. The following year the D major symphony was given its first performance at the Crystal Palace, London, under the baton of August Manns. Two months later Richter performed the symphony at one of his London concerts, and wrote to Dvorak of his own enthusiasm, and that of the orchestra at the rehearsals. In America the work first was played by Theodore Thomas at New York, January 6, 1883; in Chicago, at the thirteenth concert of the first season of the Chicago Orchestra, at the Auditorium, March 5, 1892.
Concerning this D major symphony, Paul Stevan, in his biography, Anton Dvorak (1941) wrote:
"This particular symphony seems strikingly akin to Brahms, in some way corresponding to the latter's Second, composed in the same key. Nevertheless, Brahms' airy gaiety was not achieved with a light heart, whereas Dvorak's symphony in its entirety is the outpouring of a joyous spirit intoxicated with the world."
UNIVERSITY MUSICAL SOCIETY INTERNATIONAL PRESENTATIONS--1968-1969
Opening the NINETIETH ANNUAL CHORAL UNION SERIES
THE CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA performs their one hundred ninety-third concert in Ann Arbor. This is the fifth consecutive year this orches?tra has opened the Choral Union Series. For thirty years, from 1905 to 1935, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra was the nucleus of the annual May Festival.
Istvan Kertesz, Hungarian by birth and training, is guest conductor for the first two weeks of their season. He has conducted in Hill Auditorium at one previous concert, given by the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra in January 1963. (An interesting note on that occasion is that he conducted with a baton hastily improvised backstage from a coat hanger!)
GARY GRAFFMAN, young American pianist, will be heard in the second concert in this series on Monday, October 14, in the following program: Sonata in G major (Haydn); Sonata in F minor (Beethoven); Sonata in B minor (Liszt); "Gaspard de la nuit" (Ravel); Etude in C-sharp minor, Op. 2, No. 1 (Scriabin); and "Islamey," Oriental Fantasy (Balakirev).
Opening the FIRST ANNUAL DANCE SERIES
THE NATIONAL BALLET, from Washington, D. C. (in Hill Auditorium), Friday, October 11, 8:30. Frederick Franklin, Director
Program
"Swan Lake," Act II (Tchaikovsky); Concerto Barocco (Bach); Pas de deux "Le Corsaire"; and Raymonda (Glazounoff)
Opening the SIXTH ANNUAL CHAMBER ARTS SERIES
I MADRIGALISTI DI VENEZIA (in Rackham Auditorium), Sunday, October 20,8:30
Program
Music of the Venetian School--Madrigals and instrumental works by Monteverdi, Legrenzi, Cavalli, Bruni, and Gabrieli
Annual MESSIAH Performances In Hill Auditorium--December 6, 7, 8
University Choral Union, Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra, Susan Belling, Soprano; Elizabeth Mannion, Contralto; Henry Nason, Tenor; David Clatworthy, Bass; Lester McCoy, Conductor
Tickets on sale beginning October 10, at $3.0O-$2.0O-S1.5O-$1.0O
THE UNIVERSITY MUSICAL SOCIETY, Burton Tower Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104
Hours: 9:00 to 4:30, Monday through Friday; Saturday 9:00 to 12:00 (Also li hours before performance at auditorium Box Office)