UMS Concert Program, March 25: Detroit Symphony Orchestra -- Antal Dorati

Season: sixty-fifth
Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor

ckzhoit
orch(2stra
DotOti music director
sixty-fifth season 197879
march 25 hill auditorium, ann arbor
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Inc.
(Founded 1914) ANTAL DORATI. music director
OFFICERS 1978-79
John B. Ford, chairman Robert B. Semple, president
Rinehart S. Bright, vice president Pierre V. Heftier, vice president Ralph T. McElvenny, vice president Paul S. Mirabito, vice president Dean E. Richardson, vice president Alan E. Schwartz, vice president
Richard L. Terrell, vice president Mrs. R. Jamison Williams, vice president "Mrs. Theodore O. Yntema, vice president Thomas H. Jeffs II, treasurer William C. Rands III, assistant treasurer "Peter P. Thurber, secretary
BOARD OF DIRECTORS 1978-79
Louis G. Allen
Andrew W. Barr
H. Glenn Bixby Rinehart S. Bright
J. Lawrence Buell, Jr.
Mrs. C. Henry Buhl
Eugene A. Cafiero
Philip Caldwell
Peter A. Cartwright
E. Paul Casey
Ferdinand Cinelli
Walker L. Cisler
Mrs. Avern Cohn
Mrs. Abraham Cooper
Michael Counen
Rodkey Craighead
Alexander M. Cunningham
Frederic DeHaven
Anthony DeLorenzo
Robert Dewar
Frank W. Donovan
David K. Easlick
Mrs. Charles M. Endicott
Mrs. Robert Fife
Mrs. Charles T. Fisher III
Max M. Fisher Gordon T. Ford
Mrs. Henry Ford II "John B. Ford
Edward P. Frohlich
David L. Gamble
Hans Gehrke
Mrs. Robert A. Gerisch
William E. Giles
A. R. Glancy III
William T. Gossett Executive Committee
John C. Griffin
Karl Haas
Mrs. Hugh Harness
Martin Hayden Pierre V. Heftier
Hon. Erma Henderson
Lee Hills
Hudson Holland, Jr.
Dorothy Byrd Holloway Thomas H. Jeffs II
Mrs. Henry C. Johnson
Ernest A. Jones
Maxwell Jospey
Robert Kanzler
John Karmazin. Jr.
Robert P. Lambrecht
Kenneth B. Lange
Mrs. Paul J. Lay
Walton Lewis
Thomas V. Lo Cicero
Wilber H. Mack Ralph T. McElvenny
Dr. Marjorie Peebles Meyers
Hon. William G. Milliken Paul S. Mirabito
Ken Morris
Rev. J. Stanley Murphy, C.S.B. Walter T. Murphy
Mrs. H. Wayne Nelson
Miles M. O'Brien
Donald D. O'Dowd
Peters Oppermann
W. Calvin Patterson
Raymond T. Perring
Ralph L. Polk
John Prepolec
Edith Quintana
Mrs. Jerome H. Remick, Jr.
Dean E. Richardson J. Marshall Robbins Irving Rose
Alan E. Schwartz Arthur R. Seder, Jr.
Robert B. Semple Nate S. Shapero Mrs. Allan Shelden Mrs. Florence Sisman Mrs. Howard F. Smith, Jr. Bert L. Smokier Gari M. Stroh, Jr. Joe H. Stroud Robert M. Surdam
Peter P. Thurber Mrs. Richard Torley Mrs. S. Pinkney Tuck Mrs. Richard W. Tucker Mrs. Joseph A. Vance, Jr. Mrs. Francis L. Van Dusen Mrs. Richard Van Dusen Richard Vining Harold G. Warner David D. Williams Mrs. Delford G. Williams Hon. G. Mennen Williams
Mrs. R. Jamison Williams Richard E. Williams Mrs. Isadore Winkelman
Mrs. R. Alexander Wrigley
Mrs. Theodore 0. Yntema Hon. Coleman A. Young Donald S. Young Mrs. John E. Young, Jr.
Marshall W. Turkin, executive director
DETROIT SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
FIRST VIOLINS
Gordon Staples
Concertmaster Bogos Mortchikian
Associate Concertmaster Joseph Goldman Gordon Peterson
Assistant Concertmasters Misha Rachlevsky Jack Boesen Franklyn D'Antonio Derek Francis Alan Gerstel Nicholas Zonas LeAnn Toth Beatriz Budinszky Malvern Kaufman Richard Margitza Linda Snedden Smith Paul Phillips Elias Friedenzohn Santo Urso
SECOND VIOLINS Edouard Kesner Felix Resnick Alvin Score Lillian Fenstermacher James Waring Margaret Tundo Walter Maddox Roy Bengtsson Thomas Downs Robert Murphy Larry Bartlett Joseph Striplin Bruce Smith Gabriel Szitas
VIOLAS
Nathan Gordon David Ireland Philip Porbe Eugenia Staszewski LeRoy Fenstermacher Hart Hollman Walter Evich Anton Patti Gary Schnerer Catherine Compton
VIOLONCELLOS
Italo Babini
James C. Gordon Chair
"Thaddeus Markiewicz Edward Korkigian Mario DiFiore David Levine John Thurman Barbara Fickett Marcy Chanteaux Debra Fayroian Timothy Butler William Graham
Assistant Principal tCo-principal
ANTAL DORATI Music Director
Werner Torkanowsky
Guest Conductor and Associate to the Music Director
Paul Freeman Conductor-in-Residence
Kenneth Jean
Assistant Conductor
Martin Fischer-Dieskau
Conductor Fellow
BASSES
Robert Gladstone Raymond Benner Stephen Molina Maxim Janowsky Linton Bodwin Stephen Edwards Albert Steger Donald Pennington David C. Thomas
Orchestra Fellow
HARPS tEIyze Ilku tCarole Crosby
FLUTES
Ervin Monroe Shaul Ben-Meir 'Robert Patrick Clement Barone
PICCOLO
Clement Barone
OBOES
Donald Baker Ronald Odmark Robert Sorton Treva Womble
ENGLISH HORN
Treva Womble
CLARINETS Paul Schaller Douglas Cornelsen "Brian Schweickhardt Oliver Green
BASS CLARINET Oliver Green
E-FLAT CLARINET
Brian Schweickhardt
BASSOONS Robert Williams Phillip Austin Paul Ganson Lyell Lindsey
CONTRABASSOON
Lyell Lindsey
FRENCH HORNS Eugene Wade Corbin Wagner Charles Weaver Edward Sauve Willard Darling Keith Vernon
TRUMPETS
Donald Green
Gordon Smith
Alvin Belknap
John Carroll
TROMBONES
Raymond Turner Joseph Skrzynski "Nathaniel Gurin Elmer Janes
TUBA
Wesley Jacobs
TIMPANI Salvatore Rabbio Robert Pangborn
PERCUSSION
Robert Pangborn "Norman Fickett Raymond Makowski Sam Tundo
KEYBOARD Muriel Kilby
LIBRARIAN Albert Steger Elmer Janes, assistant
PERSONNEL MANAGER Oliver Green
HILL AUDITORIUM, ANN ARBOR
detroit symphony
Antal Dorati Music Director
Sunday afternoon, March 25 at 2:30
Antal Dorati, conductor
ILSE VON ALPENHEIM, piano
STRAUSS Don Juan, Opus 20
STRAUSS Burleske for Piano and Orchestra, D minor
ILSE VON ALPENHEIM
INTERMISSION
STRAUSS Tod und Verklarung, Opus 24
STRAUSS Till Eulenspiegel's lustige Streiche, Opus 28
The Stcinway is the official piano of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra
Broadcasts of concerts from the current DSO season are heard weekly over the facilities of WDET-FM in Detroit and the other Public Radio stations throughout Michigan.
Concerts of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra are made possible in part with the support of the State of Michigan through a grant from the Michigan Council for the Arts.
This afternoon's concert marks the DSO's 60th appearance in Hill Auditorium.
THE CONDUCTOR
Antal Dorati, the ninth Music Director in the Detroit Symphony Orchestra's history, has had a long and distinguished career as an orchestra conductor. He has appeared with virtually every major orchestra throughout the world.
Maestro Dorati was born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1906 and entered that city's Academy of Music at the age of 14. Trained as a composer, cellist, pianist and conductor, he graduated at 18, the youngest in the history of the Academy. He was immediately named coach and, soon after, conductor of the Royal Opera House in Budapest.
Maestro Dorati joined the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo as its leading conductor in 1934, and his Detroit Symphony Orchestra debut came during Ballet Russe appearances in Detroit in 1936. During the next several years, he made extensive tours of Australia and the United States.
In 1945 Maestro Dorati was named Music Director of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and four years later he assumed the same position with the Minneapolis Symphony. He left that orchestra in 1960 to pursue his career as a guest conductor and to make recordings.
In 1966 he became Principal Conductor of the Stockholm Philharmonic and in 1970 was named Music Director of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington; in 1977 he became the National's Principal Guest Conductor. He became Chief Conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London in 1975, and was named Laureate Conductor of the RPO last July.
One of the world's most recorded conductors, Dorati has more than 500 recordings to his credit. In March of 1979 he received the 22nd award of his illustrious recording career -the Grand Prix du Disque--for his most recent Haydn opera on the Philips-Mercury label, mondo della lima. His recording of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture with the DSO has been setting sales records ever since it was released last December.
His many awards include honors bestowed upon him by the governments of France, Austria and Sweden.
PROGRAM NOTES
by Robert Holmes
Dean, College of Fine Arts, Western Michigan University
'DON JUAN." TONE POEM
AFTER NIKOLAUS LENAU, OPUS 20.....RICHARD STRAUSS
Born Munich, 1864; died Garmisch-Partenkirchen, 1949
Strauss composed Don Juan during the years 1887-88 at Munich The first performance took place on 11 November 1889 in the Weimar Opera House, the composer conducting the Grand Ducal Orchestra It was published in 1890 with a dedication "to my dear friend Ludwig Thuille."1 The work is based on a poem written by Nikolaus Lenau. written in 1844.-
The first performance in the United States was given by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Arthur Nikisch conducting, on 31 October 1891.
First performance in this series: 19 November 1920; Ossip Gabrilowitsch conducted Last performance in this series: 13 November 1971: Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt conducted The DSO has performed Don Juan over 80 times since 1920. under such conductors as Bruno Walter (1952). Thomas Schippers (1963). Andre Previn (1970 at Meadow Brook) --and the composer himself, at a special concert in Orchestra Hall on 7 November 1921. at which Strauss also conducted Tod unit Verkldrung and Till Eulenspiegel.
The score calls for 3 flutes and piccolo, 2 oboes and english horn. 2 clarinets. 2 bassoons and contrabassoon. 4 horns. 3 trumpets. 3 trombones and tuba, timpani, cymbals, triangle, bells, harp, and strings Performance time is about 17 minutes.
Ernest Newman considers the ultimate literary origin of the Don Juan story to be El Burlador de Sevilla v Convidado de Piedra (The Mocker of Seville and the Stone Guest, written in 1630 and printed in 1634), by the Spanish monk Gabriel Tellez, who used the pen name Tirso de Molina. Other literary versions are as follows: Don Juan, oil Le festinde pierre by Molierc; two mid-17th century Italian plays, one by Giliberti and the other by Cigogni; The Libertine by Thomas Shadwell (1676); and several other settings by Italian, French, Spanish, English and German writers including Zorilla, dc Musset, Dumas. Goethe, Da Ponte, Byron and Shaw. Some of the other well-known musical settings include convitato di pietra (The Stone Guest), an opera by Gazzaniga with a libretto by Bertati; Dargomyzhsky's The Stone Guest, Gluck's ballet, Mozart's Don Giovanni, as well as settings by Le Tellier, Righini, Tritto, and Gardi.
Although all earlier literary depictions of Don Juan portray a lustful sensualist, Lenau's hero, according to the poet's biographer Ludwig August Frankl, longs to find a woman who is "incarnate womanhood ... all the women on earth, whom he [Don Juan] cannot as individuals possess." Frankl asserts that "because he does not find her, although he reels from one to another, at last Disgust seizes hold of him and the Disgust is the Devil that fetches him."
'Austrian composer (1861-1907); he was a fellow student and slose friend of Strauss, who, in an effort to aid his colleague's artistic aspirations, performed some of Thuille's works in Meiningen.
-Pseudonym for the Austrian poet Nikolaus Franz Niemtsch von Strehlenau (1802-50).
_ The.
Detroit
Symphony1
Droodcost
W D E T
1019 FM
MARCH 7 Klaus Tennstedt
B'i.ck"e' Symphony No 8
MARCH 14
Paul FreemanLeon Bates (piano), Irene Oliver (S), Benjamin Matthews (B-BAR), Morgan University Choir
works Of Gershwin
MARCH 21 Klaus TennstedtEmanuael Ax (piano)
works of Mozart and Beethoven
MARCH 28 Aldo Ceccato
works of Borodin. Tchaikovsky
Wednesdays at 6:00pm on WDET-FM 1019
also hear Detroit Symphony Preview ot 9:15PM Sundoys
Detroit's Public Radio Statlon-A service of Wayne State University
Radio Previews of DSO Concerts . . .
Both of Detroit's classical-music FM stations broadcast weekly programs devoted to upcoming Detroit Symphony Orchestra concerts.
The Symphony Preview on WDET-FM, Detroit's Public Radio Station (101.9 Mz), is aired on Sunday evenings at 9:15 p.m.; the program host is Chris Felcyn.
The Fine Arts broadcasters, WQRS-FM (105.1 Mz), broadcast a DSO preview at 7:00 p.m. on Monday evenings; the host is Charles Greenwell.
THE TYFOCI 1AFT COMPANY
Printers -Publishers
o FFSET LETTERPRESS
445 YORK STREET TRinity 2-2501

PROGRAM NOTES -continued
Here is a rather old-fashioned translation of Lenau's poem:
0 Magic realm, illimited, eternal,
Of glorified woman, -loveliness supernal! Fain would I, in the storm of stressful bliss, Expire upon the last one's lingering kiss! Through every realm, O friend, would wing my flight, Wherever Beauty blooms, kneel down to each, And, if for one brief moment, win delight!
1 flee from surfeit and from rapture's cloy, Keep fresh for Beauty service and employ, Grieving the One, that All I may enjoy.
The fragrance from one lip today is breath of spring;
The dungeon's gloom perchance tomorrow's luck may bring.
When with the new love I sweetly wander,
No bliss is ours upfurbish'd and regilded;
A different love has This to That one yonder,
Not up from ruins be my temples builded.
Yea, Love life is, and ever must be new,
Cannot be changed or turned in new direction;
It cannot but there expire -here resurrection;
And, if 'tis real, it nothing knows of rue!
Each beauty in the world is sole, unique;
So much the Love be that would Beauty seek!
So long as Youth lives on with pulse afire,
Out to the chase! To victories new aspire!
It was a wond'rous lovely storm that drove me: Now it is o'er; and calm all 'round, above me; Sheer dead is every wish; all hopes o'ershrouded,-'Twas pYaps a flash from heaven that so descended, Whose deadly stroke left me with powers ended, And all the world, so bright before, o'erclouded; And p'r'aps not! Exhausted is the fuel: And on the hearth cold is fiercely cruel.
Many writers have tried to make exactingly literal program music out of Strauss's version, identifying themes, and bits and pieces of themes, with specific characters, but Strauss was not quite that naive. Glenn McGeoch is right when he points out that it "is not program music strictly speaking; it tells no definite story or series of connected incidents; it is an exercise in musical psychology, a field in which Beethoven gave us Coriolanus, and Liszt essayed a portrait of Faust. In this work Strauss is a student of human nature and life, no less than an accomplished musician."
His whole career is symbolically mirrored in his own Don Juan, in the splendid vitality and high promise of his beginning, the subsequent period of cold and reckless perversity, the gradual oncoming of the inevitable nemesis of weariness of disillusion, until at last, the words of Lenau, on whose poem this work is ostensibly based, ergreift ihn
THIS WEEK'S GUEST ARTIST
Ilse von Alpenheim was born in Innsbruck, Austria, and made her debut at the age of nine. She studied at the Mozartcum in Salzburg with Franz Ledwinka and Winfried Wolf. Since then she has toured extensively all over Europe and has played with most of the major orchestras.
Ilse von Alpenheim has toured the U.S.A., Japan, Australia, New Zealand and other countries in the Far East on two world tours. In recent years she has played with many of the major American orchestras, including Detroit, Cleveland, Philadelphia and the National Symphony in Washington.
Among her recent recordings is the complete set of piano concertos by Joseph Haydn, and she is now finishing a complete set of Haydn's works for piano solo. One of her latest successes on the concert stage was the world premiere of her husband Antal Dorati's piano concerto in Washington in October 1975, and the European premiere of the same work in Berlin that December.
f ma o frldiil(f4i fUt) i
recital, att
tU 1 + o{f 7HCcAcC) t CCUHJUCA.!
Tickets at $4, $6, $7, $8.50, $10 and $12 arc Burton Tower, Ann Arbor 48109. Weekdays more information call (313)665-3717. available 9-4:30, K by mail or at Sat. 9-12. For

PROGRAM NOTES -continued
der Ekel, und der ist der Teufel der ihn halt, and the theme of disgust that is blared out triumphantly in Don Juan reappears in Zarathustra. In place of the arrogant, triumphant figure conceived and portrayed by Neitzsche, we are shown a man tormented by doubt and disillusion, desperately seeking relief in religion, passion, science, and intellectual ecstasy and finally ending up where he began, in doubt and disillusion.
(Cecil Gray, A Survey of Contemporary Music, 1927)
BURLESKE IN D MINOR FOR PIANO AND ORCHESTRA . . . RICHARD STRAUSS
Strauss composed his Burleske at Meiningen in the winter of 1885-86 The first performance took place on 21 June 1890, at the fifth concert of the 27th session of the Allgemeine Deutsche Musikverein at the City Theatre in Eisenach (the native city of J. S. Bach!); the composer conducted; Eugene d'Albert was the soloist.
First performance in this series: 6 April 1922; Ossip Gabrilowitsch conducted and the soloist was William Bachaus Last performance in this series: 12 January 1975; Aldo Ceccato conducted and the soloist was Lorin Hollander Other guest soloists in DSO performances of the work have included Claudio Arrau (1944), Byron Janis (1960) and Glenn Gould (also 1960).
The score calls for 2 flutes and piccolo, 2 oboes. 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons. 4 horns. 2 trumpets, 4 timpani, and strings, in addition to the soloist Performance lasts about 17 minutes.
It was published in 1894 and bears a dedication to d'Albert.
When Richard Strauss was 21 he gained the post of Assistant Conductor at Meiningen under the eminent Hans von Biilow. It was a fine opportunity. The Meiningen Orchestra was superb and rehearsed every day from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Young Strauss learned many scores, the orchestral routine, rehearsal methods, how to deal with musicians -in short, he learned how to conduct under one of the greatest musical figures of the Romantic Era.
Strauss made his debut with the orchestra on 18 October 1885, three weeks after he assumed his responsibilities. He directed his own symphony and played Mozart's C minor piano concerto (K. 491) with his own cadenzas. Johannes Brahms, who was in Meiningen for rehearsals of his Fourth Symphony, attended the concert, and afterwards complimented the young composer, a rare thing for the caustic Brahms -who could not, however, let the compliment stand, adding that Strauss would do well to study the dances of Schubert to develop his melodic invention.
Encouraged by the performance, the reception, and Brahms's praise. Strauss set to work and wrote his Burleske. He distributed the parts for rehearsal, and a virtual debacle ensued. The composer himself labeled the composition utter nonsense, and von Biilow, for whom the piece was intended, held that the "Lisztian" piano part was "unplayable." His genius thwarted (Strauss was not the type to feel embarrassed), he shelved the manuscript.
Five years later, he performed it at a festival concert in Eisenach and this time met with success, so much so that publisher Mainauer offered a substantial price for it. Strauss hesitated because, as he wrote to his friend Alexander Ritter. "Now I really am in need of money . . . (but) it goes terribly against me to publish a work about which I am indifferent." It was published.
His opinion of the youthful piece had not altered but he realized that it
cjr{IVESITY &tUSICAL8OCIETY presents,
am orbor may PestfoaL,
1979
uotYi the pbiLaDeLpfcria oRchestRa
;i ;V.v cS'6; m7 77i.v nationally-known Festival features:
Monday. April 23 Pianist Alicia de Larrocha and soprano Victoria de los Angeles perform the music of their native Spain in a special one-hour recital.
Wednesday, April 2.: Conductor Eugene Ormandy and soprano Victoria de los Angeles open the Festival with the music of Hindemith, Ravel, Prokofiev, Mozart, Rossini and Wagner,
Thursday, April 26 Riccardo Mini conducts Mendelssohn's
Symphony So. 3 and Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5.
Friday. April 27 Conductor Riccardo Mutt and pianist Alicia de Larrocha perform an all-Beethoven program. SOLD-OUT.
Saturday. April 28 Eugene Ormandy, conductor; the Univer?sity Choral Union; and soloists Alma Jean Smith, soprano; Martti Talvela, bass; Alexandrina Milcheva, mezzo-soprano; Zurab Sotkilava, tenor perform Verdi's "Manzoni" requiem. SOLD-OUT.
All concerts at 8:30 in Hill Auditorium on the campus of the University of Michigan. Tickets for April 23rd are half regular Festi?val price. Regular Festival tickets are $4 to $12 by mail or at Burton Tower, Ann Arbor', 4SI09, weekdays 9-4:30, Sat. 9-12. For a brochure call (313)665-3717.
PROGRAM NOTES -continued
would appeal to the prestigious virtuosos and bring his name before their audiences. Eventually he apparently reappraised it, because he scheduled the work on his own last concert, which took place in London in 1947.
The word "Burleske" suggests humor, but -and this is a debatable point -Strauss's wit seems not to have been of a classical, lasting type, such as that of Shakespeare or Mozart, or even perhaps of some of Strauss's contemporaries such as Bartok, Nielsen and Stravinsky. Today the Burleske simply does not titillate.
But it does have other qualities: its pianistic idiomaticism -it must be a joyous thing to play; its virtuosic orchestral writing -it must be an equal joy to conduct; its fusion of both and the astute balance of substance and genre -good enough to be believable yet histrionic enough not to belie its original ambitious footlight purpose.
TOD UND VERKLARUNG. OPUS 24........RICHARD STRAUSS
Strauss began the tone poem Death and Transfiguration in 1888 and completed it the following year The work was published in Munich in April 1891 The first performance was from manuscript: the composer conducted it at the fifth concert of the 27th Musicians' Convention of the Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein in the City Theatre of Eisenach on 21 June 1890. the same concert which heard the premiere of the Burleske.
The first American performance was given by the Philharmonic Society of New York. Anton Seidel conducting, on 9 January 1892.
First performance in this series: 18 December 1919, conducted by Ossip Gabrilowitsch Last performance in this series: 14 February 1970. conducted by Thomas Schippers. Strauss himself conducted the DSO in the work at Orchestra Hall on 7 November 1921.
The work is scored for 3 flutes. 2 oboes and english horn. 2 clarinets and bass clarinet. 2 bassoons and contrabassoon. 4 horns, 3 trumpets. 3 trombones and tuba, timpani. 2 harps, gong, and strings It lasts about 23 minutes in performance.
It bears a dedication to Friedrich Roesch. author and composer.
Although he lived until 1949, Richard Strauss's best-known works were composed before World War I. Indeed, his most famous tone poems, Don Juan. Macbeth, Death and Transfiguration. Till Eulenspiegel, Thus Spake Zarathustra, Don Quixote, and Ein Heldenleben, were all written before 1900. Hence, although Strauss was the dominant figure in German musical life in the first half of our century, he still must be considered the last great figure of that transitional period referred to as post-romanticism, which began shortly after the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 with the works of Wolf and which continued through Mahler and Regcr.
In some instances, particularly in the earlier ones, Strauss's tone poems were first performed without programmes but only descriptive titles; the composer insisted repeatedly that his works were to be listened to as music, rather than as narrative descriptions. But partly due to public pressure and partly due to his own increasing predilection for programmatic literalncss, Strauss added more explicit descriptions after the composition was finished. Such was the case with Don Juan, for example, and with the composition which followed it. Death and Transfiguration.
DETROIT SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ANTAL DORATI, Music Director
CONCERT CALENDAR FOR THE COMING WEEKS
AT FORD AUDITORIUM UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED
Thursday evening, March 29 at 8:30 Friday morning, March 30 at 10:45
JAMES DE PREIST, conductor
RUDOLF FIRKUSNY, piano
LEKEU Adagio for Strings
MARTINU Piano Concerto No. 2
RACHMANINOFF Symphony No. 2
Saturday morning, March 31 at 11:00 Saturday afternoon, March 31 at 2:00
YOUNG PEOPLE'S CONCERTS WILD WEST SHOW
PAUL FREEMAN, conductor PICKWICK PUPPET THEATRE
TURAN-MIRZA KAMAL, guitar
Saturday evening, April 7 at 8:30
DETROIT SYMPHONY CHAMBER ORCHESTRA
PINCHAS ZUCKERMAN, conductorviolin
EUGENIA ZUCKERMAN, flute
BACH Violin Concerto in A minor
MOZART Flute Concerto in G major
HAYDN Symphony No. 84
Tuesday evening, April 17 at 8:30
ANTAL DORATI, conductor
VLADIMIR ASHKENAZY, piano
BART6K Piano Concerto No. 2
BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 5
PROGRAM NOTES -continued
In his Life of Ritter, Hausegger claims that Strauss asked his friend and mentor Alexander Ritter to write the poem which, although it probably should not be judged as poetry, vividly describes the music. Even though he was not listed as its author when the text appeared in the first published score, it is now generally believed that this was the case, that Ritter carefully studied the score and then wrote the poem.
It depicts the final suffering, the recollection of the past, the death, and the apotheosis of a human being. Death is vicious; the transfiguration into Paradise is magnificent.
Like many earlier tone poems, the single movement follows a gigantic free sonata-allegro outline with four narrative sections superimposed. The following analysis breaks up Ritter's text into four sections, coinciding with the musical structure. The literal translation is by Philip Apthorp.
I. Introduction: Sleep, Illness. Reverie. Largo; C minor; 44.
"In the necessitous little room, dimly lighted by only a candle end, lies the sick man on his bed. But just now he has wrestled despairingly with Death. Now he has sunk exhausted into sleep, and thou nearest only the soft ticking of the clock on the wall in the room, whose awful silence gives a foreboding of the nearness of Death. Over the sick man"s pale features plays a sad smile. Dreams he, on the boundary of life, of the golden time of childhood"
The Introduction is divided into four sub-sections and a codetta. Section I depicts the dimly-lit room where the exhausted man lies (muted strings, low woodwinds, and timpani). Section II recalls the golden time of childhood (oboe, flute and clarinet enter over harp and strings; then oboe and harp are foremost, followed by violin, flute and harp). Section III is a very brief return to the present and the silent room (timpani and strings). Section IV is a prolonged return to the sweet childhood recollection (oboe, flute, and a solo violin are foremost), and the codetta functions as. a transition into the exposition by suggesting the renewal of the death struggle (chromatic and dissonant).
II. Exposition: Fever and struggle with Death. Allegro molto agitato; D-flat minor.
"But Death does not long grant sleep and dreams to his victim. Cruelly he shakes him awake, and the fight begins afresh. Will to live and power of Death! What frightful wrestling! Neither bears off the victory, and all is silent once more!"
The exposition may be viewed as being in five sub-sections: the main theme, three episodes, and a subsidiary theme. The main theme, announced by a fatalistic thump of timpani, symbolizes the death struggle (full orchestra). The three episodes represent the reaction of the individual, his will to live, and the frightful wrestling back and forth (various orchestral combinations). The subsidiary theme suggests once again the recall of youth (it begins with solo flute over strings, moves to a waltz-like section, and then on to a brief passage again representing the will to live).
III. Development (and Recapitulation): Dreams, childhood, memories, and death. Meno mosso, ma sempre alia breve.
PROGRAM NOTES -continued
"Sunk back tired of battle, sleepless, as in fever frenzy the sick man now sees his life pass before his inner eye, trait by trait and scene by scene. First the morning red of childhood, shining bright in pure innocence! Then the youth's saucier play -exerting and trying his strength till he ripens to the man's fight, and now burns with hot lust after the higher prizes of life. The one high purpose that has led him through life was to shape all he saw transfigured into a still more transfigured form. Cold and sneering, the world sets barrier upon barrier in the way of his achievement. If he thinks himself near his goal, a 'Halt!' thunders in his ear. "Make the barrier thy stirrup! Ever higher and onward go!' And so he pushes forward, so he climbs, desists not from his sacred purpose. What he has ever sought with his heart's deepest yearning, he still seeks in his death sweat. Seeks -alas! and finds it never. Whether he comprehends it more clearly or that it grows upon him gradually, he can yet never exhaust it, cannot complete it in his spirit. Then clangs the last stroke of Death's iron hammer, breaks the earthly body in twain, covers the eye with the night of death'
The Development, the longest of all the sections, is in four sub-sections followed by the recapitulation. Section I depicts the "morning red of childhood" (woodwinds, particularly the flute, alternating with strings, particularly the solo violin). Section II (Etwas breiter) portrays "the youth's saucier play," ripening "the man's fight" (various orchestral combinations). Section III (Appassionato) continues in the same manner. Section IV alternates between the aspirations of youth and the will to live (trombones), ending in the ominous gloom of the death chamber. The short recapitulation (Allegro motto agitato) depicts the brief final conflict with a struggle for the release of the spirit (an ascending chromatic figure).
IV. Coda: Transfiguration. Moderato.
'"But from the heavenly spaces sounds mightily to greet him what he yearningly sought for here: deliverance from the world, transfiguration of the world."
Beginning with death and darkness (gong) this section reaches the highest orchestral ecstasy; it is an apotheosis not only of life but of orchestral writing.
TILL EULENSPIEGELS LUSTIGE STREICHE, OPUS 28 ... RICHARD STRAUSS
Strauss completed Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks in May 1895 The first performance took place at a Giirzenich concert in Cologne on 5 November 1895; Franz Wiillner conducted.
First DSO performance: 7 March 1921 under the direction of the composer.
First performance in this series: 20 March 1924; Bruno Walter conducted Last performance in this series: 21 September 1974; Aldo Ceccato conducted Other famous guest conductors of the work here have included Willem Mengelberg (1928), Vladimir Golschmann and Fritz Reiner (both 1936), Tauno Hannikainen (1940), Victor de Sabata (1952). Werner Torkanowsky (1961). Eugen Jochum (1962), Josef Krips (1963). Henry Lewis (1970). and Hiroyuki Iwaki (1973 at Meadow Brook).
The work is scored for 3 flutes and piccolo. 3 oboes and english horn. 2 clarinets
in B-flat. clarinet in D and bass clarinet, 3 bassoons and contrabassoon, 6 horns. 4 trumpets, 3 trombones and tuba, timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, a watchman's rattle, and strings It lasts about 15 minutes in performance.
Literary historians claim that Till Eulenspiegel ("Tyll Owlglass") was born around 1300 and died around 1350 near Liibeck. The earliest printed version of the legend appeared in Strasbourg in 1519. It was written by Dr. Thomas Murner, a defrocked Franciscan. Versions were soon published in other countries, the first one in English appearing around 1530.
John George Robertson, a German literature scholar, writes of Till: "He is the wily peasant who exercises his wit and roguery on the tradespeople of the towns, above all, on the innkeepers; but priests, noblemen, even princes, are also his victims. His jests are often pointless, more often brutal. . . . The satire of the chapbook turns on class distinctions, and it might be described as the retaliation of the peasant on the townsman who in the 14th and 15th centuries had begun to look down upon the country boor as his inferior."
Characteristically, Strauss divulged the program for Till Eulenspiegel only begrudgingly and, even then, it was in three different phases, so that one hardly knows how literal the program really is. At first, the composer refused to go beyond the title. But then conductor Franz Wiillner managed to coax the following from the reticent musical storyteller:
"It is impossible for me to furnish a program to 'Eulenspiegel'; were I to put into words the thoughts which its several incidents suggested to me, they would seldom suffice, and might even give rise to offense. Let me leave it, therefore, to my hearers to crack the hard nut which the Rogue has prepared for them. By way of helping them to a better understanding, it seems sufficient to point out the two 'Eulenspiegel' motives, which, in the most manifold disguises, moods, and situations, pervade the whole up to the catastrophe, when after he he been condemned to death Till is strung up to the gibbet. For the rest, let them guess at the musical joke which a Rogue has offered them."
Finally, the composer was persuaded by the Strauss scholar Wilhelm Mauke to write the guidelines in a score. Mauke rewrote the description in the following capsule version:
"Once upon a time [violins] there was a prankish rogue [french horn theme followed by another featuring the clarinet], ever up to new tricks, named Till Eulcnspiegel. Now he jumps on his horse and gallops into the midst of a crowd of market women [oboes and clarinets], overturning their wares with a prodigious clatter [timpani]. Now he lights out with seven-league boots; now conceals himself in a mousehole. Disguised as a priest, he 'drips with unction and morals.' yet out of his robe peeps the scamp [a pious theme closing with glissando strings as he rips off the garb]. As a cavalier he makes love, at first in jest, but soon in earnest, and is rebuffed. He is furious, and swears vengence on all mankind [loud exclamation in unison horns], but meeting some 'philistines" he forgets his wrath and mocks them [peasant dance]. At length his hoaxes fail. He is tried in a Court of Justice and is condemned to hang for his misdeeds drum roll]; but he still whistles defiantly as he descends the ladder. Even on the scaffold he jests. Now he swings; now he gasps for air; a last convulsion [descending major seventh intervals in bassoons, horns, trombones, and tuba]. Till is dead."
THOMAS PETTIT
3? CONCERT QUALITY PIANOS & SERVICE ffc
882-0047
Piano Technician for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra Member Piano Technicians Guild
American Composer
CLARK EASTHAM
will accept a limited number of private students in PIANO -THEORY -COMPOSITION
Call (313) 541-3459 for auditions 418 N. WASHINGTON, ROYAL OAK________Faculties of WSU and U-M DEARBORN
Half the fun of learning music is baring the right teacher . . .
MARIUS FOSSENKEMPER
Formerly member of the Detroit Symphony for over 30 consecutive years
"He is a bulwark of artistic authority" -Dr. Thor Johnson
Woodwind, Keyboard, Ensemble. Theory
963-0369
NATHAN GORDON MARJORIE GORDON
SOLO VIOLA -Detroit Symphony Orchestra LYRIC COLORATURA SOPRANO
Wayne State U. Faculty Wayne State U. Faculty
Conductor, Dearborn Symphony Director, Piccolo Opera Company Coordinator, Excursions in Music
By Appoiniment Only. 861-6930
MISCHA KOTTLER
Former Pianist -Detroit Symphony Orchestra Chairman of Piano Division of Wayne State University
INSTRUCTION IN PIANO
18665 Fairfield Tel. 862-1886
ALICE LUNGERSHAUSEN
Harpsichordist -Detroit Symphony Orchestra
INSTRUCTION -CONCERTS
821 -6922
DIEOPTISCHE HELENA
_ The Egyptian Helen
Wednesday evening, flpril 25 at Z3O Ford fluditorium
CONCERT VERSION OF RICHRRD STRflUSS OPERfl
DETROIT SYITIPHONY ORCHESTRA RNTflL DORfiTI, conductor
GWYNETH JONES, soprano mflTTI KflSTU, tenor
BRRBRRfl HENDRICKS, soprono WILLRRD WHITE, bass-baritone BIRGIT FINNILfiE, contralto CURTIS RRYRITI. tenor
KENNETH JEWELL CHORALE
Benefit Prices: 25.OO. 17.50.12.OO Student tickets: 25.OO Ford fluditorium Box Office 962-5524