APO Livestream - The New Zealand Herald Premier Series: Light & Shade- Listening Notes: Experienced Listener

PREMIER
SERIES
LIGHT
LISTENING NOTES
FOR EXPERIENCED LISTENERS
RESPIGHI The Birds
IBERT Flute Concerto
RAVEL Pavane
RESPIGHI Church Windows

OTTORINO
RESPIGHI
(1879 – 1936)
COMPOSER PROFILE
• Born in Bologne, Italy in 1879
• Taught piano by his father, who was a piano teacher
• He also studied violin, viola, composition (with
Rimsky-Korsakov), and music history
• Moved to St. Petersburg, Russia when he was 20,
and joined the Russian Imperial Theatre as Principal
Violin
• When he was 34, he moved to Rome to teach
composition. He remained there for the rest of his life
• By the mid-1920s, he achieved world fame and
toured extensively
THE BIRDS
Respighi was heavily influenced by his studies of
Baroque music, and this is evident in The Birds; which
was composed in 1928. It was written as an attempt to
recreate bird sounds in musical notation (e.g. twittering,
the fluttering of wings and scratching of feet).
It is a suite which consists of five sections, or
movements, composed for a small orchestra.
I. Prelude
II. The Dove
III. The Hen
IV. The Nightingale
V. The Cuckoo
The first movement, Prelude (Allegro moderato, A Major),
is moderately fast and in four time. This movement is an
overture for the rest of the Suite. It opens with a melody
based on an operatic song by the Italian composer
Bernardo Pasquini (1637-1710). This is followed by
a medley of birdsong and themes from the following
movements and ends again with the Pasquini melody.
The second movement, The Dove (Andante espressivo,
F# minor), is in moderate speed and in three time. This
movement is inspired by French composer Jacques de
Gallot (c.1625-1700). It opens with a solo oboe, harp and
strings. Rapidly played notes imitate the flutter of wings,
and the melody is passed to clarinet and solo violin.
Next, The Hen (Vivace, A Minor) is very fast and in three
time. This movement is based on the music of French
composer Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683-1764). The
movement opens with the clucking of hens played by
violins before oboes, bassoons, violas, and cellos join in,
which all increase the hen-house-feeling.
The Nightingale (Andante mosso, C Major) is in moderate
speed and four time. The melody for this movement was
inspired by an 18th-century piece; though not much is
known about this work. The gentle melody is played by the
winds and accompanied by the strings.
The final movement, The Cuckoo (Allegro, A Major) is
fast and in four time. This melody of this movement is
also inspired by Pasquini’s operatic song. The woodwinds
imitate the cuckoo in this final movement, with trills and
staccato quavers adding to the birdsong.
DID YOU KNOW?
Elsa Respighi, Ottorino’s wife, was also a composer. She
was only 41 when he died, and being 15 years younger;
she lived on for another 60 years, dying one week short of
her 102nd birthday.
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CHURCH WINDOWS
This suite was based on three piano pieces that Respighi
also composed, during a time when he was heavily
inspired by Gregorian chanting. He uses this sonorous
vocal style with the orchestra. This suite has four
movements.
I. The Flight into Egypt
II. St. Michael the Archangel
III. The Matins of St. Clare
IV. St. Gregory the Great
The opening movement, The Flight into Egypt (Molto lento,
D Minor) is very slow and in five time. It gently pulses and
uses a stepwise melody, common in medieval music. His
use of musical scales creates an exotic feeling, and the
slow five time is used to illustrate the uneven steps of the
slaves escaping from Egypt.
The next movement, St. Michael the Archangel (Allegro
impetuoso, D Minor) is impetuous and fast, and in two
time. It represents a battle with a dragon in the sky; and
the sounds of weapons clashing. The trombone is used
to play his first theme in this movement, against a horn
fanfare and the strings playing descending, chromatic
scales. A second theme enters, played by the horns and
strings. A slow section follows this, played off stage by
a solo trumpet before the sky battle starts up again and
finishes with a huge crash at fff on the tam-tam
(a gong-like type of percussive instrument).
The Matins of St. Clare (Lento, F# Minor) is very slow
and in five time. This movement is calm and peaceful
compared to the previous one. It opens softly with a
pedal note in the horns and violas and a melody in the
flutes and oboes. He also uses bells to recreate the
monastery image fully. The movement also changes key
from minor to major, creating an uplifting, rapt feeling.
The final movement, St. Gregory the Great (Lento, Ab
Major) is very slow and in four time. This movement
was inspired by Gloria from the Missa Angelica (Angelic
Mass). It opens quietly with bell-like figures and the
horns playing the Gregorian chant. This movement also
includes an organ solo which takes the movement to a
climax before the brass section reprises the Gloria motif
and brings the piece to a grand finale.
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JACQUES
IBERT
(1890 – 1962)
COMPOSER PROFILE
• Born in Paris, France in 1890
• His mother was an accomplished pianist
• She provided him with piano and violin lessons, but
Ibert decided he wanted to be a composer
• After graduating high school, Ibert went to work for his
father’s struggling business
• While working there, he met many actors, singers and
writers and he developed an interest in theatre which
would remain throughout his life
• When he began studying music, his father withdrew
financial support
• Ibert made money working as an accompanist and
composing piano pieces and songs
• He was an excellent improviser and became an
accompanist for silent movies in theatres, which led
him to compose over sixty film scores later in his life
FLUTE CONCERTO
Ibert’s Flute Concerto was composed in 1934 and it was
dedicated to the great French flautist Marcel Moyse. This
piece is considered one of the most difficult pieces in the
flute repertoire.
The Flute Concerto is composed of three movements:
I. Allegro
II. Andante
III. Allegro Scherzando
The first movement, Allegro is in two time and it opens
with a short four-bar introduction before the solo flute
enters with rapid running passes and very few chances
to breathe. The orchestra briefly takes over the fast
passages, and the flute also engages in question and
answer with other instruments. This movement rushes
headlong to a final loud chord at ff.
Andante is lyrical and in three time. It uses the full range
of the flute, and it opens with a blues-influenced melody
punctuated occasionally by the timpani. There is tension
and resolution in this movement underlying a poignant
melody. Ibert’s wife once commented that the Concerto
had been written shortly after the death of Ibert’s father
and that this movement expressed a spirit of mourning
and reflection.
The final movement, Allegro Scherzando is in multiple
times. It once again shows off the virtuosic ability of the
solo flute. It contains jazz-influenced rhythm, fanfares
and two improvised solos. The final solo is followed by
the entire orchestra playing together and it brings the
Concerto to a climactic conclusion.
DID YOU KNOW?
During World War I, Ibert joined an army medical unit and
was decorated with the Croix de Guerre by the French
government.
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JOSEPH
MAURICE RAVEL
(1875 – 1937)
COMPOSER PROFILE
• Born in the town of Ciboure, France – very close to the
Spanish border
• Won a place at the Paris Conservatoire at the age of 14
• His first work was published when he was 20
• He studied with composer Gabriel Fauré
• His music was influenced by Spanish colour and rhythm
• In 1928, after touring the USA, he was awarded an
honorary Doctorate from Oxford University
• Ravel battled Pick’s Disease in the last few years of his
life, which increasingly affected his speech and motor
control
• After an unsuccessful operation in 1937, he passed away
PAVANE
A pavane was a stately dance from the Renaissance
period, used to open ceremonial balls put on by the
aristocrats. The slow, processional nature of the music
allowed the dancers to show off their elegant ball gowns.
The sense of longing and tenderness, so compellingly
captured in Ravel’s Pavane pour une enfante défunte, was
inspired by his beloved mother, Marie. From the Basque
country, she would often sing him Basque folksongs,
sparking a deep sympathy and love for his mother’s
people and folklore.
The title of the work is the source of some confusion.
In translation, it means ‘Pavane for a dead princess’,
but it wasn’t intended as a sad musical vignette. Rather,
Ravel was drawn to the imaginative world of the Spanish
17th-century painter Diego Velázquez. The noble and
graceful pavane, as Ravel explains, ‘is not a funeral lament
for a dead child but rather an evocation of the pavane
that might have been danced by such a little princess as
painted by Velázquez.’
Ravel originally composed the Pavane pour une enfant
défunte in 1899 as a piece for solo piano. This beautiful
and simple work became an immediate favourite.
However, pianists often played it slowly, transforming the
pavane into a deathly dirge, prompting Ravel to exclaim ‘It
was the princess who dies, not the pavane!’ Many critics
agree that Ravel’s careful orchestration of the work in
1910 was an improvement.
The Pavane begins with a long-breathed horn melody
that gives way to a sunlit, pastoral oboe entry followed by
quietly nostalgic strings, then the tune makes its pulsating
reappearance, this time on the woodwinds. There’s a
drifting passage with strings, harps and flutes before the
theme makes its last entrance, every instrument bearing it
aloft, as though it were being gently carried shoulder-high
during a sad funeral procession.
DID YOU KNOW?
Ravel’s most famous piece is arguably Boléro, which
skaters Torvill and Dean used to accompany their goldmedal
winning ice dance at the Olympic Games in 1984.
It was originally written as a piano accompaniment to a
ballet. Ravel himself said of the work, ‘it has no music
in it’ and was surprised by its widespread success and
popularity.
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