Promenade Concert

Promenade Concert No.399

This concert is over. Date: Sat. 8. October 2022 14:00 (13:00)

Venue: Suntory Hall Venue Info Seat

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Artists

Gergely MADARAS, Conductor
Josef ŠPAČEK, Violin

Profile

Gergely MADARAS (Conductor)

Gergely Madaras is Music Director of the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège since 2019. He has previously held positions as Chief Conductor of the Savaria Symphony Orchestra and Music Director of the Orchestre Dijon Bourgogne.
Having forged strong professional relationships throughout Europe, Gergely regularly appears as a guest conductor with orchestras including the BBC Symphony, BBC Philharmonic, Hallé, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Tonhalle Orchestra Zürich, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Filarmonica della Scala, Orchestre National de Lyon, Maggio Muiscale Fiorentino, the Oslo, Copenhagen, Bergen, Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestras as well as the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Münchener Kammerorchester and Academy of Ancient Music. Further afield, he has appeared with the Melbourne and Houston Symphony orchestras.
2021/22 includes debuts with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, Bamberger Symphoniker, Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic, Musikkollegium Winterthur, Hamburger Symphoniker and Den Norske Opera & Ballet Orchestra. He will also return to Budapest Festival Orchestra, as well as Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI for three programmes across the season, which include the opening concert of Milano Musica at La Scala and a staged performance of Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle.
While grounded in the core classical and romantic repertoire, he maintains a close relationship with new music. He has collaborated with composers George Benjamin, Péter Eötvös, György Kurtág, Tristan Murail, Luca Francesconi, Philippe Boesmans and Pierre Boulez, for whom he served as assistant conductor at the Lucerne Festival Academy between 2011-2013.
Equally established in the operatic repertoire, he has appeared at the English National Opera, Dutch National Opera, Hungarian State Opera and Grand Théâtre de Genève. Future plans include his debut at La Monnaie in Brussels.
Born in Budapest in 1984, Gergely first began studying folk music with the last generation of authentic Hungarian Gipsy and peasant musicians at the age of five. He then went on to study classical flute, violin and composition, graduating from the flute faculty of the Liszt Academy in Budapest, as well as the conducting faculty of the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, where he studied with Mark Stringer.

Josef ŠPAČEK (Violin)

Praised for his remarkable range of colours, his confident and concentrated stage presence,
his virtuosity and technical poise as well as the beauty of his tone Josef Špaček has gradually emerged as one of the leading violinists of his generation. His performances of a wide range of repertoire demonstrate his “astonishing articulation and athleticism” (The Scotsman) and “a richness and piquancy of timbre.” (The Telegraph).
He appears with orchestras including the Orchestre de Paris, the RundfunkSinfonieorchester Berlin, the Bamberger Symphoniker, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique du Capitole de Toulouse, the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI Torino, the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie, the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Luxembourg, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo, the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, the Symfonieorkest Vlaanderen and the Kammerakademie Potsdam.
Josef Špaček collaborates with eminent conductors such as Jakub Hrůša, Semyon Bychkov,
Manfred Honeck, Valery Gergiev, Thomas Adès, Krzysztof Urbański, James Gaffigan, James Conlon, Maxim Emelyanchev, the late Jiří Bělohlávek, Thomas Søndergård, Cornelius Meister, Michael Sanderling, David Zinman, Eliahu Inbal, Tomáš Netopil, Pietari Inkinen, Marc Albrecht, Aziz Shokhakimov, Christian Vasquez, Jahja Ling and Lio Kuokman.
He equally enjoys giving recitals and playing chamber music and is a regular guest at festivals and in concert halls throughout Europe (among others at the Rudolfinum in Prague, the Konzerthaus in Vienna, the Muziekgebouw aan ‘t IJ in Amsterdam, the Kronberg Academy, the Evian Festival, the Kaposfest and at Schloß Elmau), Asia and the USA (among others at Kennedy Center, Washington D.C., 92Y in New York, La Jolla in San Diego, the ChamberFest Cleveland and the Nevada Chamber Music Festival). In the summer of 2021 he will make his debut at both the Verbier and Rosendal Festivals.
His chamber music partners include Gil Shaham, Kian Soltani, James Ehnes, Clemens Hagen, Julian Steckel, Gerhard Oppitz, Noah Bendix-Balgley, Máté Szücs, Miroslav Sekera, Tomáš Jamník, Sharon Kam, Kristóf Baráti, Zoltan Fejervari and Suzana Bartal.
Supraphon released a highly praised recording of the violin concertos of Dvořák and Janáček, coupled with the Fantasy of Suk, with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Jiří Bělohlávek. The Sunday Times wrote: “The violinist’s individual, deeply considered and virtuosic account of Dvorak’s solo part is the highlight of this keenly conceived programme”, adding that “in this repertoire, Špaček is second to none today.” It was the “Recording of the week” of The Sunday Times, “Recording of the month & of the year” of MusicWeb International and it received 5* in Diapason. Other recordings to date are a recital disc with works for violin and piano by Smetana, Janáček and Prokofiev with pianist Miroslav Sekera (Supraphon), works for violin solo and violin and piano by H.W. Ernst (Naxos) and an early CD with the complete Sonatas for Solo Violin by Eugène Ysaÿe.
Josef Špaček studied with Itzhak Perlman at The Juilliard School in New York, Ida Kavafian and Jaime Laredo at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, and with Jaroslav Foltýn at the Prague Conservatory. He was laureate of the International Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels, and won top prizes at the Michael Hill International Violin Competition in New Zealand, the Carl Nielsen International Violin Competition in Denmark and the Young Concert Artists International Auditions in New York.
He served as concertmaster of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, the youngest in its history. The orchestra named him “Associate Artist” as of January 2016. He held this post until the end of the 2019/20 season and now devotes himself exclusively to his solo career.
Josef Špaček performs on the ca. 1732 “LeBrun; Bouthillard” Guarneri del Gesù violin,
generously on loan from Ingles & Hayday.
He lives in Prague with his wife and their three children. In his spare time he enjoys cycling.

Program

Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsody No.2

Program Notes
Bartók: Violin Concerto No.2, Sz.112

Program Notes
Dvořák: Symphony No.8 in G major, op.88

Program Notes

　Franz Liszt: Born in Raiding, Hungary (now in Austria), October 22, 1811; died in Bayreuth, July 31, 1886

　Liszt was captivated by Hungarian gypsy music all his life, right from childhood. He collected melodies he heard played at campsites and other locations. His writings are peppered with references to them and their music, and he even wrote a 450-page treatise on the subject, published in 1859. Liszt explained the title as follows: “By using the word rhapsody my inten-tion is to indicate the fantastic-epic nature which I believe this music to possess. Each of these pieces seems to me to resemble part of a series of poems which all express national fervor. … [The rhapsodies] have their origins in the proud and warlike ardor and the pro-found grief which gypsy music can depict so well.”
　Liszt was mistaken in equating “gypsy” music with that of the Hungarian Magyars, as re-search by Bartók, Kodály and others has proven. The themes he used actually came from “urban” sources, mostly popular tunes recently composed. The gypsy flavor derives from use of the so-called “gypsy scale” (C D E-flat F-sharp G A-flat B C), sectional structure punctu-ated by sudden breaks, abrupt transitions, and a freely improvisatory style. Contrast and gathering momentum are the principal shaping forces of this music.
　The nineteen rhapsodies were composed across a span of more than four decades in two main spurts. Nos. 1-15 date from the mid-forties to the early fifties, while the remaining four were written in the early 1880s. The original solo piano version of No. 2 (by far the most popular of all the rhapsodies) comes from 1847. Thereafter, arrangements, rearrangements and disarrangements have appeared for everything from simplified versions for young pi-ano students to full orchestra, and in everything from Bugs Bunny cartoons to feature films (100 Men and a Girl). The orchestral version we hear at this concert (Karl Müller-Berghaus, 1829-1907) is the best-known, but it is just one of several.
　Structurally, the rhapsodies are free in form, the overall shaping forces generally defined by areas of contrast and overall gathering momentum. Like many of them, No. 2 begins with a slow introduction leading into an Andante mesto, which features a lush, passionate theme played by the strings. The second main part is the friska, which begins quietly in the solo oboe, gradually building in speed, texture and volume. The whole orchestra finally gives out the principal theme of the friska in the major mode − a sort of brilliant can-canesque dance tune.

　Robert Markow's musical career began as a horn player in the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. He now writes program notes for orchestras and concert organizations in the USA, Canada, and several countries in Asia. As a journalist he covers the music scenes across North America, Europe, and Asian countries, especially Japan. At Montreal's McGill University he lectured on music for over 25 years.
　

Ⅰ Allegro non troppo
Ⅱ Andante tranquillo
Ⅲ Allegro molto

　Béla Bartók: Born in Nagyszentmiklós, Hungary (now Sinnicolau Mare, Romania), March 25, 1881; died in New York City, September 26, 1945

　Bartókʼs Second Violin Concerto was written in 1937-1938 for the violinist Zoltán Székely, with whom Bartók had formed a friendship years before. It ranks among the half dozen or so greatest violin concertos of the twentieth century, one that can stand proudly beside those of Berg, Bloch, Elgar, Prokofiev and Sibelius. Bartókʼs concerto also belongs securely in their company for its lyricism, warmth and accessible style.
　When Székely asked Bartók to write a concerto for him, he had in mind a traditional, full-fledged, three-movement work. Bartók, on the other hand, preferred a single-movement work in variation form. In the end, both men got their way. The central movement is a theme-and-variation set. The outer movements are in sonata form, but are variations of each other. (The themes of the first movement are recast in the finale, which unfolds section by section as a reflection of the opening movement.) Székely gave the first performance on March 23, 1939 with Willem Mengelberg conducting the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orches-tra.
　The concertoʼs formal logic is indubitably remarkable in itself, but it is the emotional intensi-ty and mellow expressiveness that keep it securely in the repertory. As in most of Bartókʼs compositions, a strong sense of the Hungarian ethos is present, noticeable especially in the rhythms and scale patterns.
　The concerto opens with solo harp gently strumming B-major chords, as tonal and conso-nant a sound as you could find anywhere. Cellos softly pluck an introductory motif. At the seventh bar the soloist enters, tearing into the passionate first theme − a rhapsodic, intensely lyrical idea that is in neither B major nor B minor, but is unmistakably Hungarian in charac-ter. The second theme, introduced by the soloist against a quiet, almost mysterious back-ground of sustained strings, has become somewhat notorious as an example of a twelve-tone row without actually behaving like one. The cadenza begins with Bartókʼs only use of quarter tones in the concerto, as the solo violin “bends” the notes slightly up and down.
　A simple, tenderly plaintive theme played by the solo violin introduces the second move-ment. There is a distinct folk character to its melodic contours as well as a parlando (speak-ing) quality to it. From this theme Bartók derives six contrasting variations, each a little world unto itself in terms of dynamics, mood, tempo, texture and orchestration. Wind in-struments occasionally come to the fore, but there are pronounced roles for the harp, celes-ta, and timpani.
　The third movement closely follows the structural outline of the first, being in effect a free variation of the earlier movement. Its first theme is identical to that of the first movement, note for note, but the rhythm and character are so changed as to render it almost unrecog-nizable. The second theme (the twelve-tone idea) is melodically somewhat modified and takes on a swaying, dancelike character. New rhythms, new colors, new ways of fragmenting and recombining elements of the themes all provide a fascinating exercise in musical analysis while offering the less analytically inclined listener a vast array of brilliant sonorities, emo-tional expression, folk-inspired melodic ideas and rhythmic excitement.

　Robert Markow's musical career began as a horn player in the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. He now writes program notes for orchestras and concert organizations in the USA, Canada, and several countries in Asia. As a journalist he covers the music scenes across North America, Europe, and Asian countries, especially Japan. At Montreal's McGill University he lectured on music for over 25 years.
　

Ⅰ Allegro con brio
Ⅱ Adagio
Ⅲ Allegretto grazioso
Ⅳ Allegro ma non troppo

　Antonín Dvořák: Born in Mühlhausen (near Prague), Bohemia (today Nelahozeves, Czech Republic), September 8, 1841; died in Prague, May 1, 1904

　The genial, carefree spirit of Dvořákʼs Symphony No. 8 has endeared it to generations of concertgoers. Its prevailing happy spirit, idyllic moods, and evocations of nature and simple rustic life call to mind other symphonies of a pastoral nature: Beethovenʼs Sixth, Schumannʼs Spring Symphony (No. 1), Schubertʼs Fifth, Mahlerʼs Fourth, and Brahmsʼs Second.
　Dvořák began work on his Eighth Symphony in late August, 1889. He was in high spirits and full of creative confidence. He “complained” to a friend that his head was so full of ideas that it was a pity it took so much time to jot them down. “Melodies simply pour out of me.” For this reason, it took him only twelve days to write the composition sketch for the first move-ment, a week for the second, four days for the third and six for the finale. The orchestration required an additional six weeks. Three months after commencing work on it, the score was ready for the printer, who, in this exceptional case, was not the usual Simrock, but the Eng-lish firm of Novello. Dvořák conducted the first performance on February 2, 1890 in Prague.
　The symphonyʼs first movement presents analysts with a puzzle: What role does the opening nostalgic theme play? Is it the “first” theme, or an introduction? Is the “main” theme then the simple, birdlike tune played later by the flute? If so, what then does one call the warmly no-ble cello theme that follows the timpaniʼs “rat-a-tat” and the succeeding idea characterized by upward leaping octaves in the cellos? No matter, really. The point is that Dvořák did incor-porate a great wealth of melody into this movement. One program annotator (Richard Freed) finds in it “an atmosphere of fairy tales and forest legends … bird calls, woodland sounds and bluff Slavonic marches.”
　The second movement, like the first, opens with a nostalgic, rather solemn theme. A second idea in C major offers a new theme in the flute and oboe, accompanied by descending scales in the violins. An angry outburst from the horns leads to a brief, anxiety-filled passage, but sun, warmth and charm soon return.
　The third movement is a graceful waltz that frames a central trio section announced by a new theme in the flute and oboe. Dvořák borrowed this theme from his opera The Stubborn Lovers. The waltz returns, and a brief, energetic coda concludes the movement.
　A trumpet fanfare opens the Finale, followed by a charming and carefree theme in the cellos. Simple and natural as the theme sounds, it caused Dvořák much difficulty. He wrote ten dif-ferent versions of it before he was satisfied. (Beethovenʼs “Ode to Joy” theme underwent a similar metamorphosis.) Dvořák then builds a set of variations on this theme, including an exuberant outburst from the full orchestra with trilling horns and scurrying strings. A cen-tral section in C minor presents a new march-like idea. When this subsides, Dvořák returns to the peaceful world of the principal theme, which undergoes further variations. A rousing coda brings the symphony to a brilliant close.

　Robert Markow's musical career began as a horn player in the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. He now writes program notes for orchestras and concert organizations in the USA, Canada, and several countries in Asia. As a journalist he covers the music scenes across North America, Europe, and Asian countries, especially Japan. At Montreal's McGill University he lectured on music for over 25 years.
　

【Soloist Encore】(10/8up)
Když šel z Hradišta
（Josef ŠPAČEK, Violin）

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