TMSO Special（7/23）

This concert is over. Date: Tue. 23. July 2024 14:00 (13:00)

Venue: Suntory Hall Venue Info Seat

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Artists

Alan GILBERT, Conductor
Hiroshi IKEMATSU, Contrabass

Profile

Program

Magnus Lindberg: EXPO (2009)

Program Notes
Eduard Tubin: Double Bass Concerto ETW22 (1948)

Program Notes
Rimsky-Korsakov: Sheherazade, op.35

Program Notes

Magnus Lindberg: EXPO (2009)

　When Alan Gilbert started as Music Director for the New York Philharmonic, I was commissioned to compose a piece to open the season for Gilbert to conduct in his new role. I named the piece EXPO, and my main intention was to write a piece that would function as an exposition of Alan Gilbertʼs way of making music with the orchestra.
　EXPO is full of extreme contrasts − there is super-fast and super-slow music, and it is the strange amalgam between those poles.
　Itʼs a piece built on qualities I find so gorgeous in Alanʼs work as a conductor - absolute technical and physical straightness, no mystery around the rational part of it, and then on top of that, the highly irrational and mysterious part of how you actually put music together. Given the brevity of the piece, itʼs only nine or ten minutes, I thought a pithy word like EXPO would make a fitting title. Besides, I like the sound of the word.
　A work of any length must have a trajectory, a sense of direction, and logic for how it evolves. I have tried to establish a musical language to communicate this drama. As short as EXPO is, there are more than ten tempo markings, resulting in a feeling of great tension and energy in the orchestra.
Magnus Lindberg

World Premiere
2009/09/16
Avery Fisher Hall, New York, NY
New York Philharmonic / Alan Gilbert

Magnus Lindberg was born in Helsinki in 1958. Following piano studies he entered the Sibelius Academy where he studied composition with Rautavaara and Heininen. He made a decisive move in 1981, travelling to Paris for studies with Globokar and Grisey. During this time he also attended Donatoniʼs classes in Siena, and made contact with Ferneyhough, Lachenmann and Höller.
　Lindbergʼs output has positioned him at the forefront of orchestral composition, including the concert-opener Feria (1997), large-scale statements such as Fresco (1997), Cantigas (1999), Concerto for Orchestra (2002-3) and Sculpture (2005), and concertos for clarinet (2002), two for violin (2006 and 2015) and two for cello (1999 and 2013). Works also include Seht die Sonne (2007), commissioned by Berliner Philharmoniker under Simon Rattle and San Francisco Symphony, his first choral-orchestral work GRAFFITI, premiered in Helsinki in 2009 and Era (2012) for the 125th anniversary of Concertgebouw.
　Lindberg was Composer-in-Residence of New York Philharmonic between 2009 and 2012, with new works including Al Largo for orchestra and Piano Concerto No.2 premiered by Yefim Bronfman. Further residencies followed with SWR Radio Symphony Orchestra Stuttgart in 2011-12, and London Philharmonic in 2014-17, with commissions including Violin Concerto No.2 for Frank Peter Zimmermann. Recent works include TEMPUS FUGIT, commissioned by Finnish Radio Symphony to celebrate the centenary of Finnish Independence in 2017, Serenades for the Chicago Symphony and Piano Concerto No.3 premiered by Yuja Wang and San Francisco Symphony under Esa-Pekka Salonen in October 2022.
Reprinted by kind permission of Boosey & Hawkes

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Magnus Lindberg: Born in Helsinki, June 27, 1958; now living in Helsinki

　Magnus Lindberg is one of the leading lights on the contemporary music scene in Finland. After graduating from the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Lindberg traveled widely in Europe, attended courses in Siena and Darmstadt, worked privately with Vinko Globokar in Paris, and ventured as far afield as Indonesia. His first big success came in 1982 with Action − Situation − Signification, written for the new-music ensemble Lindberg founded in 1980, Toimii (“It works,” in Finnish). This was followed three years later by Kraft (Strength), a thirty-minute, highly complex work of gut-wrenching power with seventy-part chords written into a meter-high score. Kraft remains one of Lindbergʼs best-known works and has won him important prizes.
　The great majority of Lindbergʼs compositions are instrumental, either for full orchestra (“my favorite instrument”), chamber ensembles of various sizes, or solo instrument. “Vigorous, colorful, dense and kinetic” are the words the New York Philharmonicʼs program annotator James Keller used to describe Lindbergʼs recent compositions, which include Serenades, premiered by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 2021; the Third Piano Concerto by the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra in 2022; and the Viola Concerto by the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra earlier this year. His Quintet for piano and winds, fashioned after Mozartʼs and Beethovenʼs works for this formation, was premiered last year in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
　Lindberg spent the years 2009-2012 as the New York Philharmonicʼs composer-in-residence at the invitation of the Philharmonicʼs incoming music director at the time, Alan Gilbert. The opening night gala of the 2009/2010 season was Gilbertʼs inaugural concert as the orchestraʼs new Music Director, and the opening work at that concert was Lindbergʼs EXPO. This event also marked the first time a Philharmonic season opened with a newly-commissioned work since Aaron Coplandʼs Connotations in 1962.
　David Patrick Stearns, reviewing EXPO for The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote: “Part fanfare, part concerto for orchestra, EXPO is an aerobic workout for all sections of the orchestra and […] an exhilarating showcase.”

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.
　

Eduard Tubin: Double Bass Concerto ETW22 (1948)

Allegro con moto - Andante sostenuto - Allegro non troppo, poco marciale
(played without pause)

Eduard Tubin: Born in Torila, Estonia, June 18, 1905; died in Stockholm, November 17, 1982

　Much like Chopin, who spent most of his life in exile due to war, Eduard Tubinʼs career took him from his native Estonia to Sweden, the country to which he fled in 1944 and where he spent the rest of his life. Tubin was born in the village of Torila, Estonia, which at the time was part of the Russian Empire. He received his initial musical education in Tartu, Estoniaʼs second-largest city, and later studied with Kodály in Budapest. In Stockholm Tubin conducted and composed prolifically. His catalogue includes ten symphonies (an eleventh remained incomplete upon his death), two operas, concertos (including one for balalaika), and much choral and vocal music. He received several Swedish music awards and was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music in 1982.
　Tubinʼs importance has been recognized internationally only in recent years, largely through the efforts of conductor Neeme Järvi, who, like Tubin, is an exiled Estonian. In Tubinʼs native land, an International Eduard Tubin Society (https://www.tubinsociety.com/?lang=en) was established in 2000; in 2005 the capital city of Tallinn observed the centennial of Tubinʼs birth with a major festival devoted to his works; a statue of Tubin was erected in Tartu. and a Tubin Museum opened near his birthplace at Alatskivi Castle in 2011.
　Like Chopin living in Paris but still a Pole at heart, Tubin even as a Swedish citizen remained culturally an Estonian and wrote much music based on musical sources from his homeland. In later years his music took on more modernistic traits. The Double Bass Concerto does not quote Estonian folk music but, like most of Tubinʼs music, it takes as its raison dʼêtre the development of thematic material.
　In 1947, Tubin received a visit from Ludvig Juht in Stockholm. Juht too was of Estonian origin, but since 1934 had been a member of the Boston Symphonyʼs bass section. Juhtʼs playing was of virtuoso caliber, and during the off-season he toured as a soloist. As he needed material to add to the paltry repertory at the time, he commissioned Tubin to write a concerto for him. The logical venue for the world premiere would have been in Boston, where the orchestraʼs conductor, Serge Koussevitzky, was himself a former double bass virtuoso (and composer of a concerto for his instrument, today a repertory staple), but this was not to be. The first performance of any kind (possibly a private one) was given in Rockport, Massachusetts (about 40 miles northeast of Boston) on July 19, 1948 by Sofia Stumberg with piano accompaniment. Juht performed the concerto on October 2, 1948 in New Yorkʼs Town Hall, also with piano accompaniment, but he never got to perform the concerto with orchestra. The premiere in this form was given on March 8, 1957 (two months after Juhtʼs death) by the Spanish soloist Manuel Verdeguer with the Columbia Symphony Orchestra in Bogota. Why Bogota? Because the conductor there was Olav Roots, an old Estonian friend of Tubinʼs.
　The twenty-minute concerto is cast in three movements played without pause. The opening melodic material is presented by the soloist over a darkly menacing rhythmic accompaniment. The full orchestra extends this material until the soloist returns with a new, gently lyrical theme played cantabile. Soloist and orchestra then exchange roles, the soloist accompanying while the orchestra further explores the thematic material. Following an orchestral climax the double bass, accompanied by strings and harp, embarks on the central movement to a wide-ranging theme of longing and aspiration. An extended cadenza leads into the final movement, music that at once seems both pleasantly jaunty and nervously unsettled.
　Hanna Jürgensonʼs Masterʼs thesis on the concerto, published earlier this year, is available online.
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.
　

Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade, op.35

Ⅰ The Sea and Sinbadʼs Ship (Largo e maestoso - Allegro non troppo)
Ⅱ The Story of the Kalander Prince (Lento - Andantino - Allegro molto)
Ⅲ The Young Prince and the Princess (Andantino quasi allegretto)
Ⅳ Festival at Baghdad; The Sea; The Ship Goes to Pieces on a Rock
Surmounted by a Bronze Warrior; Conclusion (Allegro molto)

Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov: Born in Tikhvin, near Novgorod, March 18, 1844; died in Liubensk, near St. Petersburg, June 21, 1908

　The two hundred or so dramatically linked stories that constitute the Thousand and One Nights (or Arabian Nights) originated in Eastern lands centuries ago. The stories were handed down over the years and embroidered by each storyteller in his or her own fashion. A conteuse named Scheherazade provided a convenient framework on which to drape a rich and colorful tapestry of these stories, folk tales, poems and dramatic narratives. In the form she related them, we are indebted to the misogynistic Persian king Shahriar.
　Having been outraged by his faithless wife, Shahriar resolved to avenge himself on the entire female population of his city. Each night he would marry a beautiful young woman, only to kill her the following day. After some time, a girl of exceptional charm, wit and intelligence came forward with a plan to end this reign of terror. She offered herself to the King as his next bride, and the King gladly accepted, though he warned her that she would die on the following day. When bedtime approached, the girl began to relate an enthralling story to the King, but broke off just at the most exciting part, with a promise to continue the next day. The King postponed her execution so as to hear the outcome of this story, but the girl repeated her tactic the following night, and the night after that to a total of a thousand nights. By this time, she had borne him a son, the King had come to love her, and he finally renounced his categorical hatred of women. The Queen had in the meantime won the love and gratitude of the people as well, and they named her Scheherazade, which means “Savior of the City.”
　Wondrous to hear were Scheherazadeʼs marvelous tales of intrigue and adventure set in exotic lands. Rimsky-Korsakov, with his masterful ability to exploit dazzling orchestral colors and sonorities, was just the composer to set these tales to music. Scheherazade, his four-movement “narrative” of scenes from the Arabian Nights, was written during the summer of 1888. It was first performed in St. Petersburg on October 22 with the composer conducting.
　“My aversion for the seeking of a too definite program in my composition,” wrote Rimsky-Korsakov, “led me [in the new edition] to do away with all those hints of it which had lain in the headings of each movement. … In composing Scheherazade, I meant these hints to direct but slightly the hearerʼs fancy on the path which my own fancy had traveled, and to leave more minute and particular conceptions to the will and mood of each listener.” Since Rimsky-Korsakov wished each listener to imagine his or her own kaleidoscope of fairy-tale images and designs of Oriental fantasy, there is little to be gained by trying to match the music with specific stories.
　Likewise, a lengthy description of each movement would serve little purpose; the individual imagination must be free to roam. Nevertheless, one cannot miss the recurring “voice” of the lovely, seductive, mysterious Scheherazade, represented by a sinuous theme played by the solo violin. This is just one of the many tantalizing touches of orchestration found in the magnificently colored score. Here are a few poetic lines from Edward Downes, commenting on the resplendent orchestration: “The color of the melody changes like the shifting lights on the fabled Arabian Sea… the strings glint and gleam with true oriental splendor … Rimskyʼs orchestra displays an iridescence of tone color so rich and subtly shifting that one is reminded of the spreading of a peacockʼs tail.… The storm and sea subside and the story is done. The voice of Scheherazadeʼs violin fades upward through a final, serene chord of the orchestra, like the passing of a dream.”

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】（7/23up）
Stanley Myers：Cavatina
　（Hiroshi IKEMATSU, Contrabass、Naoko YOSHINO,Harp）

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