As we've noted, there's more than one reason to care about Mahler's loopy little Wunderhorn song "Ablösung im Sommer," Part 1

FOR STARTERS, IS THIS THE SAME SONG?

MAHLER: Lieder aus der Jugendzeit (Songs from Youth):
"Ablösung im Sommer" ("Summer Replacement")

Cuckoo has fallen to his death
on a green willow tree.
Cuckoo is dead!
Fallen to his death.

Who then for us this whole summer
will while away the time?
Cuckoo! Cuckoo!
Hey! Lady Nightingale must do so!

She sits on a green branch:
the small, delicate Nightingale,
the dear, sweet Nightingale!
She sings and hops, is ever happy,
even when other birds are silent.

We'll wait for Lady Nightingale,
who lives in green hedgerows.
And if the cuckoo is at an end,
then she will start to warble.

-- original text "based on" Des Knaben Wunderhorn but
mostly by Mahler, translation (mostly) by William Mann

Listen on YouTube (audio only)
Or click here to go to Internet Archive, then press ► to play


Janet Baker, mezzo-soprano; Geoffrey Parsons, piano. Hyperion, recorded in Rosslyn Hill Unitarian Chapel, Hampstead, London, Feb. 24-25, 1983

Or click here to go to Internet Archive, then press ► to play


Diana Damrau, soprano; Stephan Matthias Lademann, piano. Telos Music, recorded in Telos Music Studios, Mechernich-Floisdorf, Germany, May or Sept. 2003

Click here to listen on Internet Archive, then press ► to play


Anny Felbermayer, soprano; Viktor Graf, piano. Vanugard, recorded in Vienna, 1952

Click here to listen on Internet Archive, then press ► to play


Judith Raskin, soprano; George Schick, piano. Epic-CBS-Sony, recorded in New York City, June 1965

A NOTE ON THIS WEEK'S MUSIC (AND SOME
CONSIDERATIONS GOING FORWARD)

Happily, Internet Archive seems back to something like normal functioning, meaning that it's once again possible to draw on Sunday Classics clips that reside there. However, this post, as you may recall, was originally conceived to depend on YouTube for music, and so a fair amount of today's music is so sourced, though it's all audio-only.

A number of today's performances already existed in the SC Archive (chez Internet Archive), and I've returned to embedding clips, hoping they'll play normally. But for these selections I've also included links to their Internet Archive pages. And I've included them in a particular form: with the "Webamp" player active. I've done this for another reason. While I.A. was grounded, the team was also working on a new version of its player, which is what 's used to play the clips that are embedded here. So that even after access to the archive was restored, for a while it was necessary, even if you were listening on-site, to switch to the Webamp option in order to hear anything.

At some point the new player must have been activated, but it appears that, understandably, it wasn't designed to work on old, no-longer-supported browser versions. So anyone who's dependent on such browsers isn't going to be hearing much music. If there are any SC readers in that situation, I'd love to know about it, because this means that all those years' worth of posts are going to be music-less for you. K can at least continue going forward to provide on-site links.

by Ken

In last week's post ("Not that it takes much, but I'm in an 'Urlicht' frame of mind -- and we're going to have some other Mahler Wunderhorn songs too," Oct. 28) we listened to a pair of Mahler's great song hits, "
Urlicht" and "Father Anthony's Fish Sermon," both settings of texts drawn from the folk-song anthology Des Knaben Wunderhorn" ("The Youth's Magic Horn") -- and a little wisp of a third, less consequential Wunderhorn song: the song we've just heard again in an almost confounding range of renderings, "Ablösung im Sommer." It's one of Mahler's early Wunderhorn settings, which he felt no need (or reason) to orchestrate himself, though we've already heard it with orchestra (and we have in store performances with orchestratations by several different hands).


IT'S A CHARMING, PERHAPS GOOFY
OR MAYBE EVEN WEIRD LITTLE SONG

Not that it takes much, but I'm in an "Urlicht" frame of mind -- and we're going to have some other Mahler Wunderhorn songs too

AND DO WE HAVE A KNOCKOUT "URLICHT" COMING UP!

---

TODAY WE HAVE MUSIC!!!  (It's just not in our usual form)

Internet Archive, where SC's music is lodged, has been dealing with major cyber-attacks (see below). While it's back online (hooray!), it's still in "read-only" form, so I still had to find another way to "re-musicalize" an SC post.

---

zart  adj  sensitive, delicate, tender
[from Mahler's directive to the singer of "Urlicht":
"durchaus zart" -- "throughout zart"]

MAHLER: Symphony No. 2 in C-sharp minor (Resurrection):
iv. "Urlicht" ("Primal Light"): Sehr feierlich, aber schlicht (Choralmässig) (Very solemn, but simple/plain/truthful) (Chorale-like)
Then at bar 3: "Nicht schleppen" ("Don't drag")


Per the 2015 YT posting: "the first known footage of Glenn Gould conducting"

O little red rose,
Man lies in greatest need,
Man lies in greatest pain,
I would rather be in heaven.
Then I came upon a broad path,
then came a little angel and wanted to turn me away.
Ah no, I didn't let myself be turned away:
I am from God and want to return to God,
the dear God will give me a little light,
will light the way for me to eternal blissful life.

-- original German text from Des Knaben Wunderhorn

Maureen Forrester, contralto; orchestra, Glenn Gould, cond. Live performance filmed in Loew's Uptown Theatre, Toronto, for the CBC's 1956-57 Chrysler Festival series, aired Feb. 20, 1957

by Ken

To quote myself from the Oct. 2 Sunday Classics post:

Mahler had access to sheer beauty in a way that only Schubert could rival (think of "Urlicht," the radiant alto setting drawn from Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano's three-volume German folk-poetry anthology Des Knaben Wunderhorn, which sets the stage for the monumental finale of the Resurrection Symphony). In addition, for all Mahler's command of musical tragedy, he was the genuinely wittiest composer the classical world has produced (think of "Father Anthony's Fish Sermon," a very different Wunderhorn settting).

Now, the above text chunk contains a basic breach of Sunday Classics protocol -- did you spot it? It's the, er, inspiration for the form this blogpost has finally taken: to rectify that error, which we'll talk about -- after:

(1) We deal with the Internet Archive disaster;
and (2) we hear more Mahler songs based on Des Knaben Wunderhorn.


(1) NOW, ABOUT INTERNET ARCHIVE: FINGERS CROSSED
FOR A RETURN TO NORMAL (BUT MORE SECURE) SERVICE
[Feel free to skip this section -- I really had to include it, though. -- Ed.]

You've probably noticed that we haven't had music on Sunday Classics since early October, and that's because essentially all our music is lodged on the indispensable Internet Archive, which describes itself as "a non-profit library of millions of free texts, movies, software, music, websites, and more." The Archive took itself offline in response to massive cyber-assaults beginning Oct. 8-9 (prefigured by lesser attacks in the spring). This update was posted by I.A.'s director of Library Services. (There are numerous links, which you can see in the online posting.)

Internet Archive Services Update: 2024-10-21
Posted on October 21, 2024 by Chris Freeland

Brahms knew, and so did Mahler: Being a for-real functional artistic genius is (gosh!) really hard work

"Mahler's way of thinking in music did not easily conform to the rules of the symphonic scholars. He could not contain himself in the A B A divisions of symphonic form. In this unique first movement he adapted large-scale sonata form to his own power of improvisation. He believed that music should continually grow, phrase by phrase, one section balancing another, by laws not only of musical form as usually obeyed but also by psychological and organic growth and the logic of contrast. . . ."

-- Neville Cardus, in his "Appreciation of Mahler's Third"
[reproduced in part in the last post in this Mahler 3 series]

"This final published version [of the Andante sostenuto of Brahms's First Symphony] is clearly both tauter and richer, for there is less repetition and more diversity, and Brahms has cast fresh light on his themes by bringing them into new relationships. Altogether these changes provide a deeply fascinating insight into genius at work."

-- Robert Pascall, vice chair of the New Complete Brahms Edition (and editor of the symphonies), in his notes for the Mackerras-Teldec Brahms 1

REMEMBER THE VERY DIFFERENT VERSIONS WE'VE
HEARD OF THE ANDANTE SOSTENUTO OF BRAHMS 1?

BRAHMS: Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68:
ii. Andante sostenuto

► A reconstruction of the "initial performing version":

► And this: the familiar published (i.e., final) version
(which we'll be hearing -- and thinking about -- a lot more!):

Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Sir Charles Mackerras, cond. Telarc, recorded in Usher Hall, Edinburgh, January 1997

WE'LL TALK ABOUT THEM, BUT FOR NOW MIGHT WE HAVE
MAESTRO M. PLAY US ANOTHER SYMPHONIC ANDANTE?

BBC Philharmonic, Sir Charles Mackerras, cond. BBC Music Magazine, recorded live in Bridgewater Hall, Manchester (England), Nov. 16, 2002 (published 2005)

by Ken

It's taken us a long time and a crazy path to get here, "here" being out-the-other-end of the first movement of the Mahler Third Symphony --

OUR CRAZY PATH TO WHEREVER WE ARE NOW:

► "Setting out to trace the lineage of Boston Symphony concert-masters back to 1962, we wind up trapped in the gigantic first movement of the Mahler Third Symphony," July 23

► "Coming momentarily (if not sooner): An adventure in musical metamorphosis -- presented in a pair of mutually accessible parts," Sept. 22

► "Part 1: Marching in anguish, or to triumph, or toward what? In the 1st movement of Mahler 3, we've sure left BrahmsWorld behind!," Sept 23

► "Part 2: Marching in anguish, or to triumph, or toward what? In the 1st movement of Mahler 3, we've sure left BrahmsWorld behind! (Then again, are we so sure?)," Sept. 27

► "Brahms knew, and so did Mahler: Being a for-real functional artistic genius is (gosh!) really hard work," today

BECAUSE THE ANDANTE SOSTENUTO IS SO DEAR TO ME,
THE SC ARCHIVE TEEMS WITH PERFORMANCES OF IT

While we've got another whole group of recordings coming up in this post, for immediate hearing I've plucked out two, from the Brahms symphony cycles I feel closest to, returning to them regularly with tingly expectation that's always rewarded. Kurt Masur's Andante sostenuto and Kurt Sanderling's are different; notably, though Masur sounds in no way rushed, Sanderling sets a still-more-spacious pace, which the Dresden players fill with glowing life. But both draw me back above all because the orchestras have achieved real identification with the music, playing not just with heart-enriching beauty and finesse but with a soul-stirring sense of really living the music, whether in melodic or accompanimental or ensemble writing -- all of it sounded and made to fit together with such fullness and depth and general "rightness" of expression.

(It sobers me to realize that I've been loving the Sandering-Dresden Brahms cycle for something like half a century now, especially enjoying, in the early decades, those beautiful Eurodisc LP pressings.)

Part 2: Marching in anguish, or to triumph, or toward what? In the 1st movement of Mahler 3, we've sure left BrahmsWorld behind! (Then again, are we so sure?)

"[Mahler] could not contain himself in the A B A divisions of symphonic form. In this unique first movement he adapted large-scale sonata form to his own power of improvisation. He believed that music should continually grow, phrase by phrase, one section balancing another, by laws not only of musical form as usually obeyed but also by psychological and organic growth and the logic of contrast. This gargantuan first movement of the Third Symphony is truly well shaped, with natural and inevitable sequences: Chaos at the beginning is changed to cosmos."

-- Neville Cardus, from his "Appreciation of Mahler's Third" (1967),
reproduced in the High Performance CD reissue of the Leinsdorf-BSO M3

Neville Cardus (Apr. 2, 1888 – Feb. 28, 1975; from 1967, Sir Neville), longtime music critic of the Manchester Guardian, had a passion for Mahler which found full expression in his 1965 book Gustav Mahler: His Mind and His Music. His "Appreciation of Mahler's Third," which graced RCA's original LP issue of its 1966 Leinsdorf-Boston Symphony recording, is happily retained in the booklet for the 1999 High Performance CD edition.

MAHLER: Symphony No. 3 in D:
i. Kräftig. Entschieden. (Strong. Decisive.)


Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Rafael Kubelik, cond. DG, recorded in the Herkulessaal of the Residenz, Munich, May 1967
[NOTE: We'll hear this performance deconstructed, then re-constructed]

TO RETURN TO PART 1 OF THE POST, CLICK HERE

INTRODUCTION
by Ken

"Such a movement defies conventional analysis." -- N.C.
[More text follows his commentary on the first movement of M3]

As I explained in Part 1 of this post, the key to our attempt in this double post to make our way through the gigantic first movement of the Mahler Third Symphony is guidance from Mahler super-enthusiast Neville Cardus, which is the first -- and principal -- order of business here in Part 2.

My way into Mahler 3 was one that would hardly have occurred to composers of Mahler's or earlier times, or, really, for several decades after his time: repeated hearings -- via, yes, a sprinkling of live performances, but even more broadcasts, and mostly through recordings.

CASE IN POINT: The earliest Mahler 3 recording is a November 1947 BBC studio job by Sir Adrian Boult

Part 1: Marching in anguish, or to triumph, or toward what? In the 1st movement of Mahler 3, we've sure left BrahmsWorld behind!

Oh, for sure we're not in BrahmsWorld anymore.
Then again, are we sure we're absolutely sure?

FRIDAY MORNING UPDATE: PART 2 OF THE POST
IS NOW UP, SO THE LINKS TO IT SHOULD BE LIVE!

"In no other of his symphonies did Mahler's imagination range as widely as in the Third. . . . Mahler, having opened the multitudinous way of this Third with an obeisance to dignity, proceeds at once to plunge us into realms of vast and primeval creation."

-- noted critic Neville Cardus
(1888-1975), from his grand 1967 "Appreciation of Mahler's Third"

[We'll be hearing a lot more about -- and especially from -- Neville C.'s Mahler 3 "appreciation" in Part 2 of this post (about which, see below).]

[NOTE: AT ANY TIME YOU CAN JUMP TO PART 2 OF THE POST]

DO YOU EVER LIKE TO CHEAT AND PEEK AHEAD TO THE END OF A WORK YOU'RE ENGAGED WITH?

We can do that! And it so happens that our composer has provided us with a perfect "pick-up" point, marked Tempo I -- a return to the very starting tempo. Just watch your volume setting, though: This section begins very quietly. I'll also point out, by way of a tease, that at the end, the composer marked the final 2½ bars, for the whole orchestra, "Mit höchster Kraft" -- "With highest strength."


New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. DG,
recorded live in Avery Fisher Hall, Nov. 25-28, 1987

by Ken

Was it clear up above, when I referred to "the end of a work," that the reference was not to the end of the Mahler Third Symphony but to the end of the first movement? As a matter of fact, in Part 2 of this post we are going to sneak-peek the end of the symphony. For now, though, I've been thinking through all these "silent" blogweeks that we have to deal more fully with the wonderful craziness, the marching madness, of this colossal movement than I did in the July 23 post, where "we [wound] up trapped in the gigantic first movement of the Mahler Third Symphony."

FIRST, A FEW WORDS ABOUT THIS "DOUBLE POST"

Back in that July 23 post where we first "[wound] up trapped in the gigantic first movement of the Mahler Third Symphony," I wrote:

My first thought was to reach back to the booklet presentation by the great English critic (and Mahler enthusiast) Neville Cardus for RCA's 1966 Leinsdorf-BSO Mahler 3 recording. But with all the musical examples to reproduce as well as all that text to be type, that seemed an impossibly arduous labor.

This post is, then, a ridiculously delayed continuation of the July 23 one, growing out of a felt need to bring some more substantial tools to bear on the tempestuous journey that is the first movement of Mahler 3. As this post began taking shape, splitting into a pair of posts, and I started sorting out what would go in which part, I worried increasingly whether the form the thing was taking wouldn't defeat the whole undertaking, since the one significant new "tool" I was bringing to the part was -- after all! -- a re-creation of the portion of Neville C.'s Mahler 3 "appreciation" which deals with the first movement, considering that N.C.'s guide looked to be bumped into Part 2.

All this while I thought about rejiggering post elements, maybe just flipping Parts 1 and 2? I wound up leaving stuff mostly where it was, on one condition, assuming the two parts could be posted at the same time: a repeated advisory that the two parts of the post can be taken in in either order, including shuttling back and forth between them. -- Ed.

[REMEMBER, AT ANY TIME YOU CAN JUMP RIGHT TO PART 2]


OKAY, TIME TO ROLL UP OUR SLEEVES AND CONTEMPLATE
THREE STAGES OF A MEMORABLE MUSICAL METAMORPHOSIS

STAGE 1 -- Could this grand old theme be any more classic? But
notice how differently the great tune can be presented to us!


Vienna Philharmonic, Rafael Kubelik, cond. Decca, recorded September 1957

Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa, cond. Philips, recorded April 1977

Staatskapelle Dresden, Kurt Sanderling, cond. Eurodisc, recorded Nov. 1971

Speaking of metamorphosis, already in this initial statement the theme is undergoing it. And note how our conductors handle it: Kubelik starting simply, then building beautifully and also decisively; Ozawa phrasing so grandly yet intimately; Sanderling tone-painting the vibrant harmonies so, er, harmoniously! -- Ed.

Coming momentarily (if not sooner): An adventure in musical metamorphosis -- presented in a pair of mutually accessible parts

EARLY MORNING UPDATE: Part 1 of the post is now posted. Part 2 will be coming soon.

UPDATE: Two more clips added, clearly related to each other, and to the other clips -- can you figure out how they're related?

STAGE 1 -- a grand old theme, which comes to us stated in three distinctly different ways:


Vienna Philharmonic, Rafael Kubelik, cond. Decca, recorded September 1957

Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa, cond. Philips, recorded April 1977

Staatskapelle Dresden, Kurt Sanderling, cond. Eurodisc, recorded Nov. 1971

STAGE 2 -- Talk about a transformation! Again, we hear it at three slightly but noticeably different paces:


Berlin Radio Symphony, Heinz Rögner, cond. Berlin Classics, recorded 1983

Bavarian Radio Symphony, Rafael Kubelik, cond. DG, recorded May 1967

Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa, cond. Philips, recorded April 1993

STAGE 3 -- This one's a doozy, which'll really come into its own in Part 2 of the post:


Bavarian Radio Symphony, Rafael Kubelik, cond. DG, recorded May 1967

Vienna Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. DG, recorded live, April 1972

BBC Symphony Orchestra, Pierre Boulez, cond. Live performance, Nov. 1974

by Ken

That's right, what's coming up is a two-part post, whose two parts (and I've never attempted this) are going to be posted at the same time and be mutually accessible, meaning that you can, if you wish, jump back and forth between them. I apologize for, but am not going to further comment on here, my long blog silence. (There'll be a few words in Part 1 of the post. But I can't change what is, or was. What is, or was, is -- or was.

Antonio Meneses (1957-2024)

WITH WEDNESDAY P.S.: ANTONIO M.’S "LIFE LESSONS"

i. Largo; ii. Molto Vivace [at 9:10]; iii. Allegro Expressivo [at 15:06]

Setting out to trace the lineage of Boston Symphony concertmasters back to 1962, we wind up trapped in the gigantic first movement of the Mahler Third Symphony

"It is well known that I cannot be without trivialities, but this time all permissible bounds have been passed, and 'one frequently feels he has landed in a tavern or a pigsty.' "

-- Gustav Mahler, writing to his 19-year-old assistant Bruno Walter
in July 1896 about his nearly completed Third Symphony, sarcastically
incorporating critical characterizations of his work as a composer

Joseph Silverstein, BSO concertmaster 1962-84,
talks about what it takes to be a concertmaster

From a December 2014 interview (Joseph S., age 82): "William Steinberg once said to me -- and he was certainly a marvelous conductor and a great man to work with -- said to me one day, 'You're playing everything louder, softer, longer, and shorter than everybody in the section.' And I said, 'I thought that was my job.' And he said, 'It is, but don't do it too well.' "

[NOTE: Eventually we'll have a fuller version of Joseph S.'s answer.]


We hear (sort of) Nathan C.'s two predecessors playing the lyrical
countersubject of the first movement of Mahler's Third Symphony

Joseph Silverstein, violin; Boston Symphony Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA, recorded in Symphony Hall, Oct. 10-11, 1966

Malcolm Lowe, violin; Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa, cond. Philips, recorded in Symphony Hall, April 1993

by Ken

I should look up the quote, but my recollection is that Bruno Walter expressed his diffidence about the Mahler Third Symphony in terms of a fear that somewhere in that gigantic first movement the devil had crept in.

Sorry, but for a change I haven't been able to piece together the post I was aiming for, a proper end to the series celebrating the accession of the Boston Symphony's new concertmaster, Nathan Cole. I hoped some of the fragments might stand on their own, and instead wandered into a trap. I'm sorry that my experiment with homing in on that lyrical second subject of the first movement of Mahler 3, as played by Nathan C.'s two immediate BSO predecessors, for whom he has expressed such admiration, didn't work out so well -- it just isn't so easy to hear either of our star fiddlers dispatching the solo.

But it's not a bad thing to make sure we all understand why I wanted to focus on the BSO concertmaster succession -- to appreciate by sight and especially sound the legacy that Nathan Cole is so aware of inheriting. It's also maybe a chance to linger a little over that gigantic first movement of Mahler 3 -- the movement where, Bruno Walter once wrote, he felt sure the devil had crept in. In his lifetime Bruno W. -- to whom the responsibility fell for conducting the premieres of Das Lied von der Erde and the Mahler Ninth Symphony, would remain probably the leading champion of Mahler's still-widely-patronized music, but even he turned his back on Mahler 3, 6, 7, and 8, which would have an even longer, more arduous path to repertorial daylight.


WOULD YOU BELIEVE WE HAD ONLY ONE RECORDING OF
THE FIRST MOVEMENT OF MAHLER 3 IN THE SC ARCHIVE?

Best wishes to Antonio Meneses, with thanks for all you've given us

[photo by Marco Borggreve, 2023]

❇︎  the "Rococo theme" from Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations

Antonio Meneses, cello; RTVE Symphony Orchestra (Madrid), Yoav Talmi, cond. Live performance, 2008
[NOTE: Not to worry -- we're going to hear the whole performance. -- Ed.]

❇︎  the little Adagio from Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata

Antonio Meneses, cello; Maria João Pires, piano. DG, recorded live in Wigmore Hall, London, Jan. 4, 2012
[NOTE: We're going to hear this whole performance too. It's a treat! -- Ed.]

We hear above: first, an urgently flowing 2008 statement of the theme of Tchaikovsky's Variations on a Rococo Theme, shaped with subtle jolliness and moments of charming tease, with ebullient support from Yoav Talmi and the RTVE Symphony Orchestra; and from 2012, the soaring Adagio of Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata, with the much-loved Portuguese pianist Maria João Pires. -- Ed.

by Ken

This is heartbreaking.

From The Strad (online), July 8, 2024 edition:

Cellist Antonio Meneses diagnosed with aggressive brain cancer

The Brazilian cellist has been diagnosed with an incurable brain tumour and has stepped down from his concert and teaching schedule

Brazilian cellist Antonio Meneses has announced that he has been diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, an aggressive form of brain cancer, and has stepped down from his concert and teaching engagements with immediate effect. He made the announcement on social media on 7 July:

"Brazilian cellist Antonio Meneses, one of the leading musicians of his generation, has cancelled his concert schedule and stepped down from his position as a teacher. He was diagnosed in June with Gliobastoma Multiforme, an aggressive type of brain tumour.

"Born in Recife and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Meneses is one of the most famous soloists and chamber musicians of his generation.

"Meneses is currently receiving palliative care at his home in Switzerland, supported by his family and friends, who have been an important source of comfort at such a difficult time."

Meneses, who was born in 1957, won the first prize at the Munich International Competition in 1977 and was awarded first prize and gold medal at the Tchaikovsky Competition in 1982. He was a member of the Beaux Arts Trio from 1998 to 2008 and performed regularly in duos with pianists Menahem Pressler and Maria João Pires. He was featured as The Strad’s cover star in August 2012.

THIS HIT ME JUST AFTER I'D COBBLED TOGETHER . . .

Remembering János Starkeron (OK, slightly after) his 100th

János Starker (July 5, 1924 — Apr. 28, 2013)

BRUCH: Kol Nidrei -- Adagio on Hebrew melodies, Op. 47


János Starker, cello; London Symphony Orchestra, Antal Dorati, cond. Mercury, recorded in Watford Town Hall, London, July 10, 1962

FAURÉ: Élégie in C minor, Op. 24


János Starker, cello; Philharmonia Orchestra, Walter Susskind, cond. EMI, recorded in Kingsway Hall, London, July 16-17, 1956

by Ken

I've been trying like heck to finish up our Boston Symphony new-concertmaster series, eapecially now that the new incumbent, Nathan Cole, is officially on the job. I've made grinding but steady(ish) progress but still haven't gotten there. I might make casual mention of certain, oh, medical issues, possibly involving picturesque words like "major" and "surgery" and "this week," but that would fall ignobly under the heading of dime-store alibi-ing.

Anyway, I decided, as you'll have noticed, that we'd join The Strad, which has been publishing and republishing encomia on a daily basis, in remembrance of the great, protean cellisst János Starker, on -- or slightly after -- what would have been his 100th birthday, and we'll do it by dipping into the predictably Starker-rich SC Archive. We've led off with the two great cello-and-orchestra elegies. We can lighten the mood by selecting carefully in the musical set for which Starker was probably most famous, the six Bach cello suites. We'll go with the C major Suite, No. 3.

45 seconds' worth of musicI can't get out of my head

We've heard it before (and we're going to hear it again)

Technically, it's not really even part of a movement of the Mendelssohn E minor Violin Concerto, these 14 bars of Allegretto non tanto which provide a transitional bridge from the sublime central Andante to the romping rondo (as announced in the Allegro molto vivace above). I'm used to having the Andante seize control of me -- but this little Allegretto non troppo?

by Ken

Okay, I admit I was having a little fun with the part about our having "a soloist and conductor so closely in sync," but I wasn't kidding about "the conductor [having] the orchestra not just phrasing but practically breathing with the soloist."


LAST WEEK WE HEARD IT TACKED ONTO THE ANDANTE

ii. Andante -- Allegretto non tanto

Utah Symphony Orchestra, Joseph Silverstein, violin and cond. Pro Arte, recorded in Symphony Hall, Salt Lake City, Nov. 19 & 21, 1983

And I wrote this about it:

"No, don't crank up the volume at the start! Our soloist is really choosing to play this music -- which I sometimes think just may be the most beautiful ever written -- so, er, confidentially. There's plenty of presence in the sound; I'd describe it as quite intense; the soloist just isn't going to make a display of it. Meanwhile the conductor has the orchestra not just phrasing but practically breathing with the soloist. How often do you get a soloist and conductor so closely in sync?"

NOW LET'S BACK UP A BIT -- INTO THE ANDANTE --
AND LET IT RUN THROUGH TO THE END OF THE RONDO

end of ii. Andante -- Allegretto non troppo [at 1:05] --
iii. Allegro molto vivace [at 1:51]

Joseph Silverstein, violin, with the Utah Symphony (credits as above)


WE'VE ACTUALLY HEARD A BUNCH OF PERFORMANCES
OF THE ANDANTE OF THE MENDELSSOHN CONCERTO

And in a number of cases I stopped the clip at the end of what I would call "the Andante proper." No reason for this than I can recall -- I think it just hadn't occurred to me to be sure to tack on the Allegretto non tanto. Very possibly I was thinking that such a hanging-in-mid-air ending would be bad form for our listening experience, and only later came to realize that this very up-in-the-airness teaches us a lesson about the structure of the concerto.

Glancing back over the BSO's concertmaster path from 1962

When Erich Leinsdorf (center) became BSO music director in 1962, he engaged Joseph Silverstein as concertmaster; two years later he hired away Cleveland's principal cellist, Jules Eskin. Both long outlasted him -- Silverstein until 1984, Eskin until his death, at 85, in November 2016.

TCHAIKOVSKY: Swan Lake: Act II, Dance of the Swans - Pas d'action (Odette and the Prince; 2nd Dance of the Swan Queen)

Bernard Zighera, harp; Joseph Silverstein, violin [at 1:20]; Jules Eskin, cello [at 4:55]; Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa, cond. DG, recorded in Symphony Hall, November 1978

by Ken

One measure of an orchestra's greatness is its principals, and we just heard the 1978-vintage Boston Symphony putting on quite a show -- one after the other after the other. I think we can hear then-music director Seiji Ozawa having a ball with the range of choices, both bold and intimate, made possible by his soloists' instrumental prowess and creative imagination, knowing too that pretty much anything he can think to ask of them, they can give him. Of course the same thing applies to the orchestra as a whole.

By 1978 Joseph Silverstein and Jules Eskin had been making music together for 14 years, not just as fellow orchestra principals but as fellow founding members of the Boston Symphony Chamber Players in 1964. (Was the prospect of Leinsdorf's plan for the BSCP part of the lure that brought Jules E. to Boston from Cleveland?) They remained as foundations of Seiji Ozawa's BSO, and Jules would wind up teaming up with Joseph S.'s successor, Malcolm Lowe, even longer than he had with Joseph S. (in the post-to-come we'll hear him paired with both); he was still on the job when current music director Andris Nelsons took the reins (in 2013 as music director designate, in 2014 as music director).

Harpist Bernard Zighera [right] dates way farther back, to the early years of the Koussevitzky era, having been imported from Paris in 1926 to be in place when the harp principalship opened, two years later. For his first 17 years he was the orchestra's pianist as well. (When he had to choose, and chose to retain his harp position, his piano duties were taken over in 1943 by a young Koussevitzky protégé name of Leonard Bernstein.)

So we're all on the same page, let me note that we're picking up from last week's "The BSO's soon-to-be-seated new concertmaster, 'the other Nathan,' is only its 4th in the last 104 years," but the plans I had for a survey of the concertmaster succession from Joseph Silverstein to Malcolm Lowe to the incoming Nathan Cole have kept turning and twisting and been obstinate about resisting forward movement. So I got the idea of this sort of transitional post where we'll get to listen to a lot of nice music. Never mind that very little of it was in the plans and so had to be worked up from scratch.


WE'RE GOING TO RETURN TO SWAN LAKE IN THE POST-
TO-COME. FOR NOW LET'S JUST ENJOY SOME LISTENING