Sunday Classics snapshots: Ravel's "funny music"

The first 18 bars (1:48 in the Heifetz recording, 1:42 in the Francescatti, and
1:56 in the Perlman) of the 58-bar solo that opens Ravel's "funny music"

RAVEL: Tzigane (concert rhapsody for violin and orchestra):
Opening solo

Jascha Heifetz, violin (1953)

Zino Francescatti, violin (1964)

Itzhak Perlman, violin (c1974)

by Ken

No, we haven't by any means finished with our listen-in to Richard Strauss's serio-comic operatic treasure Ariadne auf Naxos -- or to Strauss's Four Last Songs (we still have the two most ambitious songs to cover). But for several weeks now I've had another musical itch eating at me, so I thought we could take some time out to deal with it.

And it involves a little story.

Playing in my NYC public-high-school orchestra wasn't all toil; there was the occasional perk. Okay, I'm way overstating the "toil" part, being that I wasn't what you would call a nose-to-the-grindstone practicer, which probably has something to do with how mediocre a violinist I was. And the perks weren't so grand either. The one I'm thinking of this week was a pass to a presentation on that week's New York Philharmonic subscription concert, at the Juilliard School -- not where it is now, in Lincoln Center, but in its old home on Claremont Avenue in the vertiginous reaches of Manhattan's Morningside Heights, premises that were taken over by the Manhattan School of Music when the Juilliard packed up and moved downtown.

Note that this beneficence didn't include a ticket to the actual concert.

It was a pretty venturesome solo subway journey from Brooklyn for a young teen still relatively new to the city, but I actually found the place, and then found my way back home, and in between I was treated to a presentation by the professor and composer Hugo Weisgall (right), who was so charming and witty and welcoming and smart that ever since, whenever I happen to listen to some of his music, I wish I enjoyed it half as well as I enjoyed Dr. Weisgall himself that evening.

I no longer remember the full program for that concert, or who the perfomers were -- in large part because the perk didn't include a ticket to the actual concert. But I do remember Dr. Weisgall talking about two of the works on the program. It was, I think, my first exposure to Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor (one of only two Mozart concertos in a minor key), and that exposure must have something to do with the lifelong passion I've since enjoyed for Mozart's piano concertos.


THEN THERE WAS RAVEL'S TZIGANE

Which is to say, his "concert rhapsody for violin and orchestra." I honestly don't remember that much about what Dr. Weisgall said about it, or even if he talked about it at length. But I sure as shootin' remember how he referred to it. He always thought of it, he said, as "Ravel's funny music." And I've never been able to think of it any other way. And as Exhibit A, I've offered the first not-quite-half of the piece -- the workout for the violin soloist that we just heard.

It may be worth noting, for the benefit of people who aren't record collectors, that Tzigane has long been lumped with a group of other short pieces for violin and orchestra which are among the great charms of French musical Romanticism -- notably Saint-Saëns's Havanaise and Introduction and Rondo capriccioso and Chausson's Poème. In fact, it was rehearing the lovely Poème recently that set me to thinking about these pieces, and I mean to get to it, but I thought it would be only natural to approach it backwards, starting with Tzigane.

In a way it's an odd companion for those Romantic gems by the likes of Saint-Saëns and Chausson. Tzigane, written first for violin and piano but quickly orchestrated by the composer, dates from 1924, which is of course way late for Romanticism. But as Ravel demonstrated frequently, he spoke the musical idiom of Romanticism fluently, and in its, well, funny way, his contribution to the violin-and-orchestra showpiece genre fits surprisingly well with its antecedents.

Tzigane is the French word for Gypsy (not terribly far from the German Zigeuner.) Which was a logical starting point for Ravel in a composition commissioned by the Hungarian violinist Jelly d'Arányi. I don't suppose it's hard to hear in that "funny" opening violin solo a not-quite-hommage to her countryman Béla Bartók.

However, once the orchestra finally insinuates itself, the assembled forces fairly quickly pick their way to this wonderfully Gypsy-sounding tune.

Tzigane: Moderato


Jascha Heifetz, violin; Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Alfred Wallenstein, cond. RCA, recorded Dec. 8, 1953

Zino Francescatti, violin; New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded Jan. 6, 1964

Itzhak Perlman, violin; Orchestre de Paris, Jean Martinon, cond. EMI, recorded c1974

The soloist and orchestra play with this for a while, and then, as we hear here, nudge their way into another Gypsy-sounding tune, of a more sumptuous sort, appropriately marked grandioso.

Tzigane: Grandioso


Jascha Heifetz, violin; Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Alfred Wallenstein, cond. RCA, recorded Dec. 8, 1953

Zino Francescatti, violin; New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded Jan. 6, 1964

Itzhak Perlman, violin; Orchestre de Paris, Jean Martinon, cond. EMI, recorded c1974


NOW HERE'S THE WHOLE THING

It's hardly surprising that Jascha Heifetz is the least lingering of our soloists, but the music could hardly be more brilliantly etched, or, for that matter, more rhapsodic. Itzhak Perlman seems to be trying to dig deeper into the notes, where I'm not sure there's that much deeper to dig, but in the company of that elegant master Jean Martinon he does the piece proud.

It was, as it happens, the CD containing the recordings by Zino Francescatti and Leonard Bernstein of Chausson's Poème and Ravel's Tzigane that set me to thinking about this music, and I have to say I like their performances a lot. (Yes, we'll be hearing their Poème when we get to that work.) There's something notably personal, perhaps "easeful," about Francescatti's Tzigane.


Jascha Heifetz, violin; Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Alfred Wallenstein, cond. RCA, recorded Dec. 8, 1953

Itzhak Perlman, violin; Orchestre de Paris, Jean Martinon, cond. EMI, recorded c1974

Zino Francescatti, violin; New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded Jan. 6, 1964

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