Overture Magazine: 2017-2018 Season FINAL_BSO_Overture_May_June | Page 30

GERSHWIN ’ S PIANO CONCERTO
the second movement ’ s themes and , in a spectacular conclusion , to the first movement ’ s big romantic theme as well . The Concerto ’ s last moments express the confidence of a young , vital America and the fearless young genius who gave it a voice all its own .
Instrumentation : Two flutes , piccolo , two oboes , English horn , two clarinets , bass clarinet , two bassoons , four horns , three trumpets , three trombones , tuba , timpani , percussion and strings .
SYMPHONY NO . 2 IN C MAJOR
Robert Schumann
Born in Zwickau , Germany , June 8 , 1810 ; died in Endenich , Germany , July 29 , 1856
In February 1854 after decades of mental suffering , Robert Schumann attempted suicide by jumping from a bridge into the Rhine River . He spent the last two and a half years of his life in an asylum , where he died of self-starvation at age 46 . In 1844 , a decade before the suicide attempt , he endured the worst breakdown of his life subsequent to that catastrophic final one . Every effort exhausted him , and composing became a torment . Writing to a physician friend , he recalled : “ For a while I could not stand listening to music . It cut into my nerves like knives .” Schumann was
Marin Alsop leads the BSO tormented by phobias —“ melancholy bats ,” he called them — including fears of high places , sharp objects and medicines , which he was convinced contained poisons . Worse still for a musician were auditory hallucinations , described by Clara Schumann as a “ constant singing and rushing in his ears , every noise would turn into a tone .”
Eventually , the symptoms lessened , Schumann began to grow stronger , and his creativity revived . First he completed his popular Piano Concerto . By December , he had entered one of his manic creative phases and in just three weeks sketched the Second Symphony , regarded by many as his greatest . It is easy to hear Schumann ’ s struggle against his illness in this symphony , as well as the joyous return of health and strength in the finale . Through the alchemy of art , the composer managed to transform suffering into great music , especially in the extraordinary slow movement that is the emotional heart of this work .
The sonata-form first movement opens with a long and mysterious slow introduction that contains the seeds from which the symphony will grow . First we hear a solemn fanfare in the brass , distant and dreamlike , above strings wandering in a dark maze . The woodwinds offer a four-note rhythmic idea . When the tempo finally accelerates to Allegro , this motive launches the movement ’ s main theme , full of nervous struggle . Periodically , the violins arc upward on a tormented wailing idea , which eventually grows into a new lyrical episode for woodwinds and violins .
More agitated still is the secondmovement scherzo with its fast , frenetic music for the violins . So difficult is this to play that it is customarily included in auditions for violinists seeking an orchestral position . Momentary relief from this obsessive music comes in two trio sections : the first a dialogue between woodwinds and strings ; the second a lovely , flowing episode , rich in fugal imitation and opened by the strings . A loud return of movement one ’ s brass fanfare closes the movement .
For the slow movement in C minor , Schumann created one of the most heartbreakingly beautiful melodies in the symphonic repertoire . Moving from one woodwind instrument to another , it seems to grow lovelier and more painful with each repetition . When the violins sing the melody , they twice add a chain of shimmering trills — a sublime stroke .
With an upward-rushing scale and a joyous wake-up-call of a theme in the woodwinds , Schumann seems to bound from his sickbed . The finale is the musical expression of the composer ’ s recovery , with no lingering dark shadows . Listen for the reappearance of the slow movement ’ s poignant theme in the low strings , now dancing along in quick tempo . Schumann eventually turns it upside down , creating a buoyant new tune that drives the music forward for several moments . Yet another melody is introduced by the woodwinds : a soaring and uncomplicated hymn of thanksgiving . So infectious is this melody that Schumann forgets all the others and builds the symphony ’ s conclusion around this uplifting music . At the end , the opening brass fanfare reappears , transformed into triumph .
Instrumentation : Two flutes , two oboes , two clarinets , two bassoons , two horns , two trumpets , three trombones , timpani and strings .
Notes by Janet E . Bedell , © 2018
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