Ravinia 2019, Issue 3, Week 6

comparable to the ballet ensemble. A second concert suite, conceived for a smaller ensemble and including five different excerpts, appeared in 1919. Stravinsky later compiled a 10-move- ment “ballet suite” with reduced instrumenta- tion (1945). Although Stravinsky kept to himself his doubts about his ability to complete the score on time, he openly voiced his reservations with the pro- duction itself. In an essay entitled “Firebird’s First Flight,” published with his own recording of the Firebird ballet for Columbia Masterworks, Stravinsky wrote: “ The Firebird did not attract me as a subject. Like all ‘story’ ballets, it demand- ed ‘descriptive’ music of a kind I did not want to write. I had not yet proved myself as a composer, had not earned the right to criticize the aesthet- ics of my collaborators; but I did criticize them, and arrogantly, though perhaps my age (I was only 27) was more arrogant than I was.” GEORGE GERSHWIN (1898–1937) Cuban Overture Scored for three flutes, two oboes and English horn, two clarinets and bass clarinet, two bassoons and contrabassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, bells, bongos, claves, guiro, maracas, xylophone, and strings Gershwin, along with some of his closest friends, spent several days on the isle of Cuba during mid-February 1932. Havana was a popular vaca- tion spot for movie stars, wealthy businessmen, and gangsters. In the warming rays of the Cuban sun, Gershwin indulged in his favorite pastimes: golf, trips to the horse track, cigar smoking, and the company of beautiful women. One morning, Gershwin (a bona fide celebrity among the local musicians) awoke to the sounds of a 16-piece Cuban rumba band. Fascinated by the kaleido- scopic percussion section, he acquired a number of native instruments: maracas, bongo drums, gourds, guiros, and claves. Back amid the hub- bub of New York, Gershwin wrote an exotic or- chestral piece called Rumba (later retitled Cuban Overture ), peppered with these same percussion instruments. The Cuban Overture brought important strides in Gershwin’s development as a composer, as techniques explored during formal composition and orchestration lessons with Joseph Schil- linger were put into practice. The language of his program note, written for the first performance on August 16, 1932, reflected the serious intent. The New York Philharmonic Symphony Or- chestra under Albert Coates gave the premiere as part of an All-Gershwin concert at Lewisohn Stadium before an audience of 18,000. “In my composition, I have endeavored to com- bine the Cuban rhythms with my own themat- ic material. The result is a symphonic overture which embodies the essence of the Cuban dance. It has three main parts. The first part ( Moderato e Molto Ritmato ) is preceded by a ( forte ) intro- duction featuring some of the thematic material. Then comes a three-part contrapuntal episode leading to a second theme. The first part finishes with a recurrence of the first theme combined with fragments of the second. “A solo clarinet cadenza leads to a middle part, which is in a plaintive mood. It is a gradually de- veloping canon in a polytonal manner. This part concludes with a climax based on an ostinato of the theme in the canon, after which a sudden change in tempo brings us back to the rumba dance rhythms. The finale is a development of the preceding material in a stretto -like manner. This leads us back again to the main theme. The conclusion of the work is a coda featuring the Cuban instruments of percussion.” Concerto in F Scored for three flutes, three oboes, three clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, strings, and solo piano Gershwin’s music for solo piano and orchestra received mixed reviews. Critic Paul Rosenfeld judged rather harshly: “It is only very superfi- cially a whole, actually a heap of extremely het- erogeneous minor forms and expressions.” Oth- ers recognized the significance of Gershwin’s music to a distinctly American tradition. Henry O. Osgood found these pieces “representative of a successful attempt to graft upon the great tree of legitimate music little offshoots of that vigorous sapling which is the only really original thing America has produced in music—jazz.” Walter Damrosch, conductor of the New York Symphony Orchestra, admired Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue enough to commission a large- scale piano concerto for the 1925–26 season at Carnegie Hall. Damrosch also possessed an as- tute business sense. A new piece by Gershwin, whom Time magazine featured in a cover story on July 20, 1925, was sure to draw an audience. Contracts were signed, and Gershwin began sketching his New York Concerto , later renamed Concerto in F. Previous obligations took Gershwin out of the country for a London production of his musi- cal Tell Me More . Back in New York, he wrote and orchestrated the Concerto in F between July and November. The composer scheduled a run-through two weeks before the premiere, hiring the orchestra out of his own pocket. His Concerto in F was premiered at Carnegie Hall on December 3, 1925, in a performance by the New York Symphony Orchestra, conductor Walter Damrosch, and George Gershwin as pi- ano soloist. Broadly speaking, the Concerto in F adheres to the traditional three-movement design of the Classical concerto. However, the musical details originated in a different musical world, that of dance and song. From the sketch stage, Gersh- win viewed his concerto as a sequence of musi- cal elements—rhythm, melody, rhythm—rather than forms. “The first movement employs the Charleston rhythm. It is quick and pulsating, representing the young enthusiastic spirit of American life. The second movement has a po- etic nocturnal atmosphere which has come to be referred to as the American blues, but in a purer form than that in which they are usually treated. The final movement reverts to the style of the first. It is an orgy of rhythms, starting violently and keeping to the same pace throughout.” Ger- shwin borrowed the first theme from an earlier prelude for piano. George Gershwin appeared as soloist in the Ra- vinia premiere of the Concerto in F on July 25, 1936; a brain tumor would claim his life less than a year later. –Program notes © 2019 Todd E. Sullivan George Gershwin Cover of Time magazine (July 20, 1925) RAVINIA MAGAZINE | JULY 8 – JULY 14, 2019 100