Ravinia 2019, Issue 4, Week 8

4:00 PM SUNDAY, JULY 28, 2019 MARTIN THEATRE ANDRÉ PREVIN and TOM STOPPARD’S PENELOPE RENÉE FLEMING, soprano EMERSON STRING QUARTET EUGENE DRUCKER, violin PHILIP SETZER, violin LAWRENCE DUTTON, viola PAUL WATKINS, cello SIMONE DINNERSTEIN, piano HAYDN String Quartet No. 55 Adagio—Allegro Adagio Menuet: Allegro Finale: Allegretto—Allegro Eugene Drucker, first violin BARBER String Quartet Molto allegro e appassionato Molto adagio [ attacca ] Molto allegro (come prima)—Presto Philip Setzer, first violin –Intermission– PREVIN Penelope ° Text by Tom Stoppard, voiced by Renée Fleming and speaker Score by André Previn, performed by Emerson String Quartet and Simone Dinnerstein In memory of André Previn April 6, 1929 – February 28, 2019 ° Chicago premiere, co-commissioned by Ravinia Ravinia expresses its appreciation for the generous support of Program Sponsor Howard L. Gottlieb and Barbara G. Greis . JOSEPH HAYDN (1732–1809) String Quartet No. 55 in D major, H. III:70 Haydn returned to Vienna in 1792 after a se- ries of acclaimed London concerts sponsored by violinist Johann Peter Salomon. Exhilarated by the bustling English music scene—almost nightly public performances, the tooth-and-nail competition between impresarios, and Salo- mon’s gloriously large orchestra—Haydn sought to absorb these new stimuli into his own com- positions. Few other activities vied for his atten- tion. Vienna presently stood mired in a lacklus- ter artistic state. Mozart had died tragically the year earlier, and Beethoven had only just arrived from Bonn to become Haydn’s pupil. The master composer turned to his musical workshop—the string quartet—where he often formulated innovations in form, key, and so- nority. Six quartets dedicated to Count Anton Apponyi (1751–1817) were prominent among the relatively few works of 1792–93. Apponyi, a fine amateur violinist, had served as Haydn’s sponsor at the Viennese Masonic lodge “Zur wahren Ein- tracht” (“The True Harmony”) in 1784. The six “Apponyi” quartets appeared in print as two sets of three quartets, now known as opp. 71 and 74. Scholar H.C. Robbins Landon hypothesized that Haydn conceived these quartets for public per- formances, most likely in London with Salomon as first violinist. This transplantation of a very intimate chamber form to the concert stage had a noticeable effect on his quartet style. Landon observed that these quartets “are entirely dif- ferent from the leisurely, more ‘detailed,’ and much more intimate works which Haydn had previously written for the Austrian connois- seurs. In the works de anno 1793, Haydn paints with a broad brush.” Symphonic influences are detectable in the first-movement introductions Portrait of Joseph Haydn by Ludwig Guttenbrunn (ca. 1792) JULY 22 – JULY 28, 2019 | RAVINIA MAGAZINE 115