Ravinia 2023 Issue 1

MARTIN THEATRE 7:30 PM WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 2023 JORGE FEDERICO OSORIO, piano BRAHMS Four Ballades No. . Andante No. . Andante No. . Intermezzo: Allegro No. . Andante con moto BRAHMS Variations and Fugue on a eme by Handel Aria Var. I Var. II Var. III Var. IV Var. V Var. VI Var. VII Var. VIII Var. IX Var. X Var. XI Var. XII Var. XIII: Largamente, ma non più Var. XIV Var. XV Var. XVI Var. XVII Var. XVIII Var. XIX Var. XX Var. XXI Var. XXII Var. XXIII Var. XXIV Var. XXV Fuga – – BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata No. Vivace, ma non troppo—Adagio espressivo [ attacca ] Prestissimo Gesangvoll, mit innigster Emp ndung BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata No. Maestoso—Allegro con brio ed appassionato Arietta: Adagio molto semplice e cantabile Ravinia expresses its appreciation for the generous support of Sponsor Howard L. Gottlieb & Barbara G. Greis . -O+ANNES %RA+MS ɠ Four Ballades, op. “Ballade” remained a comparatively flexi- ble musical designation throughout the th century. Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin, for ex- ample, approached the ballade as a dramatic genre emanating directly from Romantic musical poeticism. In it, the musical “narra- tive” outlined an imprecise and unpredictable sequence of episodes o en depicted through song-inspired thematic material. Other com- posers employed the term as a generic desig- nation for light, short, and tuneful keyboard pieces. Johannes Brahms explored the vast ground between those two points in his Four Ballades, op. , a collection completed in . His rst ballade most clearly approximates the dynamic Chopin model. Brahms evident- ly drew inspiration from the Scottish border ballad Edward , as published in a German translation in Johann Gottfried Herder’s Stimmen der Völker . According to the folk tale, Edward used a knife to kill his brother (in some sources, father). Most begin with the mother asking, “What makes that blood on the point of your knife?” or “How came that blood on your shirt sleeve?” Edward re- plies unconvincingly that the blood came from various animals. en he confesses his brutal act. Several scholars have pointed out that Herder’s translation ts almost exactly with the main theme of this ballade. Brahms instilled the second ballade with far subtler meaning. Its sweeping opening ges- ture, from which many thematic ideas are derived, outlines the pitches of his musi- cal motto, F–A–F (in this case, F-sharps are used), which stands for “Frei aber froh” (free but happy). e third ballade is a scherzo-like piece entitled Intermezzo , a designation Brahms employed with great frequency in his later piano collections. At this point, the lis- tener begins to sense a large-scale plan for the set, perhaps a loose analog of a four-move- ment sonata. Johannes Brahms at the piano by Willy von Beckerath (1896) Some writers have described op. as a “bal- lade cycle” with considerable justification. e rst three pieces gravitate around a com- mon tonic pitch, D (major in the rst, and minor in the subsequent two), and there are perceptible motivic links among them. is “cycle” reaches its end without a rm sense of climax or conclusion. Brahms transported the fourth ballade to a remote distance, both in terms of key (B major) and expression (ethereal and introspective), from what came before. e open-ended quality deprives the ear of a de nitive climax or conclusion, a tru- ly ballade-like e ect. Variations and Fugue on a eme by Handel in B- at major, op. In , Brahms withdrew to a suburb of Hamburg in order to spend the summer months in quiet solitude. His quarters in the small town of Hamm—a room in the house of Frau Dr. Rosing with a balcony and a view of the garden—provided Brahms a peaceful setting in which to compose. is productive period brought the composition of sever- al important works: the rst three songs on texts by Ludwig Tieck, Die schöne Magelone , op. ; the Piano Quartet No. in G minor, op. ; the Piano Quartet No. in A major, op. (completed the following year); the Variations on a eme by Schumann, op. , for two pianos; and the Variations and Fugue on a eme by Handel, op. , for solo piano. Brahms completed the “Handel Variations” in September but kept the set a secret until October , when he sent a copy of the score as a belated birthday present to Clara Schumann: “I composed the Variations for your birthday and you have not heard them yet, although you ought to have been prac- ticing them for your concerts.” Clara gave the rst public performance on December , , in Hamburg. Despite tepid enthusiasm from the audience, the variations made an imme- diate and lasting impression on Brahms’s mu- sician friends. Even Richard Wagner, whom Brahms met in Vienna on February , , and who would become a musical and aes- thetic adversary, expressed his admiration for the variations. “It shows what can still be done with the old forms by somebody who knows how to handle them,” Wagner declared. An admirer of music by past masters, Brahms chose a simple binary Aria theme from the second volume of George Frideric Handel’s Suites of Pieces for the Harpsichord ( ), where it is followed by ve variations. Brahms skillfully fused archaic and contemporary styles in his own variations. He strictly observed the theme’s structure, according to Baroque practice, yet each variation displays its own distinctive character. Most variations retain the B-flat-major tonality, although nos. , , , and turn to minor keys. Allu- sions to Baroque imitative writing appear in the canonic variations nos. and . Other RAVINIA.ORG • RAVINIA MAGAZINE