Programme Notes for Charity Concert on 28 April 2024
Gioacchino Rossini (1792-1868): Overture: The Barber of Seville
The first performance of The Barber of Seville took place in Rome on 20th February 1816, in front of a highly suspicious audience whose real assessment and enjoyment of the work was spoilt by a series of unfortunate mishaps. Apparently the leading tenor insisted on accompanying himself on the guitar and during a serenade one of his strings broke, evoking a torrent of laughter. Further expressions of derision broke out when, in the middle of a tense vocal moment, a cat strayed across the stage. However, after one or two performances, it soon became obvious that this opera was one of the finest that Rossini had produced and it eventually became very popular.
The original overture to The Barber of Seville was lost, and Rossini, instead of composing a new one, transferred an overture which had served two of his previous operas – a not uncommon practice with him. Strangely enough, although this overture once came before an opera called Elizabeth, Queen of England, it reflects so much of the character of the versatile Figaro that one would never dream that it had been composed for any other opera.
Programme notes provided by John McLeod (May 2011) and supplied through Making Music's programme note service.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 - 1791): Rondo from Horn Concerto No. 4 in E flat, K.495
Solo Horn: Caroline Ditchfield
This, the last of Mozart's horn concertos, was written in Vienna in June, 1786, two months after the completion of The Marriage of Figaro. He seems to have used as his model a series of concertos by Anton Rosetti, one of the violinists in Haydn's Esterházy band. The Fourth Horn Concerto was one of the three definitely composed for Ignaz Leutgeb, a horn player who also ran a Viennese cheese shop that was described by Leopold Mozart as being “the size of a snail shell.”
Alongside his business interests Leutgeb continued to play the horn and, despite his ability, seems to have been the butt of the Viennese musical community. Mozart delighted in poking fun at him, writing misleading instructions in his scores, adding remarks such as ‘ox,’ ‘fool,’ and ‘that ass of a Leutgeb,’ and, in this particular concerto, making things more confusing by frequently changing the colour of his ink.
The instrument for which Mozart wrote was not the modern, valved French horn of today, but little more than a coil of tubing on which the open harmonic notes could be produced, and which required the addition or removal of crooks to facilitate key changes. A few years before this concerto was written, however, a technique was developed whereby the remaining notes could be produced by placing the hand in the bell.
Programme notes provided by John Dalton (April 2004) and supplied through Making Music's programme note service.
George Butterworth(1885 - 1916): Idyll: The Banks of Green Willow
George Butterworth would have been a significant figure in the English musical renaissance, had the war not claimed him within a few years of his developing a distinctive musical voice. Born into a wealthy family and brought up in Yorkshire, Butterworth was a scholar at Eton College. He went up to Trinity College, Oxford and then on to the Royal College of Music. His friendship with Ralph Vaughan Williams led to an interest in English folk song and dance.
In 1913 Butterworth had won widespread recognition and admiration for his orchestral Rhapsody A Shropshire Lad. Many thought Butterworth had used a real folk tune, but the melody was his own. However, in The Banks of Green Willow, sub-titled Idyll for Small Orchestra, which followed a year later, he did make use of folk melodies, which he skilfully wove into the delicate orchestral textures.
The music of the idyll has a seamless quality, and the haunting opening theme, heard on the clarinet, recurs throughout the piece, albeit in various guises. As it progresses, the music increases in tempo and intensity and a rapturous climax is reached before gradually sinking back into an exquisite reverie with superb writing for woodwind; the elegance and imagination of the orchestration reminding us all too poignantly of the burgeoning talent we lost to the war.
Programme notes provided by Worcester Concert Orchestra, (June 1991) and supplied through Making Music's programme note service.
Andy Meyers (1962 - ): Tattercoats (A Fairy Tale for Narrator and Orchestra)
Narrator: David Freeman
Tattercoats is an English fairy tale collected by Joseph Jacobs in his collection More English Fairy Tales. Tattercoats started life in 2006 as a work for narrators, children’s chorus, wind ensemble and piano. It was first performed by children from Finton House School Wandsworth in the Adrian Boult Hall of the Royal Northern College of Music as part of the National Festival of Music for Youth. The performance was a great success and the pupils received a certificate for an outstanding performance.
For this concert, Andy Meyers has made a version scored for chamber orchestra with a narration replacing the original sung sections.
Programme note by Andy Meyers
Ludwig van Beethoven: (1770 - 1827): Finale from Symphony No. 3 in E flat (“Eroica”), Op. 55
Beethoven's precocious musical talent was evident at an early age, and he soon came to the notice of the musical elite. By the age of seventeen, he had played for both Mozart and Emperor Josef II. His life, though, was far from easy as his alcoholic mother died of consumption in 1787. Elector of Cologne, Max Franz employed both Beethoven and his father Johann. When Johann's alcoholism became too problematic, the elector generously kept him in employment, but paid the majority of his salary to Ludwig. Nevertheless, from the age of seventeen, Ludwig had to provide most of the income and care for his family. In 1792, the Elector sponsored Ludwig’s move to Vienna, where he studied for a time with Haydn.
Beethoven's tinnitus began to trouble him in his mid-twenties and in 1802 his doctor advised spending a summer in Heiligenstadt, not far from Vienna, to gain the space to accept his incurable disability. Beethoven returned from Heiligenstadt determined to find a new style. His renaissance produced many large-scale works of which the first was the 1804 third symphony, titled “Eroica.”
This symphony shows a distinct change in style, as it is very much longer than earlier Classical symphonies, with a wider emotional range. It is often cited as the first stirrings of the Romantic period. The manuscript of this symphony carried a dedication to Napoleon, but when the dedicatee assumed the title of Emperor, Beethoven tore up the title page. The replacement was simply “Symphonia Eroica,” but the first published copy of 1806 has the fuller "heroic symphony, composed to celebrate the memory of a great man.”
On Napoleon's death in 1821, Beethoven is said to have remarked, “I composed the music [the second movement] for this sad event seventeen years ago.”
Programme notes provided by Rod Berrieman (March 2013) and supplied through Making Music's programme note service.
George Gershwin (1898 - 1937): Four Songs arranged by Andy Meyers
Nice Work if You Can Get It
The Jolly Tar and the Milkmaid
Summertime
I’ve Got Rhythm
In his short life George Gershwin made a unique contribution to the music of the 20th century. Above all he made the popular music of America, with its jazz idioms, artistically respectable. His serious orchestral works were few but his Rhapsody in Blue brought him worldwide fame. An American in Paris, the Second Rhapsody, the Cuban Overture, the Piano Concerto, and Variations on I Got Rhythm, followed, leading to the high point which came with his opera Porgy and Bess. But, starting in 1919 with his hit Swanee, the bulk of his music consisted of songs, mostly written with the collaboration of his brother Ira, as lyricist, for Broadway shows and Hollywood films.
Nice Work if You Can Get It began life in 1930 as a nine-bar phrase with the working title “There's No Stopping Me Now.” Its title phrase “Nice work if you can get it” came from an English magazine. It was one of nine songs the Gershwin brothers wrote for the 1937 movie A Damsel in Distress which stared Fred Astaire. The Jolly Tar and the Milkmaid was also written for A Damsel in Distress. It’s a humorous song composed in the style of an English folk song as Jerry Halliday (Fred Astaire) joins a choral group to perform this song about a bigamist trying to add to his harem.
Summertime is a song from Gershwin’s 1925 opera, Porgy and Bess. It is sung by Clara as she lulls her baby to sleep while a gambling game goes on around them. A slow version of I Got Rhythm was originally in Gershwin's 1928 Broadway show Treasure Girl which survived only 68 performances. It was then incorporated into Ziegfeld's East Is West, which was never even produced. Finally in 1930 the song was included in Girl Crazy, in which Ethel Merman made her Broadway debut with a jaunty, livelier up-tempo version.
Programme note by Andy Meyers
Kingston Chamber Orchestra and Crosslight would like to thank Kingston University with their continued support of the orchestra and for the provision of free rehearsal facilities and loan of timpani for this concert.
Crosslight is a registered charity, providing debt advice, money education and one-to-one budget coaching to support families and individuals in need. Sadly, the rising cost of living and the depletion of publicly funded support services mean that its services are needed more and more. Crosslight's services are free of charge to recipients, and are tailored to individual needs, to provide support and create lasting change. The charity is funded by donations. It operates mainly in and around London, and our concert will be in aid of the Twickenham branch, which works across Richmond and Hounslow boroughs.