Musical theater and art song occasionally meet in the works of Stephen Sondheim. One example is I Remember, a little-known gem from Evening Primrose, a 1966 television musical which appeared on ABC’s Stage 67 series.
The psychological plot, inspired by a John Collier short story and adapted by James Goldman, inhabits the world of dreams, imagination and symbolism: Charles, a poet, takes refuge from the world by hiding out in a department store after closing time. He discovers a group of people who have secretly lived in the store for years. Everyone who has tried to leave has fallen victim to the “Dark Men.” With each victim, a new mannequin appears in the clothing department. Charles falls in love with Ella, a young woman who has lived in the store since the age of six. Now, she desperately wants to leave. Ella has not seen the outside world for years, but she hangs on to hazy memories:
Like Send in the Clowns, I Remember develops through short motives. The song unfolds with expansive, ascending lines which are left open, allowing us to imagine what’s over the next horizon. We can sense the free flow of imagination and the longing to reach up and embrace the sky.
Here are the songs, I Rememberand Take me to the World, from the original ABC performance, which starred Chamian Carr and Anthony Perkins. In Take me to the World, we experience the thoughts of two contrasting characters simultaneously, a device which anticipates later Sondheim songs.
No, this post isn’t about following your intuition…today we’re talking about musical inner voices, those sometimes inconspicuous lines between the melody and the bass, which are often the essence of a piece’s drama. If you have any doubts about the importance of these lines, often played by violas and second violins in orchestral and string quartet repertoire, watch this short but funny clip of conductor Sergiu Celibidache rehearsing the Adagio from Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 7.
Ensemble playing is about teamwork and every part is essential to the whole. Let’s listen to a few orchestra excerpts, which are great examples of the power of inner voices.
Nimrod
Take a moment and think about all of your Facebook friends or cell phone contacts. Could you imagine music which would fit each personality? English composer Sir Edward Elgar (1857-1934) wrote a series of variations on this original theme, each depicting one of his friends. He assigned each variation a cryptic title, leaving audiences to guess who was being represented. The piece has commonly come to be known as the Enigma Variations. The variations run the gamut from lighthearted to fiery. One of the most famous and memorable parts of the piece is Variation IX, a moving chorale dedicated to Elgar’s publisher and close friend, August Jaeger. Listen carefully to the inner voices. Pay attention to the contour of the lines and the way they fit together. Listen for moments of harmonic tension:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqvOVGCt5lw
Tchaikovsky’s “Pathétique”
Tchaikovsky’s final work, Symphony No. 6 “Pathétique”, features a triumphantly rousing third movement, followed by a Finale which sinks into the deepest despair (Adagio lamentoso – Andante). What’s interesting is the way Tchaikovsky chooses to write the opening theme of the final movement. As a listener, you might make the logical assumption that the first violins play the prominent descending scale line (F-sharp, E, D, C-sharp, B, C-sharp). But the actual opening line for the first violins is B, E, G-sharp, C-sharp, E-sharp, C-sharp. It sounds pretty strange when played by itself. The second violin part has similar jumps. So who has the famous melody? It turns out that the melody and inner voices alternate back and forth between the first and second violins. Today the second violins in an orchestra typically sit next to the firsts, but in Tchaikovsky’s day, the seconds faced the firsts on the other side of the stage (where the cellos usually are now). Tchaikovsky achieved the nineteenth century equivalent of surround sound.
In this performance, conducted by Valery Gergiev, the second violins are seated across from the firsts:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_KS-wMiDpg
Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony
In the final movement of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, a seemingly insignificant inner voice becomes the star of the show. Listen to the supporting voice at 1:11, which mirrors the top voice in contrary motion. As the development section begins, we hear it again (4:28), then more prominently in the trombones. Listen as this inner voice is transformed into a powerful, heroic proclamation played by the whole orchestra (5:28).
What are your favorite inner voices? Share your own listening suggestions in the thread below.
Gustav Mahler described the opening of the First Symphony as “Nature’s awakening from the long sleep of winter.” A seven octave deep “A” emerges out of silence, slipping into our consciousness on the level of pure sound. The high harmonics in the violins seem as natural and fundamental as the white noise of insects in a forest. The motive, which forms the bedrock of the symphony, slowly, searchingly takes shape in the woodwinds. As the music progresses, we hear bird songs and the echoes of distant fanfares in the clarinets and offstage trumpets.
Mahler’s music speaks to us on a deeply psychological level, evoking complex, indescribable emotions. It embodies heroic struggle and can alternate between moments of transcendence and the vulgar street sounds of a bohemian village band. Mahler said, “A symphony must be like the world. It must embrace everything.” The sense of paradox in Mahler’s music is captured in a story of Mahler as a child, frequently running into the street to escape his father’s violent abuse of his mother, and suddenly being met with the cheerful sounds of an organ grinder.
The First Symphony grew out of Mahler’s song cycle, Songs of a Wayfarer. It was originally conceived as a five movement symphonic poem. Mahler later cut the second movement, Blumine, and dropped the subtitle, “The Titan”, which was a reference to a novel by Jean Paul. The piece requires a greatly expanded orchestra (seven horns, four trumpets, four trombones, tuba and an expanded woodwind and percussion section). At times, instruments are used in strange new ways, playing out of their normal range to create mocking, demonic sounds. In the second movement we hear the distinctive, raspy sound of stopped horns.
Mahler was a prominent conductor (and champion of Wagner’s operas) and his scores were meticulously marked with words and phrases intended to guide future interpreters. Common musical themes reappear throughout Mahler’s nine symphonies and in some ways these works can be heard as one massive symphony. The bewilderment of the audience at the 1889 premier in Budapest is a testament to the revolutionary nature of Mahler’s vision. The music would come to be embraced by audiences of the twentieth century. Today, performances of Mahler’s symphonies are often the dramatic high point of an orchestra’s season.
Here is Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 in D Major, performed by conductor Pierre Boulez and the Chicago Symphony. Listen carefully to the distinct voices of the instruments (for example the horns at 10:44). What personas do they suggest? How does the final movement resolve the symphony as a whole?
Did you feel a sense of growing anticipation in the first movement? Go back and listen to the opening with those sustained “A’s” (the dominant in D major). It isn’t until around 4:06 that the music settles into a resolution in D major. We can relax and breathe easily. But at 7:59 we’re back where we started in the opening and this time it’s more ominous. All of the raw energy and tension, which has been building from the beginning, is released in one frighteningly explosive, but ultimately heroic climax towards the end of the movement (14:18). We’re left with crazy, giddy humor and a musical cat and mouse game in the final bars.
The Huntsman’s Funeral
The third movement was inspired by a children’s wood carving, The Huntsman’s Funeral, in which a torch-lit procession of animals carry the body of the dead huntsman. At the end of the movement, the sounds of the procession fade into the distance. You probably recognized the folk melody, Frère Jacques. Here it’s transformed into minor and played by the double bass, an instrument rarely featured in orchestral solos. Consider the persona of the double bass sound. The bizarre interjections of Jewish band music give this movement its ultimate sense of paradox and irony.
Opening amid a life and death struggle and ending in triumph, the final movement forms the climax of the symphony. Amid birdcalls, the bassoon recaps a familiar fragment (45:23) and for a moment we hear echoes of the first movement. The haunting motive from the opening of the first movement is transformed into a heroic proclamation in major. You may hear a slight, probably unconscious, similarity to Handel’s equally triumphant Hallelujah Chorus from Messiah. In the score, Mahler asks the seven horns to stand for the final statement of the theme, “so as to drown out everything…even the trumpets.”
For some interesting links, watch Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concert, Who is Gustav Mahler?and Keeping Scorewith Michael Tilson Thomas.
Recordings, old and new
There are many great recordings of this piece. Here are a few which I recommend. Share your favorites in the thread below.
Marin Alsop and the Baltimore Symphony I’ve been listening to this 2012 Naxos release a lot recently. The recording captures the dark, blended warmth of the Baltimore brass section in Meyerhoff Hall. The bass solo in the third movement is transformed into a tutti. The brisk tempo at end of the final movement suggests a youthful energy. Alsop talks about the piece here.
Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra This 1969 recording is interesting because it includes the Blumine movement which Mahler cut. The lush, velvety Philadelphia string sound is on display. Listen here.
A ferocious, restless energy characterizes Brahms’ Piano Quintet in F Minor, Op. 34. It’s music which is constantly developing and evolving from the smallest motivic seed.
At first Brahms wrestled to find the right instrumentation. The music started out as a string quartet, developed into a sonata for two pianos and then, on the recommendation of Clara Schumann, found its true form as a marriage of piano and strings. This evolution is similar to the compositional process of the First Piano Concerto, which was originally intended to be a symphony. It’s almost as if the piece was telling Brahms what it wanted to be as he composed.
Brahms completed the Piano Quintet in 1864, when he was in his early 30s. Listen for complex rhythmic shifts-moments where you might lose track of the downbeat. Also, listen for the reference to Beethoven’s Late String Quartetsin the opening of the last movement.
Here is a classic 1968 recording with pianist Christoph Eschenbach and the Amadeus Quartet:
American violinist David Nadien passed away last week at the age of 88. A student of Ivan Galamian, Adolfo Betti and Adolf Busch, Nadien first soloed with the New York Philharmonic at the age of 14. Between 1966 and 1970 he served as concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein. You can hear him play the “Pas de deux” violin solo from Tchaikovsky`s Swan Lake here.
For years Nadien taught at the Mannes College of Music and performed as a top freelance studio musician in New York. His immaculately clean, Romantic style of playing, suggestive of violinists from Elman to Milstein, was an inspiration to a younger generation of musicians. The Suzuki violin repertoire, books 1-10, are among his diverse recording credits. Notable recordings include the Franck Sonataand Tchaikovsky Concerto as well as showpieces such as Sarasate’s Habañera,Weiniawski’s Scherzo Tarentelleand Massenet’s Meditation from Thais.
Here is his recording of Sarasate’s Introduction and Tarantella:
Musical theater and art song occasionally meet in the works of Stephen Sondheim. One example is I Remember, a little-known gem from Evening Primrose, a 1966 television musical which appeared on ABC’s Stage 67 series.
