Bruckner’s Fifth Symphony: An Awe-Inspiring Contrapuntal Edifice

“Music is liquid architecture; architecture is frozen music,” said the eighteenth century German writer, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 5 in B-flat Major may be the most architectural symphony ever written. Constructed with monumental building blocks which are assembled according to principles of balance, proportion, and repetition, its four movements add up to a majestic and soaring musical structure. It takes us on a gradual, time-altering procession which requires that …

Read more

Arvo Pärt’s “Da Pacem Domine”: A Timeless Meditation

Time has a deep meaning, but it is temporary, like our lives. Only eternity is timeless. –Arvo Pärt A sense of mysticism and timelessness pervades the music of the Estonian composer, Arvo Pärt. Emerging from the currents of twentieth century minimalism, it is music which inhabits the quiet, meditative space of Gregorian chant and early polyphony. “The complex and many-faceted only confuses me, and I must search for unity,” said Pärt, who …

Read more

Beethoven’s “The Ruins of Athens”: Politics and the Triumph of the Muses

In 1811, Beethoven received a commission to compose incidental music for two Hungarian-themed plays by August von Kotzebue, King Stephen and The Ruins of Athens. The plays were written to commemorate the opening of a magnificent new theater in the Hungarian city of Pest on the banks of the Danube (now the eastern part of unified Budapest). The theater’s construction was funded by Franz I, the last Holy Roman Emperor and the first …

Read more

Beethoven’s “Razumovsky” Cycle: String Quartet No. 8 in E Minor, Op. 59, No. 2

The revolutionary nature of Beethoven’s three Op. 59 “Razumovsky” String Quartets is documented in this excerpt from an 1807 review: Three new, very long and difficult Beethoven string quartets…are attracting the attention of all connoisseurs. The conception is profound and the construction excellent, but they are not easily comprehended. Written in 1806, six years after the composer’s initial Op. 18 set, the Op. 59 String Quartets elevated the genre to a cosmic …

Read more

Puccini’s “La Bohème”: The Love Duet, “O Soave Fanciulla”

The duet, O soave fanciulla (“O gentle maiden”) is heard in the closing moments of the first Act of Giacomo Puccini’s 1896 opera, La Bohème. It is in this moment that the struggling poet, Rodolfo, and the seamstress, Mimì, realize that they have fallen in love with one another. The opera’s love leitmotif emerges as they sing in unison, A! tu sol comandi, amor! The leitmotif is heard earlier in Act I in Rodolfo’s aria, Che gelida …

Read more

Prokofiev’s Scythian Suite: Unused Music for a “Barbaric” Ballet

In 1915, the 23-year-old Sergei Prokofiev set to work on his first ballet score. Commissioned by Sergei Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes, the work, which was given the title Ala and Lolli, moved deep into Slavic mythology. It depicted an epic battle between the forces of light and darkness, represented by the sun god, Veles, and the grotesque monster, Chuzbog. The ballet’s setting centered around the Scythians, a prehistoric nomadic tribe which, beginning around …

Read more

Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 20 in D Minor: Shadowy and Tempestuous

Throughout the music of Mozart, D minor evokes shadowy supernatural forces. It is the central key of Mozart’s Requiem, as well as the searing aria that is sung by the Queen of the Night in the second act of The Magic Flute. The most haunting moments of Don Giovanni are set in D minor, beginning with the Overture’s blood-chilling opening chord. The Overture’s slow introduction foreshadows the ghostly Commendatore Scene, which occurs near the end of the opera, …

Read more