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THE FLORIDA ORCHESTRA | 2017-2018 Program Notes the soloist, leads to the poetic second theme, given by the unaccompanied piano. The development is rhapsodic, with reminiscences of the main theme woven among new melodies and passages of an improvised character. The order of the themes is reversed in the recapitulation, with the poetic complementary subject recalled by the solo flute. In the movement’s final pages, the orchestral flourish that began the Concerto returns to herald the final traversal of the main theme. Nikolai Medtner, the Russian composer and friend to whom Rachmaninoff dedicated the Fourth Concerto, thought that some extra-musical inspiration — perhaps the depiction of a solemn religious procession — lay behind the austere second movement. The entire movement is built on the opening theme. The first section is unsettled in emotion; the middle portion is a stormy transformation of the theme. The hushed solemnity of the opening returns to round out this deeply felt intermezzo. The finale’s structure is complex, supporting not only its own thematic material, but also references to melodies from the first movement as a way of unifying the Concerto’s overall form. LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN SYMPHONY NO. 7 IN A MAJOR, Op. 92 Duration: ca. 36 minutes Overview The Seventh Symphony is a magnificent creation in which Beethoven displayed several technical innovations that were to have a profound influence on the music of the 19th century: he expanded the scope of symphonic structure through the use of more distant tonal areas; he brought an unprecedented richness and range to the orchestral palette; and he gave a new awareness of rhythm as the vitalizing force in music. It is particularly the last of these characteristics that most immediately affects the listener, and to which commentators have consistently turned to explain the vibrant power of the work. Perhaps the most famous such observation about the Seventh Symphony is that of Richard Wagner, who called the work “the apotheosis of the Dance in its highest aspect ... the loftiest deed of bodily motion incorporated in an ideal world of tone.” “Beethoven,” John N. Burk explained, “seems to have built up this impression by willfully driving a single rhythmic figure through each movement, until the music attains (particularly in the body of the first movement and in the Finale) a swift propulsion, an effect of cumulative growth which is akin to extraordinary size.” What to Listen For A slow introduction, almost a movement in itself, opens the Symphony. This initial section employs two themes: the first, majestic and unadorned, is passed down through the winds while being punctuated by long, rising scales in the strings; the second is a graceful melody for oboe. The transition to the main part of the first movement is accomplished by the superbly controlled reiteration of a single pitch. This device both connects the introduction with the exposition and also establishes the dactylic rhythm that dominates the movement. The Allegretto scored such a success at its premiere that it was immediately encored, a phenomenon virtually unprecedented for a slow movement. In form, the movement is a series of variations on the heartbeat rhythm of its opening measures. In spirit, however, it is more closely allied to the austere chaconne of the Baroque era than to the light, figural variations of Classicism. The third movement, a study in contrasts of sonority and dynamics, is built on the formal model of the scherzo, but expanded to include a repetition of the horn-dominated Trio (Scherzo – Trio – Scherzo – Trio – Scherzo). In the sonata-form finale, Beethoven not only produced music of virtually unmatched rhythmic energy (“a triumph of Bacchic fury,” in the words of Sir Donald Tovey), but did it in such a manner as to exceed the climaxes of the earlier movements and make it the goal toward which they had all been aimed. So intoxicating is this music that some of Beethoven’s contemporaries were sure he had composed it in a drunken frenzy. An encounter with the Seventh Symphony is a heady experience. Klaus G. Roy, former program annotator for The Cleveland Orchestra, wrote, “Many a listener has come away from a hearing of this Symphony in a state of being punch-drunk. Yet it is an intoxication without a hangover, a dope-like exhilaration without decadence.” To which the composer’s own words may be added. “I am Bacchus incarnate,” boasted Beethoven, “appointed to give humanity wine to drown its sorrow.... He who divines the secret of my music is delivered from the misery that haunts the world.” © 2017 Dr. Richard E. Rodda Please visit www.FloridaOrchestra.org for our full program notes. 55


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