Program Notes
CARL MARIA VON WEBER
OVERTURE TO OBERON
Duration: ca. 9 minutes
Oberon, Weber’s last opera (he died in London at age
39 six weeks after conducting the premiere), has some
glorious music bound into an improbable English-language
libretto written to allow for the greatest possible theatrical
spectacle, with hardly a shred of character explication or
dramatic veracity — “the merest twaddle for regulating
the operations of scene-shifters,” according to Sir Donald
Tovey. “Its plot,” wrote Sigmund Spaeth, “tells of the quarrel
between Oberon and Titania, the fairy king and queen, who
will not speak to each other until a pair of faithful lovers
has been found. Oberon’s sprightly little errand-boy, Puck,
finds the necessary couple in Huon of Bordeaux, a knight
of the court of Charlemagne, and Rezia, daughter of the
calif of Baghdad, Haroun al Raschid. On their way home
from Baghdad, the lovers are shipwrecked and captured by
pirates, who sell Rezia to the Emir of Tunis and Huon to his
wife, Roxanna. Each resists the temptation to infidelity, and
when they are condemned to death by fire, Huon blows upon
the magic horn of Oberon, which magically transports them
to the court of Charlemagne, where all ends happily, with a
reconciliation between Titania and her husband.” Weber’s
splendid Overture, cast in traditional sonata form, is based
on themes from the opera.
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
CONCERTO NO. 1 FOR PIANO IN C MAJOR,
OP. 15
Duration: ca. 36 minutes
Overview
“His genius, his magnetic personality were acknowledged by
all, and there was, besides, a gaiety and animation about the
young Beethoven that people found immensely attractive.
The troubles of boyhood were behind him: his father had
died very shortly after his departure from Bonn in 1792, and
by 1795 his brothers were established in Vienna, Caspar Karl
as a musician, Johann as an apothecary. During his first few
months in the capital, he had indeed been desperately poor,
depending very largely on the small salary allowed him by
THE FLORIDA OR 38 CHESTRA | 2017-2018
the Elector of Bonn. But that was all over now. He had no
responsibilities, and his music was bringing in enough to
keep him in something like affluence. He had a servant, for
a short time he even had a horse; he bought smart clothes,
he learned to dance (though not with much success), and
there is even mention of his wearing a wig! We must not
allow our picture of the later Beethoven to throw its dark
colors over these years of his early triumphs. He was a young
giant exulting in his strength and his success, and a youthful
confidence gave him a buoyancy that was both attractive
and infectious. Even in 1791, before he left Bonn, Carl Junker
could describe him as ‘this amiable, lighthearted man.’ And
in Vienna he had much to raise his spirits and nothing (at
first) to depress them.”
Peter Latham painted this cheerful picture of the young
Beethoven as Vienna knew him during his twenties, the years
before his deafness, his recurring illnesses and his titanic
struggles with his mature compositions had produced the
familiar, dour figure of his later years. Beethoven came to
Vienna for good in 1792, having made an unsuccessful foray
in 1787, and quickly attracted attention for his piano playing,
at which he bested such local keyboard luminaries as Daniel
Steibelt and Joseph Wölffl to become the rage of the musicmad
Austrian capital. His appeal was in an almost untamed,
passionate, novel quality in both his manner of performance
and his personality, characteristics that first intrigued and
then captivated those who heard him. Václav Tomášek, an
important Czech composer who heard Beethoven play the C
major Concerto in Prague in 1798, wrote, “His grand style of
playing had an extraordinary effect on me. I felt so shaken
that for several days I could not bring myself to touch the
piano.”
Beethoven composed the first four of his five mature piano
concertos for his own concerts. (Two juvenile essays in the
genre are discounted in the numbering.) Both the Concerto
No. 1 in C major and the Concerto No. 2 in B-flat major were
composed in 1795, the Second probably premiered at the
Burgtheater on March 29th and the First at a concert under
Joseph Haydn’s direction on December 18th; both works
were revised before publication in 1801. Beethoven’s C
major Concerto sprang from the rich Viennese musical
tradition of Haydn and Mozart, with which he was intimately
acquainted: he had taken some composition lessons with