Written by Anna Vorhes
Born
March 25, 1881, Nagyszentmiklós, Transylvania, Hungary (now Sînnicolau Mar, Romania)
Died
September 26, 1945, New York
Instrumentation
3 flutes (piccolo), 3 oboes (English horn), 3 clarinets (bass clarinet), 3 bassoons (contrabassoon), 4 horns, 3 trumpets (4th ad lib), 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, side drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, 2 harps and strings
Duration
40 minutes
Composed
Between August 8 and October 8, 1943, commissioned by Serge Koussevitzky
World Premiere
December 1 and 2, 1944, Boston Symphony Orchestra with Koussevitzky conducting. Audience reception was so good that it was repeated in Boston on December 29 and 30, and performed in Carnegie Hall in New York on January 10 and 13, 1945
Something interesting to listen for
Concerto is a term most concertgoers know that applies to a soloist accompanied by an orchestra. There is a rich history of concerti from Baroque works which offer a conversation between the soli group of soloist and continuo (low melody and chord playing instruments) and the tutti full orchestra to the more soloistic Classical era concerti where the soloist often dominates the solo sections and on to the virtuosic concerti of the Romantic era when the soloist becomes the hero. So why do we not find a soloist here? Instead, the whole orchestra becomes the focus of our listening. First there is the idea that there is a conversation within the orchestra from section to section or from instrument to instrument. Then there is the idea that each player in Bartók’s work is worthy of being the soloist of the evening. This is especially evident for the winds in the second movement where pairs of winds take our attention with their skills. What kinds of skills are universally challenging across the orchestra? Large leaps between pitches and lines that go from very low to very high in the range of a particular instrument are a challenge to almost all instruments. Changing and complex rhythms that fit seamlessly with other instruments are a hallmark of 20th Century music, and this work offers that throughout. Today it might sound a little tame, but at the time it was very innovative. The extreme dynamic range and the constant changes necessary to make this work communicate well require constant attention. The best thing to listen for is the incredible skills of the musicians of the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra. This orchestra has built an ensemble capable of transforming an abstract score like Bartók’s into music that will capture your attention and your emotions.
Program Notes
Béla Bartók is known by musicians for his work in collecting recordings of folk music with the newly invented wax discs and for his subsequent work in discussing the distinctions that make Hungarian music different from other folk musics. He is considered the father of ethnomusicology, a field that has grown for more than a century. This always starts a discussion about whether his serious compositions quote from his work in folk music. In his Concerto for Orchestra there is one quote from Hungarian music that was not Bartók’s own work. Rather than being folk music, the lyric melody in the fourth movement is “You are lovely, you are beautiful, Hungary” borrowed from an operetta by Zsigmond Vincze.
Perhaps the best way to think about how folk music affects composers who are immersed in preserving it and in performing it is to remember that music is a language. It is not the same language as the culture who produced the language or music, but it affects people who understand it deeply the same way. You might have experienced the same effect if you are bilingual. If you learned the second language as someone fluent in your home language you may remember when you suddenly found phrases only work well in one language or the other. Rather than quoting, the nationalistic composers are using the musical language of their homeland to create something new, just as you would create a speech in one language or the other using the syntax of the language you are currently speaking.
Concerto for Orchestra was the culmination of a number of events over a few years at the end of Bartók’s life. The beginning of the path was in Hungary as Hitler began his quest to take over Europe. The composer was aware that it would be difficult and dangerous to stay in Hungary if the Nazi regime came to power. He and his wife pianist Dita Pásztory toured the United States with great success. He sent his scores to Switzerland, on to London and finally to New York where they are safe in the Bartók library today. He felt unable to leave until his elderly mother died, but after she did in 1939 the family became more urgent, finally moving to the United States in October 1940. Unfortunately making a living was harder than expected as attention had become distracted from the arts in wartime. In addition the beginning stages of leukemia were probably at work in the composer’s body.
By 1943 the composer was heartbroken about his prospects and becoming increasingly ill. He was popular and well-known enough that ASCAP (The Association of Composers and Producers) underwrote three summers at a sanitarium in upstate New York, at Saranac Lake. Two of his friends, wanting to provide him with work and with a chance to be heard, went to Serge Koussevitsky and asked the conductor to offer a commission to Bartók. They knew that the composer would not accept an outright gift.
Koussevitsky was delighted to cooperate, and Bartók started the work immediately. The composition was ready to be premiered in December 1944, and over the next couple years was played by various orchestras 48 times. Unfortunately, the composer had no more strength, only writing two additional works before his death due to leukemia in September 1945.
Bartók provided us with brief program notes for this work:
“The title of this symphony-like orchestral work is explained by its tendency to treat the simple orchestral instruments in a concertante or soloistic manner. The ‘virtuoso’ treatment appears, for instance, in the fugato section of the development of the first movement (brass instruments) or in the perpetuum mobile like passages of the principal theme of the last movement (strings) and especially in the second movement, in which pairs of instruments consecutively appear with brilliant passages.
The general mood of this work represents, apart from the jesting second movement, a gradual transition from the sternness of the first movement and the lugubrious death song of the third, to the life-assertion of the last one.”
There are five movements of this work constructed in an arch form. The first and last movements are loosely constructed sonata form. The second and fourth movements are playful scherzos, and the middle third movement is a ponderous elegy.
The first movement is Introduzione. You’ll hear the second theme of the sonata form in the oboe part, and the development features a fugato for the brass. The second movement is (Game of Pairs). This fun music offers pairs of winds playing in set intervals, including the final game Giuco delle Coppie with the trumpets in seconds, one of the most dissonant of the intervals in music. A chorale interrupts things but finally the game continues.
The third movement Elegia quotes music from the opening. It is heavy as expected with an elegy. It ends with a timpani and piccolo duet.
The fourth movement, Intermezzo interrotto (Interrupted intermezzo) includes some interesting things. It opens with the musical language of Eastern Europe. The movement is interrupted by a reference to Shostakovich’s 7th symphony, with the obnoxious march, here in the clarinet. We don’t know if Bartók’s dislike of Shostakovich 7 fueled this quotation or if it was a mutual dislike of the Nazi regime. We do know our composer was not a fan of the Russian. The lyric melody of this movement that is interrupted by the march quote is actually a piece Bartok borrows from an operetta and presents in an emotional tribute to his own homeland.
The Finale is fittingly exuberant and offers many moments of virtuosity in the orchestra. It is little wonder this is a favorite work of audiences and performers alike.