CONCERT SPONSOR
MOZART & HAYDN
Music for Paris & Oxford
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 6, 2025 / 8:00 PM / ST. MARY’S CATHOLIC CHURCH
TAICHI FUKUMURA, conductor UTAH SYMPHONY
STRAVINSKY
Concerto in E-flat major for Chamber Orchestra, “Dumbarton Oaks” (15’)
I. Tempo giusto
II. Allegretto
III. Con moto
MOZART
Symphony No. 31 in D major, “Paris” (16’)
I. Allegro assai
II. Andantino
III. Allegro
INTERMISSION
HAYDN
Symphony No. 92 in G major, “Oxford” (28’)
I. Adagio - Allegro spiritoso
II. Adagio cantabile
III. Menuetto: Allegretto
IV. Presto
ARTIST’S PROFILE — MOZART & HAYDN
Taichi Fukumura Conductor
Taichi Fukumura is the Music Director of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra and the newly-appointed Assistant Conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra. A rising Japanese-American conductor acclaimed for his dynamic stage presence and musical finesse, Fukumura is the Second Prize Winner of The Mahler Competition 2023 and a four-time recipient of the Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award 2021-2024.
Recent and upcoming highlights include guest conducting debuts with the Bamberg Symphony, Utah Symphony, North Carolina Symphony, Eugene Symphony, Delaware Symphony, and Colorado Springs Philharmonic. He also returned to the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra as guest conductor after leading the orchestra in over 110 concerts as Assistant Conductor under Music Director Robert Spano.
Other notable appearances include guest conducting members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra in their Community Chamber Concert series, leading Stravinsky’s L’Histoire du Soldat. Fukumura was invited by the Berlin Philharmonic as one of 10 assistant conductor candidates for Kirill Petrenko and the Siemens Conductors Scholarship in 2021.
HISTORY OF THE MUSIC — MOZART & HAYDN
By Ruth Eldredge
Concerto in E-flat major for Chamber Orchestra, “Dumbarton Oaks”
// Flute, clarinet, bassoon, 2 horns, and strings //
The History
Stravinsky’s Concerto in E-flat major received its nickname, “Dumbarton Oaks,” in homage to heiress Mildred Barnes Bliss and her husband Robert Bliss. The couple commissioned the concerto in honor of their 30th wedding anniversary. It premiered in May 1938 at Dumbarton Oaks, their estate in Washington, D.C. Stravinsky had planned to conduct the premiere himself, but he fell ill with tuberculosis. From his hospital bed, he entrusted the premiere to famed composer and teacher Nadia Boulanger.
Performed without pauses, the three-movement concerto demonstrates Stravinsky’s so-called ‘neoclassical’ phase, a term that Stravinsky himself used in its broadest possible meanings: many of his neoclassical works took themes from the Classical era of Greek and Roman mythology. Musically, however, Stravinsky took ‘neoclassical’ to mean anything that pre-dated the opaque, even over-wrought, textures of the late nineteenth-century Romantics and Expressionists. Most often, Stravinsky looked to the Baroque and (confusingly-named) Classical eras of Bach and Mozart. He was attracted to the transparent textures, controlled harmonies, and a more dispassionate, less emotionally-charged, approach to musical form and style.
“Dumbarton Oaks” bears out the extent of Stravinsky’s willingness to borrow, steal, and iterate musical ideas. This concerto is indebted to Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos. Stravinsky reported that “I played Bach regularly during the composition of the Concerto, and was greatly attracted to the Brandenburg Concertos.” The first movement in particular borrows the driving rhythms and small-orchestra instrumentation from the Baroque era. It also quotes J.S. Bach’s Third Brandenburg Concerto in the first four measures of the viola line, even though Stravinsky claimed that he didn’t know if this was deliberate or not.
Stravinsky’s gift for orchestral sound is also apparent: the woodwinds sparkle with bright tones and clear lines, while the strings are characteristically warm and lush, much like they do in Stravinsky’s earlier ballet scores. Each instrument also has a solo section somewhere in
the piece—a testament to Stravinsky’s fascination with instrumental tone and ability to wrangle roundabout musical structures into a tightly-crafted and ultimately timeless piece. One might also hear a hint of Aaron Copland-like harmonies in the first movement—Copland was one of Stravinsky’s many admirers.
Symphony No. 31, “Paris”
// 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings //
The History
1778 was a monumental year for Mozart, though not in ways he likely would have appreciated. Already recognized as a master of his craft, Mozart was nonetheless in need of a ‘grown-up’ job. At 22 years old, he and his sister Nannerl had aged out of the sibling-child-prodigy act that had supported their family in previous decades, but his parents had also determined he was unprepared to travel on his own, and perhaps too hot-headed to seek work by himself. As a result, in May 1778, Mozart travelled to Paris with his mother, Anna Maria, in search of publicity and new commissions.
Unlike his first trip there as a child, this sojourn was an unmitigated disaster and psychological turning point for the young celebrity. The trip ultimately failed to produce a significant commission or position for the young composer, but by the end, this was completely overshadowed by Anna Maria’s unexpected death on July 3, after a brief illness. In shock and not known for his organizational abilities on his best days, Mozart was left alone to make burial arrangements for his mother in a foreign city. Even more, his father Leopold wrote Wolfgang a scathing letter accusing him of matricide, having murdered his mother with his inattention and selfish preoccupation. This—like other myths about Mozart—is certainly an overstatement, but the fact remained that on the day of his mother’s death, Mozart wrote an extended letter to his father about the success of his new symphony and only announced her death to his family in Austria six days later. The young Mozart might be forgiven for fearing to share the news with his father, and Leopold might be forgiven for misunderstanding his son’s grief.
Given this tragic loss, the “Paris” symphony is a bright spot born of an otherwise dark landscape. The symphony itself came about from a public insult that, on its own, nearly derailed his entire endeavor. Mozart had secured a
HISTORY OF THE MUSIC —MOZART & HAYDN
performance of a Sinfonia Concertante (the music of which has not been found) at the prestigious Concert Spirituele series in the center of Paris in late May or early June. However, at the last minute, Parisian composer Giuseppe Cambini convinced the concert producer to cancel Mozart’s piece and insert one of Cambini’s pieces instead.
Mozart’s accusation that Cambini deliberately sabotaged his performance is credible, if not verifiable. Regardless, the producer commissioned Mozart with a new symphony by way of apology and thus the “Paris” symphony was born. The only catch was that it needed to be written, copied by hand, and rehearsed in a matter of days. This was not an unprecedented challenge in light of Mozart’s speedy compositional process, but it was still a logistical feat in itself.
True to its name, the “Paris” symphony was written and premiered in Paris; it also features several nods to Parisian symphonic culture. One such element, the Premier coup d’archet, requires the entire orchestra to play together at the start of a piece. This can be heard in the first few bars, in which all of the instruments play repeated D major chords. (Contrast this with Haydn’s “Oxford” symphony, also originally written for a Parisian audience, that spoofs on this convention by playing similar chords quietly, slowly, and only with the string instruments.)
into ‘eras’ or ‘periods’ to organize our concept of the past. On the one hand, labelling music with names like Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and Modern helps us organize the past: we can identify new musical trends, identify innovative pieces, and come up with a bird’s eye view of musical evolution over time. On the other hand, composers like Haydn, who sit between periods or just don’t fit into the norm, are often overlooked or misunderstood. Haydn has even been labeled as ‘transitional’ because his music has elements of the Baroque and Classical eras, but the implication has often been that his music was simply a means to a greater end.
In reality, Haydn’s 104 symphonies are a treasure chest of musical delight and new ideas. And while it’s true that without Haydn we wouldn’t have Mozart, Beethoven, or Schubert, it’s also true that without Haydn we wouldn’t have, well, Haydn. Even Mozart himself thought so: despite a 24-year age gap, the two were close friends, and though Mozart never formally studied with Haydn, he regularly referred to Haydn as his teacher.
Symphony No. 92 in G major, “Oxford”
// Flute, 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani and strings //
The History
Franz Joseph Haydn may well be classical music’s most underrated composer. Born in 1732, Haydn technically belongs to the Classical period (roughly 1750 to 1820), but most music history books nonetheless point to Mozart as the pinnacle of the era, with his memorable melodies, expansion of the symphonic form, and refined sense of orchestral sound.
Historically speaking, Haydn is often a victim of historical periodization—a method scholars use to divide the past
It’s also true that Haydn’s “Oxford” symphony sits comfortably between Baroque style and Classical expectations, even if Haydn’s music was the precedent on which those expectations were built. For example, rather than building on a memorable, even singable melody often associated with Mozart symphonies, each of the “Oxford” symphony’s four movements are based on motives—small melodic building blocks that can be divided, recombined, and even turned upside-down and backwards. Motivic writing means that Haydn could work out an entire symphony based on just one or two small musical ideas— an incredibly efficient use of material.
The practical result of this approach is that you might not leave the concert whistling a memorable Haydn tune; it’s more likely you’ll remember a mood, an expressive gesture, that the music created in the moment of listening. That said: Haydn often repeated himself. In this symphony, listen for three repeated block chords, like knocking on a door, at the very beginning and end of the symphony. Ultimately, Haydn’s music stands on its own merits: if you find yourself smiling at the end, even if you don’t quite know why, then you’ve certainly caught ‘Papa’ Haydn’s message.