F r i d a y , O c t o b e r 1 1 , 2 0 2 4 a t 7 p m U T R G V P e r f o r m i n g A r t s C o m p l e x
Tatiana Dorokhova, Piano
Islamey
Impromptu No. 1 in C minor, op. 90
Pictures at an Exhibition
Promenade
1. The Gnome
2 The Old Castle
3 Children's Quarrel after Games
4 Oxen
5 Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks
Mily Balakirev (1837-1910)
Franz Schubert (1797-1828)
Modest Mussorgsky (1839-1881)
6 “Samuel” Goldenberg and “Schmuÿle
7. The Market at Limoges
8. Catacombs (Roman Tomb) and With the dead in a Dead Language
9. Hut on Chicken Legs (Baba Yaga)
10. Great Gate of Kiev
PROGRAM NOTES
Islamey: Oriental Fantasy
Islamey is as difficult as it is joyful: a piano solo written by Russian composer Mily Balakirev in 1869 after a trip to the Caucasus It begins with an energetic dance theme created by rapidly alternating hands that showcases the percussive side of the piano Then follows a lyrical contrasting section called “Tranquillo” and “Andantino espressivo” that grows through a series of scales into a full and rapid second half of the fantasy. Its sprightly characters, drama, and “Presto furioso”, a raucous finale, are sure to delight!
Impromptu No. 1 in C minor, op. 90
A master of beautiful melodic lines, Austrian composer Franz Schubert uses them as a connecting thread between many moods, beginning with its opening funeral march. Just as in a fantasy, an impromptu provides great freedom, and Schubert mixes a sonata, variations, and freely composed music in the Impromptu No. 1 in C minor, op. 90 from 1827.
Pictures
at an Exhibition
Walking from painting to painting in a memorial exhibition, composer Modest Mussorgsky was still reeling from the loss of his friend a year earlier, the architect and painter Viktor Hartmann The 1874 exhibition in the Imperial Academy of Arts in St Petersburg, Russia boasted some 400 of Hartmann’s drawings, paintings, and designs, and it inspired an homage and testament to friendship in the form of a virtuosic pianistic showcase
PROGRAM NOTES
“Pictures at an Exhibition” is a piece in ten movements, each depicting a work the composer chose, as well as an evolving “Promenade” theme that walks the audience from canvas to canvas in a musical art gallery. Some claim to have identified the sources in surviving art works, and some of them live on only through Mussorgsky's sonic memory – all in a piece that is a concert and competition favorite. Hartmann had traveled to many places, and his artworks take us on this journey The first picture where the composer pauses is a caricature of a Gnome, perhaps a nutcracker showing large teeth Then he walks his lumbering walk on to The Old Castle, a painting of a medieval castle in Italy, where a troubadour sings a song Mussorgsky walks on to the next two paintings, one depicting children shrieking with delight and arguing in a garden of Tuileries near the Louvre in Paris.Next to this painting hangs a dreary painting of a Polish Ox pulling a cart with enormous wheels, with trodding music that begins in the low register of the piano. Moving on to the next set of art works, the Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks was a costume design for a ballet produced by the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.The sketch shows two children in egg costumes with canary headdresses. Next to the chicks hang two Hartmann paintings that Mussorgsky himself owned and had lent to the exhibition: the two contrasting portraits of Jewish men that inspired the sixth movement “Samuel” Goldenberg and “Schmuÿle”.
PROGRAM NOTES
The ultimate walk brings us to a room with four paintings: The Market at Limoges in France, where once again humans go about bustling and women discuss some ‘great news,’ The Catacombs, where perhaps the painter himself appears to tour a Roman tomb by torch light. There are two men in top hats, one with a bowler hat, and a cross and wall of skulls are bathed in an eerie orange light. The Hut on Chicken Legs, the home of the witch Baba Yaga who flies in a mortar and pestle. Hartmann created an intricate clock in the shape of her house, less threatening than its fearsome resident. Lastly, the composer ends his tour with the Great Gate of Kiev, an architectural design featuring three grandiose opulent arches, a bell tower, and stained glass windows. It was never built, but it is immortalized by his friend’s music.
Even though Mussorgsky was writing other pieces at the time, seeing his friend's oeuvre on display caused an upwelling in creativity. He wrote the memorial piece in a rush of two to three weeks!
Program Notes by Yvonne Freckmann
Artistic Liaison | Musical Bridges Around the World & The Gurwitz
OCTOBER 17, 2024
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