Sunday, May 14th, 1989
Cordier Auditorium
Robert Jones, Conductor
Overture to The Mikado | Sir Arthur Sullivan | |||
The Carnival of the Animals | Camille Saint-Saëns | |||
Introduction and March of the Royal Lion -- Hens and Cocks -- Wild Donkeys -- Tortoises -- The Elephant -- Kangaroos -- The Aquarium -- Persons With Long Ears -- The Cuckoo -- Aviary -- Pianists -- Fossils -- The Swan -- Finale |
||||
Bonnie Robinson & R. Gary Deavel, duo pianists | ||||
Pictures at an Exhibition | Modeste Mussorgsky | |||
The Great Gate of Kiev |
||||
Former MSO members
participating Vernon H. Stinebaugh, conductor |
||||
Intermission | ||||
The King's Musicians | Jean-Baptiste Lully | |||
I. Overture |
||||
Former MSO members participating | ||||
The Golden Years | Leroy Anderson | |||
Man of La Mancha | Mitch Leigh | |||
Program Notes by James R. C. Adams |
||||
Overture to The Mikado |
Sir Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) |
|||
Sullivan is best known as the other half of the Gilbert-and-Sullivan team. Although Sullivan wrote many purely musical works and a number of collaborative ones with playwrights and poets, his most lasting successes came through his collaboration with W.S. Gilbert. Sullivan was a prodigy who entered London's Royal Academy of Music at the age of fourteen, won the Mendelssohn scholarship, and went to Leipzig to study the piano with Moscheles and Plaidy, and composition and theory with Paperitz and Rietz. There were those who thought he compared very well with Brams and Tschaikowsky. Sulliven met Gilbert in 1871, and their success as a team was immediate. They both had a sense of humor that was quite spontaneous. Once, when Gilbert directed an actor to "sit down pensively," the unfortunate one sat rather ponderously, taking down a substantial part of the scenery. Gilbert remarked, "I said pensively, not ex-pensively!" Their whimsical operettas were a satirical comment on British society of the period, or, as Gilbert might have put it, "a parody of the pretentious posturing of the privileged." The Mikado is a particularly sly attack on the establishment. It is set in a wholly fictitious Japan. All the Japanese are played by Westerners dressed up in the colorful "hade" style of theatrical garb. The audience thinks it is laughing at the caricatures of the Japanese (a safe diversion in England). More knowing members of the audience can see through the exaggerated impersonations of the Japanese to the underlying criticism of their own society. The opera opens in the town of Titipu. A wandering minstrel appears, looking for his long-lost love, Yum-Yum. This minstrel, called Nanki-Poo is the son of the Mikado in disguise. He has fled the palace to avoid an arranged marriage with a hideous older woman. He finds that Koko, the Lord High Executioner of Titipu is about to marry his Yum Yum. Complications develop through which Nanki-Poo gets to marry Yum-Yum on condition that he be executed the next day. Everyone decides to pretend to have executed Nanki-Poo in order to satisfy the edict of the Mikado. When the Mikado appears unexpectedly, they first must convince him that his orders have been carried out, and the "criminal" slain. Then, once Nanki-Poo's true identity is revealed, they must convince the Mikado that they had not executed him, but had "as good as" carried out the order. It was this opera that introduced the character of Poo-Bah," Lord High Everything Else" who has gone into our folklore as the symbol of officials with too many duties vested in one person. |
||||
The Carnival of the Animals | Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) |
|||
Saint-Saëns was an extraordinarily prolific composer who worked in a surprising variety of media, including film music. Oddly enough, The Carnival of the Animals, one of his most popular compositions, was written as an occasional piece, not to be played more than once (for a Mardi Gras celebration). Saint-Saëns considered it lightweight stuff, indeed. It is certainly playful. It is in the form of a suite, each movement of which has a characterictic mood. They are as follows: 1. Introduction and Royal March of the Lions 2. Hens and Cocks 3. Wild Jackasses 4. Tortoises 5. The Elephant 6. Kangaroos 7. The Aquarium 8. Personages with Long Ears 9. The Cuckoo in the Forest 10. Aviary 11. Pianists 12. Fossils 13. The Swan 14. Finale is an exuberant romp, recapitulating some of the pieces we have heard, and involving the entire orchestra. |
||||
"The
Great Gate of Kiev" from Pictures at an Exhibition |
Modeste Mussorgsky (1839-1881) |
|||
Mussorgsky was a member of the great "Russian Five," together with Balakiref, Cui, Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakov, and as such, was a nationalist. Like them, he was strongly attracted to Russian folklore; folk songs influenced his music, and folk tales served as the literary basis for much of his work. There seem to be three attributes to Mussorgsky. Some think he was merely a gifted amateur, and put some of the peculiarities of his music down to ignorance of established procedures. Others think he did everything deliberately, but was so far ahead of his time that he was simply not understood. Still others believe that he should be admired for his originality, but his musical illiteracy must be recognized. Perhaps there is a fourth point of view: he might have been a great composer if he hadn't been an alcoholic. Tolstoy remarked that he "...liked neither talented drunks nor drunken talents." Mussorgeky's most popular work is Pictures at an Exhibition. It was written as a piano piece, but is best known in the orchestrated version by Maurice Ravel. It is a work with sufficient developmental potential as to provoke a number of people to provide their own orchestrations. In addition to the most famour one by Ravel, there were versions by Calilliet, Leonardi, Wood, Stokowski, and most recently an electronic version by Tomita. The orchestration we hear today, patterned closely after Ravel's, is by Bruno Reibold. The work is a suite of tonal "pictures" unified by a "promenade" theme, as though the composer were strolling from one picture to another. The pictures in question were all by Vladimir Hartmann, who died in 1873, and whose retrospective exhibition was attended by his intimate friend, Mussorgsky. The selection we are to hear today, "The Great Gate of Kiev," was based on an architectural drawing by Hartmann. A pageant of Russian history passes through the gate. This dramatic, richly orchestrated section provides a fitting conclusion to the suite, honoring both Hartmann and the Russian people. |
||||
The King's Musicians | Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632-1687) |
|||
Lully was born in Florence, but was taken as an adolescent to France under the sponsorship of the Chavelier de Guise. He was so adept at the violin and the dance that he came to the attention of Louis XIV, and soon became a favorite. He married well, and through great business acumen, he amassed a considerable fortune, buying much real estate near Paris. He seems to have led a life of debauchery, characteristic of much of the aristocracy of the period, and only his immense charm kept him out of serious trouble. Shortly before he died, his priest agreed to give him absolution only if he burnt a manuscript which the Church deemed offensive. Lully did so, only to reveal shortly after the priest left that he had another copy! Lully has the distinction of being the only composer known to have beaten himself to death. He was conducting his Te Deum with such enthusiasm that he banged his toe with his baton (a wooden staff, really). The injury festered, blood-poisoning developed, and Lully died. Lully was a remarkable composer who did much for the development of music at that time. He worked a great deal with Moliere, and produced music for many of his plays, most notable Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, in which he also acted. They teamed up to produce a number of mythological ballets in which Lully danced, often with Louis XIV as partner. Lully's early operas were Italianate, but soon he adopted the French manner, made it his own, and originated new procedures. He abandoned the recitativo secco in favor of recitative that was attractively accompanied. He related the music to the word much more closely, and he established the so-called French Overture, so much imitated by the Germans and the English. Unlike the rival Italian Overture, this begins slowly and ends at a fast pace. The practice was adopted by Handel for the opening of The Messiah. The King's Musicians is a suite divided into the following movements: I. Overture |
||||
The Golden Years | Leroy Anderson (1908-1975) |
|||
Leroy Anderson was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1908, and died in Woodbury, Connecticut, in 1975. He is best known for his attractive melodies and jaunty rhythms in such pieces as Sleighride and The Syncopated Clock. Anderson studied composition at Harvard with Georges Enesco and Walter Piston. He was a linguist, specializing in German and Scandinavian languages, and served with the U.S. Intelligence in Iceland and in the U.S. during the Second World War. In addition to the well-known pieces mentioned, he wrote a number of short works for unusual "instruments" such as the typewriter and sandpaper. |
||||
Man of La Mancha | Mitch Leigh (b. 1928) |
|||
Mitch Leigh was born in Brooklyn, N.Y. He studied with Paul Hindemith at Yale, and spent the early part of his career writing television and radio commercials. He then founded a company for the production of commercials. Although he has written a number of stage works, Chu Chem (1966), Cry for Us All (1970), Odyssey (1974), and Sarava (1978), the only work to receive notable success was Man of La Mancha. As practically everyone knows, the "Man" in question is Don Quixote. The musical is based on his most famous of characters of the Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes. |
||||
Manchester Symphony Orchestra Personnel |
||||
Violin Ervin Orban, Concertmaster Rosemary Manifold * Stephanie Beery Carolyn Caldwell Anita Daniel Amy Grush Linda Hare Angela Rogers Dan Seibert Vernon Stinebaugh Jon Thomas Roxanne Thomas Michael Wurzburger +^ Viola Annette Martin * Ethel Anderson Peter Collins Naida Walker Cello Waverly Berry Conlan * Betty Bueker Valerie Goetz Boud Tim Spahr Rebecca B. Waas Bass Ken Gotschall * Randy Gratz George W. Scheerer Piccolo Amy Hodson +^ Flute Maryanne C. Beery *+ Suzy Oaks + Oboe Lisa Kinsey *+^ James Nagano |
Clarinet Lila D. Hammer * Robyn Jones Bassoon Takashi Yamano * Donna Russell Horn Nancy A. Bremer * Kate Benninghoff Lois Geible Nicole Hine Trumpet Mike Clark * (co-) Steven Hammer * (co-) Stan Beery Trombone Larry Dockter * Joe Phelps William Benninghoff Tuba Mike Harkness + Timpani David Mendenhall Percussion Vic Bishop Mike Harkness + Dale E. Reynolds + * Denotes principal + Denotes MC student ^ Denotes MSS Scholarship recipient |
|||
Reunion Orchestra Personnel |
||||
Violin Marilyn Whitmore Jones (1955-58) Louise Blanchaine (1944-49) Clara Buchanan Kerns (1954-58) Virginia Coats (1946-53) Louis Durflinger (1945-65) Darlene Gall Skinner (1960-62) Viola Janet Mitchell (1969-70) Annette Martin (1954-56) Frances Mae Early Core (1956-63, 1965-68) Ethel Anderson (1953-55) Margaret Culkosky Lucas (1951-55) Cello Nancy Miller (1981-83) Helen Wales (1951-53) Flute Donna Scott Bolinger (1959-66) Lowell S. Coats (1946-53) Denise Phillips (1982-86) Patty Jones Dusenbury (1981-82) Clarinet Mark Huntington (1972-76) James Garber (1946-48) Bob Brennan (1944-47) Horn Jerry Eller (1967-71) Robert Schnar (1938-43) Eric Jones (1982-86) Trumpet Ray Goelz (1982-86) Jeff Ott (1966-68) Trombone Christopher Garber (1978-79) Gerald Miller (1939-57) Dave Voelker (1963-71) Percussion Tana Tinkey (1984-88) |
||||
![]() In 1956 he joined the faculty of Manchester College as an instructor in organ and music theory. In 1960 and 1962 he was awarded study grants from the Danforth Foundation for doctoral study at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, from which institution he received the Ph.D. degree in music theory. ![]() She served as church organist at the First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh and the Winnetka Bible Church, and currently is co-organist at the Manchester Church of the Brethren. Her teaching experience includes Suzuki instruction at the Music Center of the North Shore in Winnetka, Illinois, and the Suzuki School of Music in Pittsburgh, and the class piano instruction at Allegheny Community College. Mrs. Robinson is a native of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and is married to William P. Robinson, President of Manchester College. ![]() He organized and directed the Manchester String Festivals, which were known both statewide and nationally. The Festivals featured the appearance of such eminent conductors as Arthur Fiedler of the Boston Pops Orchestra, and Vaclav Nelhybel, known internationally as a composer and conductor. For the 25th anniversary concert, Maestro Nelhybel composed a special piece and dedicated it to "Professor Stinebaugh and the Manchester String Festivals." Professor Stinebaugh was a member of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic for twenty-three years. Since his retirement from Manchester College he has taught in the Suzuki Talent Education Program, and currently teaches violin at Grace College and serves as concertmaster of the Grace College-Community Orchestra. |