Third Concert of the 63rd Season

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
This begins with piano trills, steadily growing faster, and culminating with a piano fanfare, appropriately pompous for a lion. Then the regal march begins, with the pianos making runs like lion-roars. The strings take over the roars to the accompaniment of oriental tinkling on the pianos. Finally, the pianos resume the "roars."

2. Hens and Cocks
This is very "imitative," with the unmistakable pecking of the hens and the cock-a-doodle-do of the roosters.

3. Wild Jackasses
Here there is wild scampering of the pianos up and down the scales, forming a striking contrast with what is to follow.

4. Tortoises
Here is the first of many quotations from other composers. Saint-Saëns has taken the lively Can-can from Jacques Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld and turned it into a ponderous melody suitable for the tortoise.

5. The Elephant
A similar joke has been played on Berlioz, as his delicate Dance of the Sylphes has been slowed, and given over to the double-basses for the dance of the elephants.

6. Kangaroos
Kangaroos is a piece for the pianos alone. The springy bounce of the animals is perfectly suggested.

7. The Aquarium
Here, the sinuous gliding of the silvery fish through shimmering water is suggested by piano arpeggios and tinkling cascades of the piano, aided by the xylophone.

8. Personages with Long Ears
We immediately hear the braying of the donkeys, a sly jab at Saint-Saëns' detractors.

9. The Cuckoo in the Forest
There is a slow, deliberate series of piano chords recalling Gregorian Chant, but which may be intended to suggest the swing of a pendulum. The clarinet plays the role of the cuckoo.

10. Aviary
Rapid flutterings of the flutes cleverly evoke the twittering of birds.

11. Pianists
All piano students and their parents will recognize the monotonous running of scales in different keys.

12. Fossils
The "fossils" here are the old war-horses trotted out for every summer concert at the town park. Works of several well-known composers are parodied. The first is a parody of Saint-Saëns' own work, Danse Macabre, about skeletons dancing in the graveyard. The xylophone plays the role of the dancing bones there, as well as here, the bony "fossils" being the old tunes.

After parodying his own music, Saint-Saëns turns his attention to a series of well-known French folk-songs. The first is J'ai du bon tabac ...The second is Ah Vous dirai je Maman ... The third is Au clair de la Lune ... The fourth, Going to Syria ..., and the last, a reference to The Barber of Seville, by Rossini.

13. The Swan
This is the only section Saint-Saëns allowed to be played during his lifetime, after the initial performance. It has become a favorite of cello performers.

14. Finale is an exuberant romp, recapitulating some of the pieces we have heard, and involving the entire orchestra.

The art coordination for this performance was done by James Adams, using drawings by Alison Adams. Ms. Adams was born in England, and is not living in New Haven, Ind. She has works in collections both here and abroad, including a sculpture at the gates of West Point Military Academy.

Sir William Walton (knighted in 1951 for his achievements in music) was largely self-taught. He was not a prolific composer, but his music covers a wide range of styles and forms. He wrote two symphonies, an oratorio, an opera, concertos for viola, violin, cello, a Sinfornia Concertante for piano and orchestra, several ballets, overtures, suites, and a good deal of film music, most notably for Henry V, Richard II, and Hamlet. During the '20s, he became friendly with the Sitwells, and wrote music inspired by their words (Belshazzar's Feast and Façade). It was this latter, a parodic suite to accompany poetry spoken through a mask, that made him famous, or perhaps notorious, depending on your view. Some of his supporters are embarassed by his early music, typified by Façade, thinking of it as the work of a youth seduced by the cynicism of the age. They prefer the more serious music of the viola concerto or Belshazzar's Feast.

Others admire the early work, likening Walton to Eric Satie, and they are apt to criticize such works as Belshazzar as "theatrical" or "pompous."

The work heard today shows Walton's lighter side. Music for Children is a short work, showing great wit. It is a suite of ten pieces, eminintly danceable, in the tradition of the suites of Rameau or Bach, though not in that style.

I. The Music Lesson is a quiet, wistful piece, featuring the oboe, and reminding us of a child running scales while daydreaming of other things.

II. The Three-legged Race is a sprightly dance showing off the choirs of the orchestra successively: winds (with horns), strings, and percussion.

III. The Silent Lake is a slow, pastoral piece reminding us of Sibelius and featuring muted violas.

IV. Pony Trap is a fast, prancing sort of piece with pizzicato (plucked) strings and flashy trumpets.

V. Swing-boats is a slow dance, almost a jig, if you can imagine a slow jig. The tuba is stressed.

VI. Puppet's Dance is quiet, but sprightly, featuring oboe and strings.

VII. Song at Dusk is slow and melancholy, recalling Grieg.

VIII. Hop-scotch is a fast, syncopated piece.

IX. Ghosts is a soft, mysterious piece suggesting a game of hide-and-seek.

X. Trumpet Tune is a lively march, with fanfares, turning into a Russian dance.

Mozart wrote this Sinfonia Concertante at the age of 22, while he was residing in Paris, where he had gone for professional reasons, expecting to receive many commissions. His stay there proved less rewarding than he had hoped, and he did not think much of the French audiences. He didn't like the French language, which he considered unsuitable for singing. "...they do not sing, they shriek and howl and all from the nose and throat...." He hoped to write an opera, but was afraid that if it had "the bad luck not to please the stupid French," all would be lost, and his reputation would suffer. He was very uncharitable to Voltaire, and gloated over his death. In a letter to his father, Mozart wrote "Now I give you a piece of news which perhaps you know already -- namely, that the godless, arch-scoundrel Voltaire is dead, like a dog, like a beast -- that is his reward."

In spite of his Francophobia, which we may consider a character flaw, Mozart was intensely spiritual. He was born Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgang Gottlieb Mozart. "Gottlieb" means "God-lover." The baptismal entry read Theophilus instead of Gottlieb, Theophilus being the Greek form of God-lover. After 1770, Mozart always signed his name Wolfgang Amadeus (Latin for God-lover) Mozart. It was his choice. Throughout his life he railed against the godless ones. His family was Catholic. Mozart may or may not have been: He was a Freemason, and incorporated mystical references in several of his works, most obviously in his opera Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute), so we know at least that he was a believer, if not a conventional one. It is also argued that his membership in the Masonic order was economically based, since the intellectuals of Vienna were members, and it was smart to court such people.

"What is a sinfonia concertante?", you may ask. It has a brief career as a remnant of the Baroque Concerto Grosso, which involved a small group of instruments playing against a larger group, and was the precursor of the modern "concerto." It usually has three movements (as in this case) and incorporates elements of the symphony, frequently using the sonata form. But there is an oddity here: all three movements are in the same key. That is not characteristic of Mozart, and lends weight to the argument that this work is NOT by Mozart!

When he was in Paris, he had several friends from his days in Mannheim, who were excellent wind-players. They played the flute, the oboe, the bassoon, and the horn. Mozart wrote to his father that he was writing a sinfonia concertante for them, on commission from one Joseph le Gros, but that he was unhappy with le Gros' treatment of the work, failing to arrange a performance of it, and refusing to return the manuscript. Mozart wrote to his father that he would write it again from memory. There is no certain evidence that he did, and the work for flute was never found. Some authorities think this is that work, rewritten for the clarinet instead of the flute. We have no manuscript in Mozart's hand for this work. It dates back to a copy made in the lat 19th century. If it wasn't by Mozart, it was by someone pretty good!