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Posted on 06/27/2014 6:00:30 PM PDT by AZamericonnie
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What makes chamber music so much fun is that behind a host of boring names lies some of the most beautiful music. A name like “Octet in F” sounds academic and boring. But tell a chamber music fan that the Seattle Chamber Music Society is programming this octet, and his eyes will bug out while he sprints to the ticket office at Benaroya Hall. Works for larger chamber ensembles aren’t performed all that often because you have a pay a larger group of musicians. So when pieces like the Mendelssohn Octet, the Schubert Octet and the Beethoven Septet are programmed, it’s a real treat.
One day in 1824, the 27 year old Franz Schubert was approached by a minor nobleman, Ferdinard Troyer, a bureaucrat and gifted clarinettist, to write “something like the Beethoven Septet, but different.” Frannie was always keen for commissions, but I suspect he may have frowned inwardly at this request.
The man who had mentored Schubert from his boyhood at the Vienna Choirboys School onward was the headmaster, Antonio Salieri. Yes, that Salieri. Frannie was one of the few boys talented enough to be allowed to study with the head honcho. Tony ran a musical gym for Frannie where he handed the boy various pieces of opera libretti and said, “Set it to music.” There was one piece set to music by Schubert that sounded so much like Pamina’s first aria from Mozart’s “Magic Flute” that Salieri told him never to do that again. Was Tony ticked at the plagiarism, or the fact that Frannie was plagiarizing Mozart?
Tony believed that everything Beethoven had written after his Second Symphony was a waste of music paper. He would yell “Grotesque!” whenever the subject of Beethoven’s mature works came up. This colored Frannie’s perception of Beethoven. The boy felt guilty about loving the Seventh Symphony, whose dactylic rhythm in the second movement so influenced his later songs. It wasn’t until Salieri’s death in 1825 that Schubert dived headfirst into Beethoven’s output, which was responsible for the amazing music of the last three years of his life. (Frannie died in 1828 at age 31 from a combination of typhoid and secondary syphilis. He was bisexual.) So for Troyer to ask for something like Beethoven, but not Beethoven, would have rankled a bit in 1824.
Schubert used Beethoven’s Septet as a model, but added an additional violin. It’s scored for two violins, viola, cello, string bass, clarinet, bassoon and (French) horn. This is the horn without valves, the so-called “natural” or hunting horn, which could be dangerously unreliable in pitch at critical moments. The octet is in the six-movement serenade format: sonata, slow ternary, scherzo, theme-and-variations, minuet and finale. What is incontrovertible is that Schubert surpassed Beethoven in this serenade.
The first movement begins with a slow introduction marked “adagio”. It sets the table and shows that Schubert is pacing you for a long, long ride. (The entire piece runs about an hour.) Stravinsky once said that it doesn’t matter if you fall asleep during a Schubert piece because when you awaken, you’re still in heaven. Frannie moves around the major and minor modes before settling you gently into the tonic key of F Major.
The opening theme, marked simply “allegro”, is sunny and uncomplicated, but at 2:50 Frannie uses a cloudy D minor bridge passage to lead into the second subject in C Major. At 5:35, the exposition repeats.
At 9:00, the short development begins, and it turns dark with the second subject worked out in the minor. It turns sunnier with a turn to the major, but most development is still concerned with the second subject.
At 11:58, the recap begins with all the subjects in the traditional tonic key, F Major. Note that in the second subject, the former clarinet passage goes to the bassoon. A short coda leads to a quick and happy end.
Best wishes for wifey, Godspeed.
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Here is a list of the songs in the Jukebox:
Artist/s - Song Names:
Humble Pie - I Wonder
Ides of March - Vehicle
James Taylor - Fire and Rain
James Taylor - You've Got A Friend
Jethro Tull - Aqualung
Jethro Tull - Living In The Past
Joe Cocker & Jeff Beck - I Who Have Nothing
Joe Cocker - Airplane
Joe Cocker - Delta Lady
Joe Cocker - Feeling Alright
Joe Cocker - The Letter
Joe Cocker - Unchain My Heart
Joe Cocker - With A Little Help From My Friends(1)
Karen Carpenter - Goodbye to Love
Led Zeppelin - Stairway To Heaven
Manhattan Transfer - The Sunny Side of the Street
Otis Redding - Mr. Pitiful
Otis Redding - Try a Little Tenderness
Procol Harum - Conquistador ( Live )
Procol Harum - Simple Sister
Rob Thomas - This Is How A Heart Breaks
Robin Trower - Bridge Of Sighs
Robin Trower - Day Of The Eagle
Robin Trower - Too Rolling Stoned ( Long Version )
Rod Stewart - I Know I'm Losing You1
Rolling Stones - Sympathy For The Devil
Sheryl Crow - A Change Will do You Good
Simon & Garnfunkel - Bridge Over Troubled Water
Stevie Wonder - Do I Do
Stevie Wonder - Maybe Your Baby
Stevie Wonder - Superstitious
The Carpenters - I Can Dream Cant I
The Eurhythmics - I Need A Man
The Eurhytmics - I Need a Man
The Guess Who - American Woman
The Marshall Tucker Band - Can't You See
The Moody Blues - Im Just a Singer in a Rock and Roll Band
The Rolling Stones - Can't You Hear Me Knockin
The Rolling Stones - Let It Bleed
The Rolling Stones - Start Me Up
The Rolling Stones - Tumbling Dice1
The Rolling Stones - You Can't Always Get What You Want
The Rolling Stones - You Cant Always Get What You Want
The Young Rascals - Peopl Got To Be Free
Tom Jones - My Way
Tower of Power - You Do The Math
Uriah Heep - Easy Livin'
War - Slipping Into Darkness
Hi Publius!
Has a whole year gone by since the last Seattle Chamber Music festival? WOW...time does fly!
Is it more frequent than once a year?
Anyway, it is good to be back home.
And back on the computer. I installed a new cable mnodem today and, WOW, it it FAST!
No prob, Boss Lady! ;-)
(((( HUGS ))))
Dude....
Thought for a minute I’d learned to read Spanish! LOL!
I'll be previewing the pieces here at FR in advance of the concerts. The day before, I'll post a link to the live broadcasts. This year, I'll be in the audience at Benaroya Hall, not at home listening on my computer.
I'm glad to see you back. I wondered where you had disappeared to.
You can go back and see where I pinged you last night to take a listen to the Saint-Saens Fantasy for Violin and Harp, and the Rachmaninov Cello Sonata. Tonight, it's the big Schubert Octet for Mixed Winds and Strings, followed by Stravinsky's little Octet for Winds.
The slow movement, marked simply “adagio”, is in B-flat Major, the subdominant key to F Major. This is a thoughtful and restful movement, not at all complicated, with an occasional dip into the minor for a taste of rue. This is outdoors music, and the piece was first performed in the back yard of a house in the Vienna suburbs. They didn’t have barbeques in those days so they settled for music instead.
The Saint and the Rock!
I’m so glad i am back on the computer!
And, so, it was February that I remember, not the festival of a year ago. That makes much more sense.
i thought i was losing my mind. LOL.
LOL
(((( HUGS ))))
Prayers for all in the canteen who have requested them.
If you’re going to listen to the Rachmaninov, make sure you have some tissues ready for the third movement.
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