This July 18 performance features Noah Bendix-Baigley on violin, Jonathan Vinocour on viola, Bion Tsang on cello and George Li on piano.
Now it’s time for some fun! This is one of the great warhorses of the chamber repertory and one of its most popular pieces. Hear it once, and you’ll know why.
It starts “allegro con fuoco” in 4/4 with the strings stating the first subject in unison without harmony to provide context. The piano answers in G-flat. The strings mutter at each other as if to say, “Well, we messed that one up but good.” The piano and strings execute a buildup to the statement of the theme with harmony, and suddenly it all makes sense. You would expect the second subject to be in B-flat, but Tony chooses G Major. There is a shadow of the first subject hanging over it, and then you hear the return of the first subject and expect a repeat. But Tony doesn’t provide repeat marks, and he heads straight into development; it’s a clever bit of misdirection. Development starts in E minor but goes to C Major and then unmoors from key entirely. A wrong key recap leads to the second subject in the correct key of E-flat. The coda is symphonic in scope but slows down to a “poco sostenuto e tranquillo” passage with tremelo string playing that speeds up and rushes to a glorious finish.
The second movement, marked “lento” in 4/4, is in G-flat, the key hinted at earlier. It’s in ternary format: A-B-A. The “A” section is one of those love songs in the Czech style that only Tony could write. But the “B” section turns dark in C# minor, a cry from the heart. The storm passes, and calmness returns in D-flat. The “A” section returns, but the “B” section also returns, in much shortened form, in F# minor. The final statement of the “A” section and its coda may make your screen go blurry.
The dance movement is marked “allegro moderato grazioso” in 3/4 and E-flat. It’s not really a scherzo, but something more akin to a waltz. The second part of the melody sounds like an Eastern European pentatonic folk tune. The piano imitates a cembalom, a Hungarian string instrument that looks a bit like a zither. The “trio” section turns to the remote key of B Major, marked “un pochettino piu mosso” for a quick round dance. The return to E-flat is abrupt for a return to the waltz.
You would expect the finale to be in E-flat Major, but Tony throws a curve and starts it in E-flat minor. It’s marked “allegro ma non troppo” in 2/2. It’s in sonata format, and the second subject in G-flat is just magnificent. The third subject is in D Major. He liquidates this subject with a passage that will make your screen go blurry; it just breaks your heart. The exposition is repeated; it’s so good that you have to hear it twice! The development section lacks a key signature, not because it’s in C Major or A minor, but because Dvorak doesn’t want a little thing like a key signature to get in the way of what he is about to do. He shifts from key to key a few bars at a time, and he builds up to a re-composed recap with a hair-raising passage. But this time the second subject is in the correct key of E-flat, so you have the sense of homecoming. So is the third subject. The coda is one of the most amazing things he ever wrote.
The audience in this video went wild before they even got to the end. Bad concert manners, but one hell of a performance.
Tomorrow night, it’s Bartok and Prokofiev.
Ditto.